“Don’t,” he says. Quiet.
Deadly quiet.
Emir starts wrapping rope around my wrists. Tight.
The fibers bite almost immediately.
I twist anyway, breath ragged, cheek on fire, every muscle in my body strung so tight I feel like I might snap apart.
“Gabriel,” I choke out, “I got what you wanted—”
The rope jerkstighter.
Gabriel crouches in front of me, one forearm braced over his thigh, his expression calm enough to make me nauseous.
“You disappeared,” he says. “You went quiet. You got comfortable.” His eyes flick once, deliberately over me. “And now you expect me to believe that doesn’t matter?”
My pulse pounds harder.
He knows.
Of course he knows.
Emir straightens beside him, the ledgers still in hand. “Books are clean,” he says. “Smash and Sugar. Exile.”
Gabriel nods once.
Then looks back at me.
“It’s a start,” he says. “Not an excuse.”
Gabriel studies me for one long second.
“You were seen.”
My stomach drops.
“At the Amatos,” he says, voice flat. “One of my informants saw you go in.”
I don’t say anything. Don’t move either. Because there’s nothing to say that doesn’t make this worse.
“You’re getting in too deep with the enemy,” he continues. “Playing house with Maksim Korsakov.”
The words land uglier than they should.
Playing house.
Like the townhouse. Like his bed. Like the tattoo burning under my clothes.
Gabriel tilts his head.
“So tell me,” he says. “Do I pull you out, or do I set you straight?”
My mouth opens.
He doesn’t wait for me to try.
His palm cracks across my face so fast and hard the world blurs out—the kind of hit meant to make a point, not just hurt, and the point lands.
