Roman didn’t answer right away.

The door clicked shut softly behind them, sealing the quiet of the hallway out and leaving the suite in that strange stillness expensive apartments always had when no one had lived in them honestly for a long time.

He let Vivienne move first.

Watched her cross the threshold like someone stepping onto a stage she already understood. She didn’t rush. Didn’t touch anything unnecessarily. Her eyes moved across the room in small controlled sweeps that most people would mistake for casual observation.

Roman knew better.

She was cataloging.

So was he.

He moved deeper into the suite at an angle opposite hers, giving the space between them room to breathe while he took in the layout. The lighting had come up in warm layers when she hit the panel, illuminating the sitting room, the bar cart, the open kitchen line. The place smelled faintly of something expensive and clean—linen spray, maybe, or a professional wipe-down.

Not the smell of someone living here.

The smell of someone preparing a room.

Roman crouched briefly beside the bar cart first.

The bottle caught his eye too.

Not because of the label.

Because of the dust line.

He lifted it slightly.

The bottom of the bottle left a faint pale ring in the wood where something else had been sitting before.

Recently.

He set it back down.

His eyes moved to the glasses beside it.

Two.

Clean.

But one had a slightly different angle in the rack.

Someone had replaced them.

Carefully.

Roman straightened slowly, turning toward the kitchen as Vivienne moved toward the hallway.

He opened the refrigerator.

Protein drinks.

Sparkling water.

He leaned his forearm against the door and stared at the shelf for a second.

“Yeah,” he murmured quietly to himself.

“Definitely not Lucien.”

Lucien stocked liquor.

Lucien stocked stupid expensive champagne.

Lucien stocked things meant to impress people watching him drink them.

This was… something else.

Roman closed the refrigerator and walked back into the sitting area just as Vivienne turned toward him again.

He had already noticed the same things she had.

The grooming products visible from the bathroom door.

The cologne on the counter.

The way the thermostat had been set lower than most people preferred.

The room was curated.

But the curation had a personality.

And Roman had met that personality before.

When she asked the question, he leaned his shoulder lightly against the back of the sofa and watched her for a second.

Anything strike you as worth mentioning?

Roman’s mouth twitched faintly.

“Oh yeah.”

His voice was calm.

Direct.

He gestured loosely toward the kitchen.

“The water.”

Then toward the hallway.

“The cologne.”

Another small gesture toward the thermostat on the wall.

“And the fact that this place feels like a hotel room somebody actually uses instead of a stash house your cousin would trash in twenty minutes.”

Roman pushed off the sofa and walked slowly toward the bar cart again, hands sliding into the pockets of his coat.

He studied the bottle once more.

Then looked back at her.

“It belongs to someone.”

A beat.

“Just not the idiot we started with.”

He didn’t say the name immediately.

Not because he was unsure.

Because he wanted to see if she would.

Roman’s eyes moved across her face briefly, catching the small controlled stillness she’d adopted while studying the room.

She’d seen it too.

He could tell.

So he saved them both the pretense.

“Your brother,” he said simply.

The words landed quietly in the expensive stillness of the suite.

Roman watched her reaction carefully.

Not hunting for shock.

Just confirming the shape of the puzzle.

“This place runs like him.”

He nodded once toward the refrigerator again.

“Controlled.”

“Minimal.”

“Everything stocked exactly how he likes it.”

Another pause.

“Which means either he uses this suite…”

Roman’s gaze drifted toward the bedroom door.

“…or someone set it up to look like he does.”

He glanced back at her.

“And if it’s the second one…”

The faint smirk returned, though this time it carried less humor and more interest.

“Then whoever did it knows your family well enough to fake the details.”

Roman’s eyes moved around the room again.

Then back to her.

“So yeah.”

His voice dropped slightly.

“I’d say the room’s doing exactly what it was designed to do.”

A beat.

“Pretend it belongs to no one.”

Then he tilted his head slightly toward the hallway behind her.

“But it’s not doing a very good job.”

Vivienne watched him the entire time he answered.

Not openly enough for it to read as suspicion. She was too polished for that. But her attention sharpened and narrowed all the same, the way it always did when she was testing for fracture points. A hesitation where none belonged. A glance away too soon. A little overcorrection in tone. Anything that suggested he was steering her rather than simply speaking.

There was nothing.

Or at least, nothing new.

Roman sounded exactly as he had from the beginning—dry, direct, irritatingly unadorned. No visible angle. No theatrical hesitation. Just facts, assembled in the same rough, steady cadence she had already come to know. He was not trying to sell her anything. He was not softening the conclusion. He was not dressing it up for effect.

That almost annoyed her more.

Because it meant he had seen it too.

Her brother.

By now she was certain of it.

