“Have you made any inquiries about the gallery?” I ask, tilting my head to catch her gaze.
She smiles, eyes bright. “Already talking to people. Feels…real. Like it’s actually going to happen.”
I brush a strand of hair from her face. “Then I’ll back you in whatever you want to do. Every step. Every decision.”
She opens her mouth to reply, but a soft rumble interrupts her.
I pull back slightly, arching an eyebrow. “Why didn’t you eat?”
She hesitates, cheeks coloring. “I…was waiting for you.”
I frown, shaking my head. “Waiting for me? If you’d called, I’d have been back here at the speed of light!” I pull her to her feet. “Come on. Let’s go eat.”
She laughs, the sound light and musical, and follows me without protest.
Chapter 24 – Sienna
Two days later, I woke up to my phone buzzing on my nightstand. It’s morning, and the space beside me is empty. While I frown at Sebastian’s absence, I reach for the buzzing device. The screen lights up, relentless, buzzing with alerts I can barely keep up with. Different headlines.
Mikhailov Under Internal Investigation
Anonymous Documents Leak Indicates Major Mikhailov Fraud
Authorities Suspect High-Level Corruption in European Art Rings
I drop onto the edge of the bed, pulse hammering in my ears. My fingers shake as I scroll, unable to look away. Each headline is worse than the last, each one more damning than anything I could have imagined.
Then my eyes freeze at one of the most prominent headlines. My breath hitches. The words that make my chest stop, the ones that make the room spin just a little:
Viktor Mikhailov Arrested!!!
I clutch my mouth, my fingers trembling against my lips. I can feel the weight of the last five years—the fear, the guilt, the constant tension—start to lift, like it’s finally being pulled from my chest in one slow, impossible exhale.
My mind races. Sebastian. Sebastian did this.Wedid this. The meticulous plan, the documents, the subtle manipulation of his paranoia—it worked. He’s gone. Completely.
Relief washes over me in sharp, dizzying waves. I press my face into my hands, tears threatening to spill—not of sorrow, not of fear, but of something strange and overwhelming: freedom.
I glance at the phone again, half-expecting the news to vanish if I blink, half-expecting some final twist. But no. The headlines remain. They’re real. Viktor Mikhailov has finally fallen, undone by the very schemes he thought he could control.
The doors slide open softly.
Sebastian walks in carrying a tray with two mugs of coffee, steam curling lazily into the air. He sets it down on the low table and sits beside me, close enough that I can feel his warmth without touching him yet.
I turn the phone toward him, my hands still shaking, scrolling through the headlines as if I need him to see them too—proof that this isn’t some fragile dream.
He barely glances at the screen before he smiles.
“I saw it earlier this morning,” he says quietly. Then, softer still: “It’s done.”
Something inside me breaks open.
I throw my arms around him, burying my face against his chest as tears spill freely, uncontrollable.
“Oh my God,” I whisper, my voice cracking. “He’s really…really gone.”
Sebastian’s arms close around me instantly, firm and sure.
“Not gone,” he corrects gently. “Just caged. Where he can’t touch you.”
