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He doesn’t blink. He just looks at me—and this time, he really looks.
Something shifts in his expression. A quiet pause. A flicker of something just beneath the surface, like he hadn’t expected me to speak with such clarity, with such brutal honesty.
I don’t flinch. I let him see all of it—my frustration, my weariness, my calculated boldness wrapped around a desperate hope. I hold his gaze like it’s my only anchor in a world constantly spinning out of my control.
And for a second, just a second, I feel like maybe—I’ve got him listening not just with his ears but his mind too.
It’s small—just a flicker of something behind his eyes—but it’s there. A shift.
So, I press forward.
“My father won’t hesitate to pair me with someone else. Someone less intelligent. Less strategic. Someone who’ll want a real wife and children and the power that comes with being in my father’s inner circle. This arrangement keeps all of that at bay. It also keeps you free and keeps me safe.”
He exhales through his nose and looks away for the first time. The firelight flickers across his sharp profile. There’s a storm in his silence, one I can’t name.
“Keeps me free?”
“Yes,” I nod. “Free from marriage.”
“And what makes you think I do not want a real wife and children?
“Because you are what….forty? and still unmarried.”
He stares at me for a moment, and when he finally speaks, his voice is quieter, but no less lethal. “Do you know what happens to women who marry men like me, Mara?”
I meet his eyes without flinching. “Yes.”
He studies me. “Do you?”
“I know you’re not cruel,” I say. “I know you’re not careless. And I know you would never raise a hand to a woman. Especially not your wife.”
A beat passes. Then another. Zasha’s gaze lowers to his hands, flexing once before stilling.
“I’m not the type of man girls dream of,” he mutters.
“Good.” I smile slightly. “Because I’m not a girl. And I don’t dream.”
Another silence stretches between us, but it’s different now. Tense, yes, but alive. I can feel him shifting. Calculating. And for the first time, considering.
Before he can answer, we hear footsteps approaching. Zasha straightens, his expression unreadable once again.
“Xiomara?” my father says, brows drawn low. “What are you doing here?”
I turn to him with a warm smile and kiss him on both cheeks. “I was looking for you,” I say smoothly, looping my arm through his without missing a beat. “I had a thought I wanted to run by you.”
His eyes flick from me to Zasha and back again, lingering with suspicion—but he doesn’t press. Not yet.
Behind me, Zasha says nothing.
5
Chapter 3
Zasha
Later that night, I find myself replaying Mara’s offer.
I’ve faced down men who begged with blood in their teeth and lies in their eyes. I’ve broken bones and taken confessions that should’ve stayed buried. But nothing—nothing—has rattled me like the sound of her voice in that corridor.