Not just the suite. Not just the products or the water or the temperature or the smell of one of Sebastian’s absurdly expensive colognes hanging faintly in the bathroom air. The jewelry in the footage. The room. The feel of it. The careful impersonality that was, in fact, deeply personal if you knew him well enough. Sebastian had always liked places that looked like no one belonged to them while managing to stamp them with himself anyway. Controlled. Curated. Slightly colder than necessary. Never fully inhabited, but unmistakably his once you learned the pattern.

It was Sebastian.

And if it was Sebastian here, then Lucien at Saint Celeste had not been random either.

No.

Lucien had been placed there.

Sebastian was almost certainly the reason.

Not because he was some criminal mastermind exactly—Vivienne knew him too well to grant him that much dignity—but because he had just enough cunning and just enough laziness to create a problem and then assume everyone around him would read it the way he wanted. He probably hadn’t even bothered clearing this suite properly because in his mind the room itself was a shield. Too obvious to be his if anyone smart noticed, and therefore easy to dismiss as a setup if questions ever started getting dangerously close.

Typical male logic.

Predictable. Self-satisfied. Built on the assumption that women would either miss the details or overcomplicate them.

Vivienne moved toward Roman then, slowly, the soft carpet muting her steps until she stood close enough to make the air between them feel smaller without giving up an inch of control.

It was a risk.

She knew that.

If he was reporting back to Charles—more than that, if he was part of this in a way she had not yet seen—then saying Sebastian’s name aloud in this room could travel upward before she was ready for it. Her father would know she was looking in the right place. Adrian too. The game would tighten. They would correct. They would hide whatever came next more carefully.

But there was another possibility.

That Roman wasn’t in on it. That he was simply standing here, seeing what she saw, and waiting to learn whether she was willing to be honest when it counted.

So she gave him the smallest amount of truth she could without surrendering the entire board.

“This isn’t the second option,” she said.

Her voice stayed low and cool, but there was no performance in it now. No aristocratic dismissal, no polished little insult to keep him neatly outside her perimeter. Just precision.

Her gaze held his.

“This room reeks of my brother.”

Not just observation.

Accusation.

Vivienne tilted her head the slightest degree, watching him carefully for any shift at all—any flicker of recognition that came too quickly, any satisfaction, any sign that he’d expected her to land here because someone else had already told him where to look.

“Every detail in here is him,” she continued. “The kind of detail no one outside the family would bother getting exactly right because they wouldn’t realize it mattered.”

A beat.

“And Sebastian has always mistaken being underestimated for being clever.”

She let the words settle in the suite’s artificial stillness, then studied Roman’s face for whatever came next.

This was the gamble.

If he flinched, if he deflected, if he got too still—she’d know.

If not...

Well.

Then maybe for the first time since Saint Celeste, they were actually looking at the same fire.

Roman didn’t react immediately.

Not because he was surprised.

Because he was thinking.

He watched her the same way he had been since the moment she’d walked into Saint Celeste—quietly, attentively, the way men learned to watch suspects or witnesses when they were trying to decide which one they were dealing with.

Vivienne Blackwell was neither.

Which made her more interesting.

When she stepped closer, Roman didn’t move away. The air between them narrowed but he didn’t shift his stance, didn’t straighten, didn’t retreat into the polite space most men would have given her out of instinct.

He stayed where he was, shoulders loose, one hand resting against the counter behind him.

Then she said it.

This room reeks of my brother.

Roman’s eyes flicked once toward the hallway.

Then the bar cart.

Then the thermostat again.

Not because he needed to look.

Because he was lining up the logic in his head the way he always did—slow, methodical, almost annoyingly thorough.

When he spoke, his voice was calm.

“Yeah,” he said quietly.

Not argumentative.

Not triumphant.

Just confirming the same conclusion.

He rubbed the side of his jaw thoughtfully and began talking the way men often did when they were working a problem out loud.

“See, here’s where it gets interesting.”

Roman pushed off the counter and walked slowly across the sitting room, gesturing lightly as he spoke—not dramatically, just the unconscious movement of someone building a structure in his head.

“Because you’re right about one thing.”

He pointed toward the kitchen.

“No one outside the family would bother getting all this exactly right.”

Then toward the bathroom.

“The cologne.”

Then the refrigerator.

“The water.”

His hand lifted slightly toward the thermostat.

“The temperature.”

He looked back at her.

“That’s not a performance.”

“That’s routine.”

Roman stopped near the sofa again, leaning against the back of it.

“And routine is the part people screw up when they’re faking someone.”

A pause.

His eyes settled on her again.

“But.”

He lifted a finger slightly.

“And this is the part I’m not totally comfortable with yet.”

Roman’s voice dropped a fraction, more analytical now.

“If Sebastian built this place…”

He gestured around the suite again.

“…then he’s either sloppy enough to leave it screaming his name…”

“…or confident enough that nobody in your family would look hard enough to notice.”

Roman tilted his head slightly.

“And from everything I’ve seen so far…”

His mouth twitched faintly.

“Your brother doesn’t strike me as sloppy.”

