Laura stayed quiet, sensing this was a story he needed to tell in his own way.
"I spilled wine on her dress on purpose," Nikolai continued, his voice taking on a distant quality. "Oldest trick in the book, create a problem so you can offer to fix it, and she was so kind about it, didn't even get angry, just smiled and said these things happen."
"You were using her from the start," Laura said, not as a question but as understanding.
"That was the plan," Nikolai agreed, twirling the ribbon between his fingers like a nervous habit he'd developed over years. "Seduce the Alpha's daughter, get her to reveal secrets about her father's defenses, trade routes, anything useful, and then disappear with the information before anyone figured out what happened."
"But it didn't go that way," Laura gu
