Chapter 41 VICTOR’S FURY

Chapter 41 VICTOR’S FURY

At half past eight in the evening, three familiar taps sounded on Kira’s door. She was seated near the window and brushing out her hair with slow but steady strokes, and a sigh of irritation escaped her mouth before she put the brush down and called out.

"Come in."

She has left the door open, and she wondered why he hadn't badged in like he did on most occasions. Victor stepped inside and closed the door slowly, taking his time to make sure it was secure. He did not move across the room immediately even after that. He simply stood near the door with his hands loose at his sides, watching her in the mirror's reflection with a look that told her that this was not going to be one of the ordinary nights.

"You've been distracted lately," he said.

His voice was calm and almost gentle. Kira had learned by now that this was the version of Victor she needed to fear the most, not the usual growling, possessive man who fucked her like she was his personal whore.

"I've had a lot on my mind," she said carefully, turning on the small stool to face him.

"I imagine you have." He moved further into the room, still unhurried, his eyes never leaving her face. "I've been patient with you, Kira. More patient than most men in my position would be. I opened my home to you and gave you comfort, protection, and access to a life you couldn't have dreamed of wherever you crawled out from. And I expected, in return, a certain level of loyalty."

"I'm grateful," she said, and hated how easily the lie came out of her.

Victor smiled faintly, a smile that didn't reach anywhere near his eyes. He crossed the last few feet between them and reached down, arrogantly tilting her chin up with one finger. His touch was light and tender, but his gaze moved over her face with a cold intensity.

"I know you've been spending time with Rex all this while, Kira," he said.

Kira kept her breathing steady. "We talk sometimes. He's my stepbrother and we live in the same house."

"Mm." Victor's thumb brushed once along her jaw. "I'd like to believe that's all it is. I'd like to believe you understand exactly where your interests lie in this house, and who is capable of protecting them."

His hand slowly crept from her chin to her throat, but he didn't grip her like he would have done. He simply rested his palm there, fingers loose against her pulse, and the weight of it said everything his voice refused to. It was not a threat spoken aloud, but a reminder of capability that was patient and unhurried, and it terrified her more than any shout could have.

"Victor," she said quietly.

"I'm not angry," he said, in a tone that suggested the opposite with every syllable. "I simply want you to remember what you have here, Kira… And what you stand to lose if you forget it."

She held perfectly still under his hand, her pulse hammering against his fingers, and she said nothing because there was nothing safe to say.

Then his expression changed again, softening into something warm, and the sudden change was even more unsettling than the stillness before it.

"I have good news, actually," he said, releasing her throat and stepping back half a pace. "I finally spoke to Blackstone again this afternoon, and the lawyer meeting I promised you is finally scheduled. Next week, in the city. We'll go over Elena's estate properly this time, all of it, and put an end to your questions."

Kira felt something cold move through her chest. She couldn't believe what she had just heard. "Next week," she repeated hesitantly.

"Next week," Victor confirmed, and the warmth in his voice was so perfectly constructed, so smooth and reasonable, that for one terrible second she almost wanted to believe him.

"Thank you," she said instead, keeping her face soft and grateful, keeping her eyes wide and hopeful the way she had practiced in the mirror so many times now that it barely felt like acting anymore. "That means a lot to me, Victor. Really."

"I know it does." He studied her for a moment longer, with dark satisfaction settling into the lines of his face like a man closing a deal he'd already decided was won. Then he suddenly leaned down and pressed his lips to her temple, brief and weirdly affectionate, something that felt like the kiss a father might give a daughter rather than whatever twisted relationship existed between them.

"Sleep well," he said, straightening himself. "We have a long week ahead."

He left without waiting for a response, closing the door behind him with the same careful click he'd used to open it, while Kira sat frozen on the small stool long after his footsteps faded down the hallway.

She stood slowly and walked to the window, wrapping her arms around herself as the cold from the glass seeped through her sleeve. Her heart was still going too fast, and she pressed one hand flat against her chest as if she could slow it down by force.

A lawyer meeting. An answer, finally, after weeks of soon and trust me and I'm handling it.

She wanted to believe it was real. She wanted, more than anything, to believe that in seven days she would finally have the truth about her mother laid out in front of her in black and white, real and undeniable.

But she thought of the locked drawer in his desk with its small keyhole. She thought of the memo that was folded into the pages of a library book, the black marker covering a name except for two initials that hadn't been erased. She thought of the wardrobe cupboard, the family portrait with her mother's head cut cleanly away, and the violent red X slashed across the empty space where Elena's body should have been.

Containment protocol. Sensitive exposure.

A man who spoke in gentle, reasonable tones about a lawyer meeting was not the same man who had marked his dead wife's photograph like a target. Kira knew that now. She had felt it in the weight of his hand against her throat tonight, the patient reminder of exactly how easily he could close his fingers if he ever decided to.

She thought about Rex somewhere down the hall, probably still awake, probably still turning over every word from the kitchen the way she was turning over every word from tonight.

She thought about Vanessa, and the smile she'd worn at breakfast, and the two words Kira had said once the room emptied out.

She knows.

Kira let her forehead rest against the cold windowpane and closed her eyes.

Seven days, she told herself. Seven days until the truth, or seven days until whatever Victor actually intended.

She wasn't sure anymore which one she believed.