He let that sit for a second.

Then he stepped closer again—not invading her space, but closing enough that the conversation felt more deliberate.

“You’re assuming the same thing I did five minutes ago.”

He gestured lightly around the room.

“That this is Sebastian’s suite.”

Another pause.

“But here’s the part that bothers me.”

Roman glanced toward the hallway again.

“If it’s his…”

“…why leave it this clean?”

He looked back at her.

“And if someone else wanted to point us at him…”

Roman spread his hands slightly.

“This is exactly how you’d do it.”

Everything perfect.

Everything unmistakable.

Everything just obvious enough to be convincing.

Roman studied her face for a second, then added in that slightly over-explaining way he fell into when he started thinking like the guy in charge of a problem:

“I’m not saying you’re wrong.”

“Actually I think you’re mostly right.”

His tone stayed even.

“But when a room lines up this clean with one person…”

Roman glanced around the suite again.

“…I start wondering who benefits from us stopping there.”

He met her eyes again.

“And right now?”

A faint, crooked hint of a smirk touched his mouth.

“Your brother’s the easiest answer in the building.”

Another beat passed.

Then Roman gestured toward the bedroom hallway.

“So before we lock him in as the architect…”

“…we should see what the rest of his apartment looks like.”

He nodded once toward the door.

“Because if this place really is Sebastian’s…”

Roman’s voice flattened slightly.

“Something in there will prove it.”

“And if it’s not…”

The faint smirk returned.

“Then someone just built the most convincing Sebastian Blackwell impression I’ve ever seen.”

Vivienne listened with only half the attention her face implied.

On the surface, she looked composed enough to be taking in every word with perfect seriousness—chin level, posture immaculate, expression cool. But internally, her mind had already split away from the exact sequence of Roman’s reasoning and begun moving through its own, far more intimate map of the problem.

This was Sebastian’s.

She knew it with the kind of certainty men liked to dismiss as instinct because they had no better word for a woman’s pattern recognition when it frightened them. Maybe it was intuition. Maybe it was simply the fact that she had spent her entire life in close proximity to Blackwell men and the filthier corners of their habits. Either way, she knew.

This wasn’t the sort of building old Blackwell money truly favored for itself. It was too recently expensive. Too self-aware. Too eager to signal luxury rather than simply possessing it. The couple in the lobby had told her almost everything she needed to know without meaning to. They had clocked status, yes. Importance, certainly. But not lineage. Not Blackwell. If they had recognized her surname in her face, they would have looked longer. Straighter. More carefully. Instead, they had merely registered that she and Roman mattered in some vague, intimidating way.

Exactly the kind of place Sebastian would enjoy.

Enough anonymity to disappear. Enough polish to indulge himself. Enough access to throw his weight around without having to answer to anyone who actually knew what he was.

Roman’s reaction to her little test remained inconclusive.

Frustratingly so.

If he was lying, he was better at it than most. If he wasn’t, then the shift in him now—the visible turning of gears, the slightly narrowed focus, the way he kept circling the room and building out possibilities aloud—felt genuine. Not polished. Not performative. Just a man trying to solve something in real time.

Her suspicion lowered a fraction.

Not enough to matter.

Just enough that she didn’t actively want to push him out a window.

She let her gaze drift around the suite again while he talked. Not pointedly. Not enough to suggest she was bored. Just enough to keep him from thinking he had her full concentration for free.

The room remained offensive in its restraint. Sebastian always had terrible taste in morals and excellent taste in surfaces.

Then Roman came back toward her and her attention returned fully.

He said she was assuming the same thing he had.

That drew the faintest smirk from her, smug and small and mean at the edges.

Because yes. Of course she was.

And when he started questioning the why of it—why leave the room this clean, why make it line up so neatly, who benefited from them stopping at Sebastian—Vivienne had to hold back an actual laugh.

Not because he was wrong.

Because he was still thinking like someone outside the family.

He had never had the pleasure of being born into one of the Blackwells’ twisted little private games, where motive was rarely singular and often not even necessary. Men like Charles, Adrian, and Sebastian did not always require a grand strategic payoff to ruin someone’s evening. Sometimes boredom was enough. Sometimes cruelty was enough. Sometimes making a woman chase the wrong flame while they lit three more elsewhere was simply how they entertained themselves.

And if there was something larger beneath it?

Of course there was.

But the root of most Blackwell rot was still the same. Sebastian. Charles. Adrian. One generation producing the next with barely enough variation to change the tailoring.

She did not bother explaining any of that.

Roman wouldn’t fully understand it anyway. Not yet. Maybe not ever.

When he finished, Vivienne gave him one measured nod, as if acknowledging a junior associate who had finally managed not to embarrass himself in a meeting.

“Have fun with that,” she said coolly.

Her tone made it very clear what she thought of his continued need to dig like an earnest little bloodhound after the room had already told her what she needed to know.

“I’m not making assumptions.”

