Page 11 of Stalked & Bred by the BRATVA
Now her body needs to learn.
I wait in the upper gallery, leaning against the carved banister that overlooks the east corridor. She moves down there now, hands full of folded napkins, her steps quick and precise. She doesn’t look up. She never looks up. Not until she feels me.
Her pace falters. She glances around once, her brows drawing together like she’s just remembered she left something behind. She shakes her head and keeps going.
I move before she rounds the corner, taking the servant’s staircase down. It empties into the same hall she’s about to pass through. There’s no sound from my steps. Years of moving like a ghost in hostile spaces has trained me for this.
When she appears, she’s looking over her shoulder again, her attention fixed on something she thinks she heard. That’s why she doesn’t see me at first.
Until she collides with me.
The napkins slip from her hands, a few fluttering to the floor. Her breath catches as she stumbles, and my hands close over her shoulders to steady her.
Small. That’s my first thought. So much smaller than I imagined when I’ve been watching her from a distance. My fingers almost span the length from her collarbone to her shoulder blade. She’s tense under my touch, every muscle locked.
She looks up, and for the first time I see those eyes without glass, without shadow. Blue, but not the sapphire of the gown, lighter, softer, a shade that makes me want to see how wide they’ll go when I press her against a wall.
“I— I’m sorry,” she says, her voice barely above a whisper.
I don’t let go. “Watch where you’re going,” I murmur. Not loud. Not sharp. Just enough for her to feel the weight in it.
Her gaze flicks to my hands, then back to my face. I feel her pulse against my fingertips, quick and uneven. She smells faintly of fresh linen and the perfume she wears, sweet and cloying but somehow perfect on her.
I drop my hands slowly, letting the movement drag a fraction longer than necessary. She swallows hard, her lips parting like she’s about to speak again, but nothing comes out.
“Pick them up,” I say, glancing at the napkins on the floor.
She bends to gather them, and I take my time watching her. Not just the curve of her spine or the way her hair slips forward over her shoulder, but the delicate way she handles each folded square, as if she can’t bear to leave a single corner crumpled.
When she straightens, she keeps her eyes down, holding the napkins tightly against her chest like a shield.
“You’re new,” I say. It’s not a question.
“Yes,” she murmurs.
“How long?”
“A month.”
I nod slowly, as if I didn’t already know the exact day and hour she arrived. As if I haven’t memorised every movement she’s made since.
Her knuckles are white where she grips the linens.
“You live in the servant’s wing,” I add. Still not a question.
She glances up then, something like surprise flickering in her expression. “Yes.”
I take a step closer, and she takes a half-step back without seeming to realise it. The air between us thickens. I can almost feel the static building in it, the way it does before a lightning strike.
“You keep your door locked at night,” I say.
Her lips part. She looks like she might deny it, then just presses her mouth into a line.
“Good,” I tell her. “Keep doing that.”
I let my gaze linger on her for another beat, long enough for her to feel pinned in place, before I step aside. She hesitates, as if she’s not sure she’s free to move, and I like that. I like the way her body listens to my movements before her mind does.
As she passes, the edge of her sleeve brushes my knuckles. A small thing, nothing more than fabric against skin, but it’s enough. Enough to feel the heat of her through the thin cotton. Enough to know she felt it too.
