My finger froze over the keyboard.
There it was. Sophie sat at the dinner table, her hand moving casually to her lap, then back to her plate. Nothing unusual—except for the slight change in the angle of her wrist, the barely perceptible shift in her shoulder.
I rewound. Played it again at half speed.
"Fuck."
She'd taken a knife. Right under my nose. I'd missed it completely.
I leaned back in my chair, a cold feeling settling in my gut. If I'd missed this, what else had I missed? Had her compliance been genuine, or had she been playing me this entire time? Calculating, waiting, planning?
The Sophie I thought I knew—the defiant but ultimately trapped woman—dissolved before my eyes. In her place stood someone far more dangerous: a strategist who'd been three steps ahead of me from the beginning.
The intercom buzzed. Enzo's voice filled the room. "Boss, Antonio's men were spotted near the south perimeter again."
"Double the guard rotation. No one gets within a mile of this property."
"Yes, boss."
I closed the surveillance program and stood, straightening my cuffs. It was time for a different kind of confrontation.
I found her in the garden, reading beneath the oak tree. Sunlight filtered through the leaves, dappling her red hair with gold. For a moment, I simply watched her—this woman who'd upended my carefully controlled world.
"You took a knife," I said, stepping into her line of sight.
She didn't startle. Didn't even look up from her book. "I took two, actually."
That caught me off guard. "Two?"
Now, she looked up, green eyes challenging. "You saw me take them."
"I should have been watching more carefully."
A flash of surprise crossed her face—genuine surprise—before she masked it. "Took you long enough to notice."
I moved closer, standing over her. "Where are they?"
"Where you'll never find them." She closed her book, setting it aside. "Unless you plan to strip search me."
The memory of her body pressed against mine flashed unbidden through my mind. I pushed it away.
"Why?" I asked.
"Why what?"
"Why do it if you never intend to use them?"
She stood, brushing off her dress. Even in bare feet, she held herself like a queen. "Who says I never intend to use them?"
"You've had ample opportunity."
"Maybe I'm waiting for the right moment."
"Or maybe," I said, stepping closer, "you just wanted to feel like you had a choice."
Her eyes widened fractionally. I'd hit a nerve.
"You don't know anything about what I want."