That part she said slightly more clearly, with just enough deliberate emphasis to make the words land in the room rather than merely in his direction.

If Sebastian had something listening in here—and Sebastian absolutely would think himself clever enough to do exactly that—then let him hear her sounding disinterested. Let him hear her dismiss the obvious. Let him think she remained one step behind and mildly inconvenienced rather than fully alert.

Vivienne’s eyes moved lazily around the suite once, then back to Roman.

“Sebastian has always liked places that smell expensive and empty,” she said, tone edged with a quiet sort of familial contempt. “It lets him pretend he’s more mysterious than he is.”

Again, clear enough to carry if anyone was listening.

Again, casual enough to sound like irritation rather than accusation.

Then she turned away from him altogether and crossed to the couch, settling onto it with sleek, controlled ease, one leg crossing over the other. Her bag slid beside her. Her phone appeared in her hand a moment later.

No rush. No visible concern.

Just a woman apparently bored by male overthinking.

Vivienne opened her maps, then search, and started scanning nearby bars and hotel lounges for somewhere to get a drink once this was over—somewhere dim enough, anonymous enough, and far enough outside the family’s orbit that she wouldn’t have to feel like a Blackwell while she sat there. Somewhere no one would know her father’s name before they knew her order. Somewhere she would not have to brace for deference, gossip, or recognition before the first sip hit the glass.

If Roman wanted to keep sniffing around the bedroom trying to prove the obvious to himself, he could.

She’d be ready when he finally caught up.

Roman watched her sit.

He didn’t answer immediately.

Part of that was because he was still thinking through the room. The other part was because Vivienne Blackwell had just very deliberately shifted the tone of the space, and Roman had learned a long time ago that when someone that controlled made a move that obvious, it usually meant they wanted something heard.

Or something not heard.

He let the silence stretch while she crossed the room and lowered herself onto the couch like she owned the building instead of merely tolerating it. The movement was effortless in that irritating way people born into money often managed—no hesitation, no awkward adjustment, just a clean, controlled collapse into comfort.

Her phone appeared.

Maps.

Search.

Roman noticed.

He noticed most things about her.

That was becoming a problem.

He dragged his attention away from the couch before it lingered long enough to be obvious and turned slowly back toward the rest of the suite.

For a few seconds he said nothing, just walking a slow arc around the sitting room again while she made it very clear she had decided he was free to continue his little investigative hobby without supervision.

“Yeah,” he said finally, dry.

“Nothing screams ‘thrilling night’ like searching for cocktail bars while standing inside a potential crime scene.”

His tone wasn’t sharp.

More amused.

Roman stepped toward the bar cart again, eyes drifting over the arrangement with the same quiet attention he’d been giving everything since they walked in.

“Also,” he added casually, “if your brother wired the place…”

He glanced over his shoulder at her.

“…you might want to assume the couch is part of the listening package.”

A beat.

“Just a thought.”

He moved away before she could answer, walking down the short hallway toward the bedroom like a man who had already decided the conversation wasn’t actually over just because she’d sat down.

The bedroom door opened quietly.

Roman stepped inside.

The room looked exactly like the rest of the suite.

Expensive.

Controlled.

Clean in a way that wasn’t natural.

He took a slow breath through his nose.

There it was again.

That faint trace of cologne.

Same as the bathroom.

Same as the hallway.

Roman moved toward the bed and studied it without touching anything at first.

Perfectly made.

But the mattress dipped slightly on one side.

Recently used.

He crouched beside the nightstand.

Nothing obvious.

Phone charger.

Empty glass.

He straightened again, eyes drifting across the room.

Closet.

That was where he headed next.

He slid the door open slowly.

Inside was exactly what he expected.

A handful of expensive jackets.

Two pairs of shoes.

Minimal clothing.

Not a full wardrobe.

A staging closet.

Roman studied the jackets carefully.

Then he reached out and checked one of the interior pockets.

Empty.

Of course.

He stepped back and leaned one shoulder against the closet frame, thinking.

From the living room he could hear the faint tapping of Vivienne’s phone screen.

He pictured her out there pretending to be bored with the entire situation.

Roman shook his head slightly and walked back out toward the sitting room.

“You’re right about one thing,” he said as he reentered.

He stopped near the couch but didn’t sit.

His eyes dropped briefly to the screen in her hand before returning to her face.

“Your brother definitely uses this place.”

His tone was matter-of-fact.

But then he added, almost thoughtfully:

“Which actually makes it worse.”

A pause.

Roman folded his arms loosely.

“Because if this is Sebastian’s apartment…”

His gaze drifted slowly around the room again.

“…then someone felt comfortable enough to run a very messy operation out of it.”

His eyes settled on her again.

“And that means one of two things.”

The faintest edge of sarcasm crept into his voice.

“Either your brother’s dumber than he looks…”

Another beat.

“…or he didn’t expect anyone who could recognize his cologne to be standing in here tonight.”

