Aria’s POV
Nobody slept much after the message arrived.
Romanov spent what remained of the night on the phone with people I never saw, his voice low and clipped through the study door, while I sat awake in the room that had somehow become mine without either of us ever officially deciding it.
By morning, the estate had transformed again—more guards, tighter rotations, a version of lockdown that made the previous ones look almost casual.
“We’re not meeting their terms,” Romanov said when I found him at breakfast, dark circles carved beneath his eyes. “But we’re not ignoring them either. I want eyes on every road leading to this property, and I want a response drafted that buys us time without giving them anything.”
“What kind of response?”
“One that makes them think I’m considering it
