Page 12 of Hooked On Victor (Hooked #3)

Chapter twelve

The room was colder by morning, the hearth just a blackened mouth swallowing what little heat lingered.

Damp sea fog pressed against the old, wavy glass of the windows, beading in rivulets that trickled down like tears.

The wind had quieted to a low, restless moan, rattling the eaves and tapping a loose shutter in an uneven, syncopated rhythm.

Victor sat at the edge of the bed in the half-light, shirtless, bruised, and unmoving.

His back was a lattice of old scars and new welts, the gauze at his ribs stained rust-red and peeling away at the edges.

His head hung forward, damp hair falling into his eyes, breath fogging faintly in the chill.

Rose watched him from the doorway.

She felt the envelope in her fingers like it had weight beyond its slim size.

The oilskin was cracked with age, stiff but pliant from decades of careful hiding.

The wax seal had been broken last night under her thumb, but the shape of the Romanov crest was still pressed into its surface, accusing and proud.

She took one step forward.

He didn’t look up.

Another.

Close enough now to see the shallow rise and fall of his shoulders, the way his hands were splayed on his knees like he didn’t trust them not to shake.

She sat on the edge of the mattress beside him, the old springs groaning under the shift.

“Victor,” she said softly.

He turned, just enough that she could see the bruises beneath his eyes. The raw split on his lip. The guarded flicker behind his gaze that hadn’t left since the fight.

She held out the envelope to him carefully.

“I didn’t read much,” she said gently. “But it has your full name on it. Twice.”

His eyes dropped to it, and for a second she thought he wouldn’t take it at all.

Then, with slow, deliberate care, he lifted it from her hands as if it might burn him.

He ran his thumb over the seal.

Over the faded wax.

Over the crest he wore carved into his own skin.

Viktor Alexandrov Romanov.

She saw him swallow.

That name hadn’t been spoken aloud in years.

Kept in shadows. Passed like a secret between men who survived too long.

He broke the brittle seal the rest of the way with a soft crack , and the sound seemed to echo in the small room.

The scent of old ink and faintly charred paper spilled out like a ghost, dry and acidic, clawing at her nose.

He pulled out the letter with fingers that trembled just slightly.

The paper was thin and brown with age, cracking at the folds. Ink had bled in places, water-damaged and blurred. But the handwriting was still there. Elegant Cyrillic at the top. Below it, lines in careful, slanted French.

Victor’s eyes scanned it, line by line, chest rising and falling unevenly.

Rose sat silent. Watching the movement of his eyes. The way his thumb hovered over words like he could pull them off the page and make them speak.

Then, voice raw, he read.

My dearest Viktor,

If you are reading this, then the world has changed again.

Our blood was never meant to survive this long—but if we have, then you are the last breath of something they failed to kill.

This safehouse was built before I fled St. Petersburg. Inside, you’ll find what I could not protect myself: a cipher hidden in ink, a map only a Romanov can follow, and a failsafe meant to burn it all if greed wins over history.

The flash drive contains a list of names—enemies and allies, marked by bloodlines older than the revolution. Trust none until one proves otherwise.

But you are not alone, my boy. Another survived. You are not the only one left to carry this fire.

From blood and ashes, we rise.

—Aleksei Romanov, cousin of the Tsarevich

Victor didn’t speak for a long time after the last line fell from his lips.

He just stared at the signature.

The ink there had faded the worst, feathering at the edges.

He traced the letters with the pad of his thumb so lightly she wondered if he even felt the paper.

Rose watched him breathe.

Watched the vein in his temple pulse.

The lines bracketing his mouth deepen.

When he finally set the letter down, it was with the kind of care you gave to the dead.

She didn’t speak.

Just waited.

She knew him well enough now to know pushing would make him shut down.

Instead she reached for the map tucked behind the letter, folded like origami, vellum-thin and yellowed with time. She unfolded it carefully, the lines crackling in the cold.

Under the lamplight, fine black ink traced rivers, borders, the faint topography of an estate in Europe.

There, near the center, was the symbol of fire.

And beneath it, in neat, small lettering:

Failsafe trigger – sealed in the west wing wall. Activate only if the vault is compromised.

Heat-activated ink glowed faintly in an X when she passed her fingers over it.

She swallowed hard.

Then tucked the map into his palm.

He didn’t resist.

But he didn’t look at her.

Not yet.

Finally she reached into the envelope’s bottom and pulled out the last object: a small, black flash drive. Its surface was scuffed, but intact. Taped to its side was a note in sharp, modern handwriting:

From one Romanov to another. —N.

Victor’s eyes sharpened.

He took it with a shaking hand.

Turned it over once. Twice.

Rose watched him exhale.

“Nikolai?” she said softly.

He nodded, slow. Like his neck barely remembered how.

“He’s not trying to kill me.”

She blinked.

“You’re sure?”

He huffed, low and humorless.

“He could’ve. That day at the clinic—he looked right at you. If he’d wanted to, he could’ve taken everything from me in seconds. But he left us untouched. And this…” He held the flash drive up between two fingers, letting it catch the pale lamplight. “This is a warning. A gift. Both.”

Her eyes softened.

“He’s blood,” she murmured.

Victor’s throat worked visibly.

“Another forgotten cousin,” he said, voice cracking. “Just like me.”

Silence pressed in around them.

The wind picked up outside, rattling the loose shutter with renewed fury.

Rose didn’t let him slip back into that silence.

She reached for his free hand, fingers weaving between his like she’d always known how they fit.

“What do we do now?” she asked.

He finally looked at her.

Really looked.

Like she was the only thing in the room.

The only thing left in the world that felt real .

His jaw worked once, twice.

Then his shoulders straightened.

“We go to Europe,” he said quietly. Firmly.

He turned the flash drive in his fingers again before setting it down carefully on the letter and map.

“We find the vault. And we end this.”

Rose’s breath hitched.

She leaned closer until their foreheads touched.

“Together,” she whispered.

Victor exhaled.

A shudder rolled through his body.

“Always,” he said.

Then he kissed her.

Slow.

Sure.

No hunger this time. No desperation.

Just promise.

Just the weight of generations behind it.

Outside, the wind howled against the walls like the past refusing to die.

Inside, between the stone and the sea fog and the cold hearth waiting to be lit, a legacy stirred to life again.