His glance lingered on her a fraction longer than necessary before he looked away again.

Then Roman gestured loosely toward the hallway.

“I did check the bedroom, by the way.”

Dry.

“You’re welcome.”

Another beat.

“Bed’s been used.”

“Closet’s staged.”

“Nothing personal enough to prove ownership.”

He shrugged.

“Which means whoever cleaned this place knew exactly what they were removing.”

Roman’s attention flicked back to the phone in her hand again.

“Find anywhere good yet?”

His tone tilted slightly more sarcastic now.

“Or are you planning to solve the rest of the evening from that couch?”

Vivienne kept her eyes on her phone while he talked.

Not because she cared whether he thought she was listening. Roman Kessler had by now earned enough of her attention to be irritatingly difficult to ignore, whether she granted him the courtesy of looking at him or not. But she had no intention of rewarding every little comment with a visible reaction, least of all when he started needling her about bars and couches and the possibility of her brother wiring the furniture like some cheap little pervert with delusions of grandeur.

Her thumb moved idly over the screen.

One place in the Village looked too bright. Another too crowded. One cocktail bar in Chelsea had the kind of lighting that made everyone look self-satisfied. She dismissed it immediately.

Only when he turned away and started down the hallway did she look up.

Her gaze followed him without softness as he disappeared into the bedroom, his shoulders cutting through the doorway in that same rough, unbothered way he seemed to move through every space. She watched until he vanished entirely, then lowered her eyes back to her phone for another beat before finally looking up from it and around the suite again.

God, she hated this room.

Not because it was ugly. It wasn’t. Sebastian’s places never were. They were always handsome in the same way he was handsome—coldly, expensively, curated within an inch of their life and ultimately empty underneath. What disgusted her was the performance of it all. The deliberate non-personality. The way it tried to look anonymous while still smelling unmistakably of him to anyone who had spent enough years trapped in the same bloodline to know better.

Her expression did not shift, but something in her stomach tightened all the same.

While her screen remained lit in her hand, her attention had already split away from the bars and into darker territory.

What exactly were they doing?

Charles. Adrian. Sebastian. A pattern of men who had always found ways to turn other people into moving parts. She didn’t know yet what the larger scheme was, but she knew enough of the family architecture to recognize one when she felt it. Sebastian was almost certainly in this because he wanted something from them. Approval, maybe. Access. Proof that he was ruthless enough to be trusted with whatever uglier thing was happening behind the curtain. That was always the pathetic truth of him. No matter how polished or superior he acted, some part of him still wanted to be chosen by the real monsters in the room.

Charles and Adrian.

That was the center of it. It had to be.

Sebastian might light the matches, but he was never the fire.

The bedroom door opened again.

Vivienne did not look up immediately.

She let him come back into the room, let him start talking, let him return to the same maddening rhythm of observation and explanation as if she had not already spent the last several minutes adding to her list of reasons to either throw him out a window or keep him inconveniently close.

When he said she was right about one thing, she gave him only the faintest sidelong glance.

One thing.

Please.

She didn’t bother correcting him.

Not because she doubted herself. Because she knew better than to waste breath defending instincts she was already sure of. Roman was welcome to catch up at whatever pace made him feel accomplished.

She said nothing while he went on.

Nothing while he continued to narrate the obvious in that dry tone of his. Nothing while he added his little sarcastic edges, his commentary on Sebastian’s intelligence, his unnecessary note about the bedroom, his glance at her phone as if that too needed interpreting aloud. She simply let him build his own stack of irritations until he finally ran out of breath.

Then, at last, Vivienne slipped her phone back into her bag and lifted her eyes to him fully.

“Are you finished?”

Her tone was cool enough to frost the glassware on the bar cart.

“Because if not, I’m sure Sebastian would be delighted to listen to the rest of your thoughts. Assuming he was clever enough to have this place wired, which, given the state of his judgment lately, feels optimistic.”

She rose from the couch in one smooth movement, gathering none of the room with her except the sense that she was done allowing it to hold her hostage.

“I found a place a few blocks over.”

No details. No invitation. Just fact.

“You’re welcome to stay here and keep circling the obvious, go report back to Charles and Adrian, or entertain yourself however you like.” Her gaze traveled over him once, cutting and dismissive and just interested enough to be dangerous. “I’m leaving.”

Vivienne adjusted the strap of her bag on her shoulder and started toward the door without waiting to see whether he followed.

If he came, fine. If he didn’t, even better.

She wasn’t asking for company.

She just had no intention of sitting in Sebastian’s stale little shrine one minute longer than necessary.

Roman didn’t answer her question right away.

Are you finished?

The words hung in the room for a moment after she said them, sharp and cold enough to frost the air between them. Roman stood where he was near the end of the hallway, arms loose at his sides, watching her the way he’d watched her since the beginning—like a man studying weather patterns he didn’t entirely trust.

