Gennady laughed. “Because she entered herself. Can you imagine? All that pride, and she walks herself to the block.”
My fingers closed around the base of my glass.
Lev didn’t move.
The man in green said, “Then why are you here?”
“I’m here because she keeps mistaking delay for escape.” Gennady looked toward the dining room. His eyes found Nadia at the server station. “She’s untouched. That brings men with money, and men with money get stupid. She belongs with me. I told the auctioneer what happens if her lot goes anywhere else.”
The man in green swallowed. “He agreed?”
“He likes money. He likes keeping his fingers more.” Gennady smiled. “I coaxed him.”
The word came out soft and pleased.
My glass cracked.
The split ran thin through the rim.
Lev’s chin lowered a fraction.
A bead of Armagnac touched my thumb.
I set the glass down before it broke in my hand.
Nadia moved through the room twenty feet away, carrying four champagne flutes on a tray. She didn’t know Gennady had followed her decision back to the auctioneer. She didn’t know he had turned her choice into another Kask trap.
She smiled at a woman who thanked her.
The smile didn’t last.
Gennady kept talking.
“By tomorrow night, she stops pretending she has options,” he said. “I’ll enjoy that part.”
The man in green glanced toward the room again. “And if another bidder pushes?”
“Then the auctioneer remembers who paid him. If he forgets, someone reminds him.”
Lev’s hand rested near his knife.
I gave one small shake of my head.
We wouldn’t do this here. Nadia stood twenty feet away, and Gennady was already hunting for anything he could use against her.
The man in green left first, moving toward the restrooms before cutting through the side corridor. Gennady stayed by the coat check long enough to watch Nadia bend over a table to collect a signed receipt.
I stood.
Lev stood with me.
No one at the nearest tables looked up for more than a second.
They knew better.
I walked to the end of the booth, close enough to the short hall that the music covered my voice and far enough from the bar that Gennady would see only two Sorin men shifting position.
Lev stepped beside me.
