Aria’s POV
Elena’s hands trembled slightly as she pulled a folded page from beneath the waistband of her borrowed clothes, the paper soft with handling.
“I’ve been carrying this since I got back,” she said. “Too afraid to show you. Too afraid not to.”
Romanov took it from her carefully, unfolding it with the same precise attention he gave everything. I watched his eyes move across the page, his fingers pausing on the paper as he read, until finally he looked up with an expression I’d never seen on him before.
Something close to shock.
“Dmitri,” he said.
My stomach dropped. “Your head of security.”
“According to this,” Romanov said, his voice carefully controlled despite the visible strain beneath it, “he’s been receiving payments from a Northbridge subsidiary for the past eight mont