The frost in her voice didn’t bother him.

It was the movement that followed.

Vivienne stood.

And suddenly the room felt different.

Roman noticed the way she rose—smooth, controlled, effortless in the way people who had been raised around power tended to move when they were done entertaining a situation. There was no hesitation, no gathering of herself. Just a clean shift from stillness to motion, like someone flipping a switch.

She was finished with the room.

Finished with the conversation.

Finished with him, if necessary.

Roman pushed away from the wall slowly.

He listened while she spoke, letting the rest of her irritation roll past him without interrupting. The mention of Charles and Adrian didn’t even get a reaction. Neither did the casual suggestion that he might want to run back and report to them.

Instead, his gaze drifted briefly around the suite again while she spoke, taking in the room one more time as if committing it to memory.

Then he looked back at her.

“You know,” he said mildly, “for someone who claims not to make assumptions…”

His voice was calm, not mocking, just dry enough to scrape a little.

“…you’ve built a pretty impressive one about me in the last thirty seconds.”

He watched her cross the room toward the door.

Roman didn’t move to stop her.

Didn’t try to get the last word either.

He simply followed at a slower pace, hands sliding into the pockets of his coat as she reached the door first.

Vivienne Blackwell leaving a room had a certain finality to it.

Roman had seen that kind of exit before.

Usually from people who expected the world to rearrange itself around the decision.

He stepped out into the hallway a moment after her.

The corridor lights hummed faintly overhead again, soft carpet swallowing the sound of their footsteps as she headed toward the elevator lobby.

Roman fell into step beside her after a few seconds.

Not too close.

Not trailing either.

Just… there.

“Place a few blocks over, huh?”

His tone carried the faintest trace of amusement.

“You pick somewhere good at least?”

They reached the elevators.

Roman pressed the call button before she could.

A small chime sounded somewhere above them as the lift began descending.

He leaned back slightly against the wall while they waited, arms folding loosely across his chest.

For a second he didn’t say anything else.

Then his eyes flicked sideways toward her.

“And just so we’re clear…”

His voice lowered slightly.

“I’m not reporting anything to your father tonight.”

A beat.

Roman’s gaze lingered on her a fraction longer than necessary.

“Not because I’m scared of him.”

Another beat.

“Because if someone in your family set this whole thing up…”

His mouth curved faintly at one corner.

“…the last thing I’m doing is walking in there and telling them what we found before we know what it means.”

The elevator doors slid open with a quiet ding.

Roman stepped aside slightly and gestured toward the car.

“After you.”

Then, with the same dry tone as before:

“And relax.”

His eyes flicked briefly toward her bag where the phone had disappeared.

“I’m not crashing your drink.”

A pause.

“I just happen to be going in the same direction.”

Vivienne heard every word he said in the hallway.

She simply chose not to reward any of it.

That, too, was strategy.

If Sebastian ever decided to sit in some back office and replay the footage from Halcyon House, frame by frame, looking for proof that he had rattled her or that Roman had gotten something real out of her, he would find nothing worth keeping. No visible irritation. No useful reaction. No tension dramatic enough to feed on. Just Vivienne Blackwell crossing a hallway in a fitted coat and knee-high boots with the same cold composure she wore everywhere else, while Roman Kessler kept talking beside her like a man who had not yet learned the value of silence.

The elevator doors slid shut.

For a second, she said nothing.

She stood with one hand resting lightly against the strap of her bag, watching their reflections gather in the brushed metal as the doors sealed them inside. The mirrored surface softened them both slightly—her dark lines and polished restraint, his broader shape and rougher edges. Two figures caught in the same steel box, neither of them meant to be there, both sent by men who considered themselves clever.

The elevator gave a faint, smooth lurch downward.

Only then did she speak.

“In your experience,” she said coolly, eyes fixed on the changing floor numbers above the door rather than on him, “do things usually improve after a man tells a woman to relax?”

The question landed softly.

Which, in her case, made it worse.

After that, she let the silence return and kept it.

She did not look at him for the rest of the ride. Did not acknowledge whatever expression the line may have drawn from him. The descent was short enough that she could afford stillness, and she used it to think.

She still didn’t know why him.

That was the part irritating her now more than anything else.

If Charles and Adrian had only wanted her distracted, there were easier men to use. More obnoxious ones. Duller ones. The city was full of overconfident men willing to confuse insolence with charm. They could have assigned one of the family attorneys, some washed-up security director, a cousin’s friend from Yale with a square jaw and too much cologne. Someone irritating enough to fray her patience without being particularly effective.

Instead, they had chosen Roman.

Which meant irritation alone was not the point.

They had needed someone competent enough not to slow her down and insolent enough not to bend. Someone who would not frighten easily, would not defer too quickly, and would keep pressing at her in all the wrong places until her temper stayed just sharp enough to keep her off-balance. Strong enough not to be put off by her. Skilled enough not to become dead weight. Deliberately difficult.

