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“What is it?” Alex answers without greeting. “Either someone is bleeding, someone is dead, or you want something.”

Despite myself, my mouth twitches.

“Good afternoon to you too.”

“You want something,” he says flatly.

“I do.”

There is a pause. Then a long-suffering exhale travels down the line.

“Fine. What is it?”

“I need to know where Maksim is.”

Silence.

It stretches long enough for me to picture Alex staring at nothing, deciding whether I have earned an answer or whether he’d rather make my life difficult on principle.

“Why isn’t Maksim telling you himself?” he asks at last.

“Because he isn’t answering my calls.”

“Or your texts?”

“Or my texts.”

Another pause follows.

“That’s unusual for him,” Alex observes.

“I know.”

“He doesn’t do that.” His voice remains level. “Even when he is furious with someone, he replies eventually, usually just to insult them properly.”

“I know that too.”

“So what did you do?”

My brows pull together.

Why is that his first assumption?

“I didn’t do anything to him,” I reply, sharper than intended. “He had a panic attack at my parents’ home and has avoided me ever since. I’m concerned.”

“Concerned,” Alex repeats.

“Yes,” I reply. “I did not cause it.”

“I didn’t say you did.”

“You implied it.”

“I implied nothing.” His voice remains unnervingly calm. “But Maksim does not disappear for a week unless something is wrong. And whatever is wrong, you are involved enough for him to be ignoring you.”

I close my eyes.

He is not wrong.