I turn away, facing the glass. The city lights are blooming now, an ocean of artificial stars. Somewhere down there, Viktor is screaming. In this building, Boris is making phone calls.
And somewhere in my house, a traitor is painting a target on Maksim's back.
I hear the shift of fabric. Maksim is preparing to leave. The elevator is waiting. The hallway to the staff quarters is long and full of blind spots.
"No."
Maksim freezes.
He doesn't ask. His body realigns to the new reality instantly.
"Not tonight." I turn back to him. The air between us is thin, charged. "You don't leave this room."
Recognition flashes in his eyes. Not surprise—preparedness. He glances at the door, then back to me.
"The chair," I say, nodding to the leather wingback near the entrance. "Lock the door first. Then you sleep there."
Maksim moves. The deadbolt slides home with a heavy, finalthud. He drags the chair, angling it to cover both the entrance and the window. He sits.
He asks no questions.
The room feels sealed now. A vacuum. Just us, the glass, and the drop.
"The safehouse on Ashland," Maksim says into the dark. His voice is rough, stripping gears. "I wasn't told about the location."
I look at him. The man I created. The weapon I honed. He looks at me with anything but obedience.
It's fear. For me.
"I know," I say.
Maksim holds my gaze. He is an anchor.
My phone buzzes against the table, cutting through the quiet room.
One message. Alexei.
Viktor gave names. One is blood.
I read it. I read it again. The letters blur into white noise.
My hand stays on the phone. I glance at Maksim, sitting in the chair, guarding a door that can't keep the danger out because the danger is already inside.
The screen glows, casting long shadows across the floor.
I don't put it down.
2
MAKSIM
The clickof the deadbolt sits in the base of my skull.
It happened hours ago—long enough for the mechanical snap to stop being a sound and turn into a physical weight. I stopped tracking the minutes when Ivan's breathing changed—from the shallow, controlled rhythm of a man anticipating a threat to the heavy, dragging cadence of actual sleep.
Now the penthouse is just a box of glass and silence. The HVAC system pushes recycled air through the vents, a low hum that vibrates in the floorboards. The wind off Lake Michigan leans against the sixty-story glass, making the tower's steel skeleton groan.
I sit in the wingback chair by the door. The leather is cold against my spine. I've angled the chair to cover both the primary entrance and the panoramic wall of windows—a single field of fire for both threats.