A tailored problem.

The doors opened onto the main floor.

Vivienne stepped out first, spine straight, expression unreadable again.

The lobby was quieter now than when they’d entered. Softer lighting, lower voices, the hour tipping toward the kind of evening where buildings like this tried hardest to look undisturbed. Gavin Price stood near the reception desk with a folder in hand, posture too alert for anyone merely passing through. He looked up the second he saw them.

For one fleeting moment, it was obvious he wanted to say something.

Explain. Clarify. Offer himself back into relevance.

Vivienne turned her head and gave him a single look.

Nothing dramatic. No narrowed eyes, no sharpened mouth. Just enough of her attention to remind him where his instincts ought to be pointing.

He thought better of it immediately.

Good.

She kept walking.

Roman reached the front door first and opened it without ceremony. The cool night beyond pressed through the widening gap, carrying city air and wet pavement and the distant burn of food from somewhere down the block.

Before stepping out, Vivienne glanced once over her shoulder.

Price was already on the phone.

Of course he was.

Not frantic. Not visibly furtive. Just efficient. The kind of call building men made when they had been trained to understand that being useful often meant being first with information.

She filed that away and stepped outside.

The city met her in a rush—cold, alive, indifferent.

Vivienne drew in one slow breath and held it for half a second, letting the air clear the last of Halcyon House from her lungs. The stale suite. The false neutrality. The Blackwell fingerprints dressed up as anonymity.

When she finally spoke, her tone had changed.

Still cold. Still precise. But stripped now of some of the ornamental frost she wore inside buildings that belonged to her family. This was cleaner. More direct. She had already tried elegance with him. He was too quick for that sort of handling, too observant to be steered by implication alone.

So she didn’t bother.

“There’s a place a few blocks from here,” she said, eyes on the street ahead rather than on him. “Dark enough, anonymous enough, and unlikely to be infested with anyone who reports back to my father before last call.”

A beat.

Then she turned her head, looking at him fully.

“We’re not finished.”

No invitation in the words. No softness. Just fact.

“If you still want answers, walk with me.” Her gaze moved over him once, cool and exacting. “Have a drink. Say something worth hearing for a change.”

She started down the block before he answered, entirely confident he would follow if only because men like Roman Kessler disliked being left behind almost as much as they disliked being told what to do.

Roman let the elevator doors close before he answered her.

Not immediately.

Not even when she dropped the line about relax—which, admittedly, almost pulled a real reaction out of him.

Instead, he watched her reflection in the brushed metal. The way she held herself. The way she didn’t look at him. The control of it. The restraint.

Then—

“In your experience… do things usually improve after a man tells a woman to relax?”

Roman’s mouth twitched.

Not quite a smile.

More like he appreciated the hit.

“Almost never,” he said.

Calm.

Unbothered.

“And I keep doing it anyway.”

A beat.

“Bad habit.”

He didn’t elaborate.

Didn’t apologize.

Just let it sit there between them like something mildly inconvenient and entirely unsurprising.

⸻

By the time they stepped out into the lobby, Roman had already clocked Price before Vivienne acknowledged him.

The guy looked like he’d been waiting.

Not long enough to be obvious.

Long enough to matter.

Roman didn’t slow down. Didn’t engage. Just tracked it the same way he tracked everything else—filed it, moved past it.

The door came next.

Roman pushed it open without ceremony, stepping aside just enough for her to pass through first. Cold air spilled in, cutting clean through the building’s controlled atmosphere.

Outside felt better.

Real.

Less curated.

Roman stepped out after her, letting the door fall shut behind him with a muted click. He rolled his shoulders once, subtle, like he was shaking off the weight of the building rather than the conversation.

Then she spoke again.

Different tone this time.

Cleaner.

He noticed that too.

Roman listened without interrupting as she laid it out—place, distance, anonymity, no family eyes.

Then—

We’re not finished.

His gaze shifted to her fully now.

There it was.

Not the polished version.

Not the social one.

The real one.

Roman held her eyes for a second longer than necessary.

Then she turned and started walking.

Of course she did.

Roman didn’t answer right away.

He just watched her go for a few steps.

The way she moved through the street was the same as everywhere else—controlled, deliberate, like the city adjusted around her whether it wanted to or not.

Then he fell into step beside her.

Not rushing.

Not lagging.

Just matching pace.

“You’ve got a real talent,” he said after a moment, voice low, carrying easily through the night air.

“For making invitations sound like threats.”

A faint glance at her.

“Impressive.”

He shoved his hands into his coat pockets as they walked, eyes moving briefly over the street—traffic, pedestrians, reflections in glass, the usual quiet scan.

Then back to her.

“And for the record…”

His tone shifted slightly. Still dry. Still edged. But more focused now.

“I’ve been saying things worth hearing all night.”

A beat.

“You just don’t like most of them.”

He let that land.

