“You’re the product designer, aren’t you?”
I look up.
The man in front of me is tall and striking, with a beauty that makes your brain go momentarily offline. Sharp cheekbones. Pale eyes. A smile that looks friendly the way a cat looks friendly right before it decides your hand is a toy.
Caro.
I know it before I register the tells: the particular stillness, the faint porcelain quality of his skin, the way his gaze lingers on the pulse point at my throat for a fraction of a second longer than is polite.
“I work in the product development division, yes,” I say. Friendly. Professional.
“Your presentation on the V-Series was impressive.” He takes a step closer. A small step, but the space gets significantly smaller. “You have a real gift for making complex things accessible.”
“Thank you. It’s really about understanding what the end user—”
“I don’t often meet humans who understand our world as well as you seem to.” Another step. His smile widens, and I catch the barest glint of something sharp behind his lips that makes my pulse skip for reasons that have nothing to do with attraction. “Perhaps we could discuss your work further. Over dinner.”
His gaze drops to my throat again, lingering this time, and a chill races down my spine that has nothing to do with the air conditioning. Because I’ve read enough about Caros to know that when one looks at you like that, at the pulse beating under your skin, it isn’t just interest.
It’s appetite.
And I’m alone, and human, and standing in a gap between booths where the crowd has thinned, and for the first time all day, I feel the full weight of what it means to exist in a world that was not designed for people like me.
I open my mouth to respond, to say what, I have no idea, something politely deflective and slightly panicked, when a hand settles on the small of my back.
Warm. Large. Unmistakably deliberate.
Every thought I’ve been having evaporates.
“Miss Morgan.” Alexei’s voice comes from beside me, and it’s the same as always, cool, measured, but there’s an edge beneath it that I’ve never heard before. One that makes the Caro in front of me go very, very still. “We’re needed at the next appointment.”
He doesn’t let go.
His fingers spread slightly, the pressure increasing just enough that I can feel the heat of his palm through the fabric of the dress Ruby chose for me. It isn’t a grip. It’s a claim. Quiet, absolute, and completely unambiguous to everyone in the vicinity who has the supernatural senses to read it.
The Caro’s eyes shift from me to Alexei, and whatever he sees in the prince’s expression makes him incline his head, and just like that, he’s gone, dissolved into the crowd.
Alexei doesn’t break stride. The touch stays, guiding me smoothly, firmly, away from the display, away from the crowd, toward the corridor that leads to the private suites. His pace is even, unhurried as always, but there’s a difference in how he’smoving. Coiled. Like the stillness that precedes a storm, if the storm were six-foot-something of Atlantean royalty in a dark suit steering a twenty-two-year-old human through a trade fair with his palm on her spine.
“Y-Your Highness—”
My voice comes out in a stammered whisper. His palm is warm against my spine and my pulse is doing things that would concern a medical professional.
“This is...this isn’t appropriate.”
“No.” His voice is silk over steel. “It’s not.”
“I’m working for you—”
“Yes.” His pace doesn’t falter. Neither does the pressure at my back. “But I’m also about to marry you.”
I stop walking.
Like, just stop. My feet cease to function. My legs forget their entire purpose. If I were a computer, there would be a spinning wheel on my forehead and a message that saysZia.exe has encountered an error and needs to shut down.
“I...what?”
He turns to face me. He lets go, finally, but the ghost of it stays, burning against my spine.
