THE DEVIL'S ASSISTANT

Closer

Selena

I made a decision Sunday night.

I sat on my bedroom floor with my back against the bed and my knees pulled to my chest and I made a decision that went against every sensible thought I had ever had in my entire life.

I was going to stop running.

Not toward him. Not yet. But I was going to stop pretending I felt nothing. Stop punishing myself for feelings I hadn't asked for and couldn't seem to get rid of no matter how hard I tried.

My mother called while I was sitting there.

"You sound different." she said immediately. She always knew.

"I'm fine mama."

"Mhm." A pause. "Is it a man?"

"Goodnight mama."

She laughed — warm and rich and so painfully familiar it made my chest ache. "Baby whatever it is don't let fear make the decision for you. Fear is a terrible navigator."

I stared at the ceiling after we hung up.

Fear is a terrible navigator.

Monday morning I walked into Croft Tower and for the first time since I started I didn't steel myself at the elevator. Didn't build the wall before the doors opened.

I just walked in.

Damien

She was different Monday morning.

I noticed it immediately. The careful distance she'd maintained since the gala — that deliberate professional coolness — was still there but something underneath it had shifted. Like a lock turning slowly from the inside.

She brought my coffee at 8AM and set it on my desk and when our eyes met she didn't look away first.

Small thing. Enormous thing.

I said nothing. Did nothing. Just held her gaze for one steady moment and let her find her own footing.

Marcus had told me once — you can't push a door that opens inward. You have to wait.

For the first time in my life I was learning how to wait.

Selena

It happened at 3PM.

I was at my desk when the phone rang. Unknown number. Something cold moved through me before I even answered.

"Miss Voss." A man's voice. Smooth and careful and immediately wrong. "I think it's time we had a conversation about your employer."

I sat very still.

"Who is this?"

"Someone who knows things about Damien Croft that you don't." A pause. "Things you should know before it's too late."

My heart was hammering but my voice stayed flat. "I don't know what you're talking about."

"You will." he said. "Be careful Miss Voss. The man you're protecting doesn't deserve it."

The line went dead.

I sat staring at my phone for a long moment. Then I stood up walked across the office and knocked on Damien's door.

"Come in."

He looked up from his screen. Read my face immediately — because he always read my face immediately — and was on his feet before I said a word.

"What happened." Not a question.

"Someone called me." I said. "About you."

Something shifted in his expression. Fast and dark and dangerous.

"What did they say."

"That you're hiding things." I held his gaze. "Are you?"

The silence that followed was the loudest thing I had ever heard.

He crossed the room slowly and stopped in front of me. Close. His eyes searched mine with an intensity that made it hard to breathe.

"Everyone hides things Selena."

"That's not an answer."

"No." he said quietly. "It's not."

I searched his face. Looking for the lie. Looking for the thing that would make this easier — make walking away easier.

I couldn't find it.

"You should have told me there were people who would come after you through me." My voice was steady but my hands weren't.

He noticed. His jaw tightened.

"I didn't think —"

"You didn't think I needed to know?" I said. "Or you didn't think they'd find me?"

"Both." The honesty of it was almost worse than a lie would have been.

I looked at him for a long moment. At this man who had paid my mother's bills without a word. Who had bought me an orchid and pretended he hadn't. Who had stood on a balcony in the cold and told me he was scared.

Who was standing in front of me now looking like a man waiting to be left.

I made a decision.

"Tell me everything." I said.

His eyes searched mine. "Selena —"

"Everything Damien." I said firmly. "If I'm in this — whatever this is — I need to know what I'm in."

A long silence.

Then he walked to his desk and pressed a button on his phone.

"Marcus." he said. "Close the building. Nobody in or out." He looked at me. "And bring the file."

He turned back to me and something in his expression cracked open just slightly.

"Sit down." he said quietly. "This is going to take a while."

I sat down.

And for the first time since I walked into Croft Tower I felt the ground shift beneath everything

But I didn't move.

I stayed.

Because fear was a terrible navigator.

And I was done letting it drive.