Chapter 34
1118 Words
Alicia was gone.
Quinn barely registered it—one second she was beside him, the next she’d vanished into the chaos like smoke through his fingers.
But his focus snapped back to the fight.
Sasha and Ryan were tearing through the ballroom like a storm. Guests screamed, ducking for cover. Security scrambled, unsure whether to intervene or run.
Ryan lunged, swinging a baton from his jacket, catching Sasha across the arm. She staggered back, snarling, but didn’t falter. Quinn surged forward, cutting across the panicked crowd.
“Sasha!” he shouted.
She ducked another blow, rolled behind Ryan, and slammed a hard kick into the back of his knee. He buckled slightly, just as Quinn crashed into him from the side, tackling him into a marble column. The two men grunted and grappled, Ryan throwing an elbow into Quinn’s ribs.
Sasha moved in a blur, slipping behind Ryan and twisting his arm hard behind his back.
Ryan tried to throw her off—but Quinn grabbed the other arm, and together, they forced him down.
With a sharp crack, Sasha slammed Ryan’s head against the floor, hard enough to knock him out, but not kill.
He slumped.
Quinn and Sasha exchanged breathless glances before grabbing each of Ryan’s arms and hauling him up between them. Security was moving now, pushing through the panicked guests.
“We need to move—now,” Quinn barked.
They half-dragged, half-carried Ryan out through the service hallway. Sasha was silent the entire time, her jaw clenched, eyes forward, not sparing Quinn a single glance.
The limo was waiting at the back entrance.
Gary was leaned halfway out the door, tie crooked and drink in hand. “Hey! What’d I miss?” he slurred. “Looks like someone had too much fun.”
Calvin stepped out of the shadows, his smirk already forming. “Well, well. I didn’t know it was a masquerade and a wrestling match. Did I miss the dance card?”
“Shut up,” Quinn grunted, throwing open the door as they shoved Ryan inside.
Sasha climbed in without a word, taking the farthest seat from Quinn.
Gary belched and hiccupped. “Seriously, was it a three-way? I feel like I should’ve bought popcorn.”
Quinn didn’t respond. He looked at Sasha.
She didn’t look back.
Her arms were crossed, her eyes fixed out the window. She didn’t speak a word the entire ride back to the chateau.
The silence was suffocating.
The chateau was quiet when they arrived. Calvin had arranged for the lower level to be prepped in advance—a cold, stone-walled space designed for interrogation. There was a one-way mirror dividing the room, giving them full surveillance and observation.
Quinn and Sasha dragged Ryan’s limp form down the narrow stairs, each step echoing ominously through the corridors.
Gary stumbled behind them, humming to himself, completely unaware of the tension thickening like fog.
Calvin opened the secure room. “This one’s soundproof, got cameras on every wall. Steel locks. He’s not going anywhere.”
They tossed Ryan onto the steel-framed bed in the corner of the room, in the middle of the room was an interrogation table. Sasha immediately began strapping restraints to his wrists and ankles, moving with cold efficiency.
Quinn watched her, the tightness in his chest worsening.
She wouldn’t look at him.
When they were sure Ryan was secure, they stepped out and sealed the door. From the outside, they could see him through the one-way glass.
“Get some rest,” Calvin said. “We’ll interrogate him in the morning.”
Sasha was already walking away, her steps brisk and silent.
Quinn moved to follow. “Sasha—”
She didn’t stop.
“Sasha, wait.”
Still nothing. She turned the corner of the hall, disappearing up the staircase without a word.
Quinn stood there alone, her silence louder than any shout.
The ache in his chest deepened.
He didn’t know what hurt worse—seeing her in Beck’s arms, or knowing she didn’t want to talk to him now.
Quinn stood at the bottom of the staircase, fists clenched at his sides. The silence that followed Sasha’s retreat felt heavier than any words she could’ve thrown at him.
He debated going after her, taking the steps two at a time and demanding she tell him what was wrong—why she wouldn’t look at him, why her silence felt like a punishment.
But something stopped him.
Maybe it was the flicker of hurt he’d seen in her eyes. The same pain he now carried like a splinter lodged too deep to pull out. That look she gave him on the dance floor—when he was holding Alicia. He hadn’t been thinking. He was chasing answers, not betrayal.
But it hadn’t mattered.
To Sasha, it had looked like something else.
The image burned in his mind: Sasha in Beck’s arms, her body stiff, her eyes glancing back at him with a look that had said everything. She hadn’t wanted to go with Beck. She had wanted to be with Quinn.
And now, he had no idea where they stood.
Quinn turned away from the stairs and headed down the hall, back toward the observation room.
Gary was slouched on a couch, one leg over the other, watching Ryan through the one-way glass like it was a late-night thriller.
Calvin leaned against the wall, arms crossed. “You two got pretty cozy out there,” he said, nodding toward the hallway Sasha disappeared into. “Hell of a dance.”
Quinn didn’t respond.
“Look,” Calvin sighed, tone softening, “you don’t have to say it. I get it. She's not easy. But trust me—if she’s hurt, it’s because she feels something. Sasha doesn’t do feelings, not unless it’s real.”
Quinn’s jaw tensed. “Yeah, well… it’s hard to tell with her sometimes.”
Calvin smirked faintly. “That’s because you haven’t figured out that when she pushes you away, it means she’s scared.”
Quinn’s silence confirmed the truth he didn’t want to admit.
He looked through the glass at Ryan—still unconscious, still strapped down—and knew the answers he needed were coming. But somehow, the answers from Sasha felt even more important now.
He stepped back from the glass, the weight of everything pressing into his shoulders. The ballroom. Alicia. Beck. Sasha.
Calvin turned toward the stairs. “Get some rest, Virelli. You’ll need it tomorrow.”
But Quinn didn’t sleep.
He just kept thinking about Sasha’s eyes, and the question neither of them had the courage to ask:
What if this—whatever this was between them—was becoming something real?
- Writer
