Page 220 of The Devil's Thorn
“And by who?” Nikolai asked.
“Who do you think?”
The table went quiet for a beat. Viktor.
No one said it aloud, but I felt it in the shift of the air. His name had become a shadow that walked the halls long before he did.
Rafael didn’t speak. But I felt the tension in his fingers against my leg.
A server leaned down, refilling glasses with wine that probably cost more than many peoples apartments. I murmured a soft thanks, even though I didn’t reach for the glass.
And then—movement. A man approached the table from behind. He didn’t say anything. Just leaned down beside Rafael, his mouth close to his ear. I watched Rafael’s face as the whisper reached him—just a flicker. That was all. And then he stood.
His chair scraped back quietly, and I felt the shift where his hand had been on my leg. “I’ll be back,” he said under his breath, turning his head to glance at me. “Don’t speak to anyone unless you want them to remember your name.”
I gave a single nod, not blinking. He didn’t smile. Just walked away, the man leading him toward a darker corridor tucked behind the dining hall.
The seat beside me was empty now. But I didn’t feel alone. I felt watched. And I wasn’t sure yet if that was worse.
Yuri’s gaze lingered on Rafael as he disappeared into the shadows of the hallway with the man who’d whispered in his ear. The weight of the room shifted slightly, but no one at the table seemed alarmed. Just curious.
I leaned back in my chair, the subtle press of Rafael’s absence more noticeable than I wanted it to be. I could still feel the imprint of his hand on my thigh, and without it, I felt like something vital had gone quiet.
The conversations around the table resumed. More trading of favors and veiled threats. Deals masked as pleasantries. Power laced into every syllable. But my mind drifted.
I let my fingers trail down the stem of my wine glass, not drinking. Just feeling. I had no idea what Rafael was being pulled into, and the longer he stayed gone, the more that itch in my spine returned.
I pushed my chair back and stood.
Yuri’s eyes flicked to me immediately. “Going somewhere?”
“Just stretching my legs,” I said softly, offering a slight nod.
He didn’t say anything else, but he stood too, trailing behind me at a casual distance. Nikolai stayed put, eyes locked on the room with that quiet, watchful coldness of his.
The corridors around the ballroom weren’t empty, but they were less crowded than the main hall. The walls were lined with oil paintings and towering vases of roses so dark they looked black in the candlelight. My heels barely made a sound on the marble floor.
“You don’t like sitting still,” Yuri said beside me.
“Never did.”
He smirked, hands in his pockets as he walked beside me. “Reminds me of someone else I know.”
“Rafael?”
He tilted his head. “You think you’ve got him figured out already?”
“I don’t think anyone ever really does.”
Yuri chuckled, then glanced down at me. “Fair point.”
I was about to ask him something—anything to keep my thoughts from spiraling—when a voice interrupted us.
“Yuri.”
We both turned.
The man approaching had a quiet presence that didn’t ask for attention but took it anyway. He was tall, lean but strong, dressed in black tailored slacks and a deep grey dress shirt rolled at the sleeves. His hair was dark and slightly tousled, a few strands falling across his forehead, and his sharp jaw was shadowed with a clean stubble. But it was his eyes—gray with a hint of something steel beneath—that held the weight of someone who’d seen too much too young.