Then added, almost casually:

“But I’ll take the drink.”

Another glance at her.

This one lingered a fraction longer than it should have.

“You might even get something better out of me once you stop pretending you’ve already solved it.”

Roman looked ahead again, matching her stride as they moved down the block together.

“Lead the way, Blackwell.”

Vivienne did not answer right away.

Not because his comment had stung. If anything, it came close to earning the one thing she almost never gave him freely: amusement.

A real talent for making invitations sound like threats.

She kept walking for another few steps, the city sliding around them in slick black pavement and reflected storefront light, before the faintest trace of something curved at the edge of her mouth.

“An occupational hazard,” she said at last.

Her tone was dry enough to keep the line from becoming warmth.

Beside her, Roman matched her pace too easily. Of course he did. He seemed to do most things with that same irritating lack of strain—as though the world, no matter how expensive or unfamiliar, was simply another place he’d decided not to feel out of place in. Vivienne found it deeply improper.

And, more annoyingly, increasingly difficult not to notice.

She refused to look at him when he said he’d been giving her worthwhile observations all night. Refused as well to acknowledge the longer glance that came after it, though she felt it all the same—precise enough to register, restrained enough to be deniable. Most men either stared or avoided looking altogether. Roman did neither. He watched in a way that suggested he expected to be watched back.

Insufferable.

“You confuse volume with value,” she said, crossing the next side street without breaking stride. “It’s a very common male weakness.”

A taxi hissed past through the damp street, its headlights washing briefly over the fronts of closed galleries and low-lit restaurants. Chelsea at this hour was neither glamorous nor ugly. Just expensive in pockets. Anonymous in others. Exactly what she wanted.

“And I’m not pretending anything,” she added a beat later, quieter now, though no less sharp. “I simply prefer not to perform every unfinished thought out loud while I’m still in possession of it.”

That, at least, was the difference between them.

Roman seemed content to think with sound. Vivienne preferred conclusions.

The corner ahead glowed with a wash of amber from a wine bar she dismissed instantly without even slowing. Too many windows. Too much glass. Too many people who would later describe the woman in the camel coat with unnerving accuracy.

She kept going.

Roman’s use of her last name lingered more than she would have liked.

Blackwell.

Not Ms. Blackwell with staff polish. Not Vivienne with deliberate insolence. Just the surname, clean and thrown back at her like something between a challenge and a concession. She should have disliked it more than she did.

So she said, with the faintest lift of one brow, “And if you’re going to keep calling me Blackwell as though you’re issuing instructions on a football field, at least try to do it with better material.”

The line almost entertained her.

Almost.

The next block was quieter. Fewer people. Better.

Vivienne slipped one hand into the pocket of her coat, the other still light on the chain strap of her bag, and let the night air work the last of Halcyon House out of her system. Her irritation had not vanished—far from it—but it had thinned just enough to leave something sharper in its place. Thought. Motion. That peculiar alertness that came when the game had shifted and she could feel the shape of it changing even if she couldn’t yet name the center.

She still did not know exactly why Roman had been placed in her path.

That question returned, persistent and unwelcome.

If Charles and Adrian wanted her distracted, yes, Roman served that purpose beautifully. He irritated her on instinct, pushed where most people deferred, and refused to behave like a man who knew his station. But the more time she spent with him, the less satisfied she was with that explanation alone. He was too effective. Too quick. Too capable of keeping pace once the problem stopped being theatrical and became real.

Which meant he was either exactly what he appeared to be—

or precisely what they needed him to be.

Neither possibility was comforting.

Vivienne glanced at him then, briefly, from the corner of her eye. Dark coat. Hands in pockets. That same rough, maddening calm. He looked less like a fixer beside her on a Chelsea sidewalk than he had inside the Blackwell library or the security room at Saint Celeste. More human. Less easily filed away.

She disliked that too.

“Don’t mistake this,” she said, eyes forward again, “for me enjoying your company.”

A pause.

“It’s simply become clear that sending you away would only mean listening to you later.”

There.

That felt more appropriate.

More honest, too, in its own way.

They passed another corner, then another. A man in a wool peacoat exited a restaurant carrying takeout; two women in heels smoked beneath a scaffolding tunnel; somewhere farther down the block, laughter burst from a bar doorway and vanished almost immediately into traffic noise.

Vivienne slowed slightly at the next intersection, scanning the opposite side of the street.

Not that one. Definitely not that one. Absolutely not anywhere with a DJ.

Then she spotted it half a block farther on—narrow frontage, low light, no obvious scene spilling onto the sidewalk, the kind of place that tried to look forgettable and mostly succeeded. Good.

She tilted her head toward it almost imperceptibly and kept walking.

“It’s ahead,” she said.

Then, after a beat, with just enough sarcasm to keep the moment from becoming anything like softness:

“Try not to say anything catastrophic before we make it inside. I’d hate to have dragged you this far only to abandon you on the pavement.”