The kind of woman I always assume sees right through girls like me and dismisses us in under a second.
Instead, she’s studying me with unsettling focus, one leg crossed over the other, fingers curved around a teacup she hasn’t touched.
She’d insisted on meeting me first.
Not Aleksei.Me.
At first I thought it was a power move, or some upper-crust ritual I wasn’t aware of. But when she’d said, very calmly,I’d prefer to speak to the assistant before I decide whether to meet the man,I’d heard something else in it.
Caution, maybe. Or curiosity. Or the kind of woman who knows men like Aleksei come with shadows and wants to look at the shape of the shadow before stepping into it.
Fair enough.
“You’re quieter than I expected,” Celeste says at last.
I blink. “Sorry?”
She smiles faintly. She sets her cup down. “You’ve met him, obviously.”
“Yes.”
“And?”
Straight to the point. I can respect that.
I choose my words carefully. “He’s intense.”
Her lips curve. “That’s one word.”
I don’t disagree.
She leans back slightly, looking me over again like she’s evaluating more than just my answer. “Tell me something real.”
That catches me off guard. “I’m sorry?”
“Everyone says the same things about men like him. Powerful. Private. Dangerous. Efficient.” She waves one hand, dismissing the clichés. “What is he actually like?”
I hesitate.
Because what am I supposed to say?
That he eats women alive with his eyes and then pretends not to know their names? That he can ignore you all day and still leave your skin burning where he touched it? That somewhere beneath the ruthlessness there’s something almost unbearably careful, and that somehow makes him worse?
Instead, I say, “He notices more than he lets on.”
Celeste goes still for the briefest second.
Then she nods slowly, as if I’ve confirmed something for her rather than told her anything new.
“Mm,” she says. “I thought so.”
A waiter glides by with sparkling water and tiny pastries arranged like jewelry. I take one out of politeness. Celeste doesn’t touch anything.
My phone buzzes again on the table.
Jake. Again.
I ignore it and force myself back to the task at hand.
