The penthouse was a fortress, but the silence was a traitor. It whispered of the plan, of the trap, of the moments stretching between now and tomorrow night. Lysander was a vortex of controlled energy, his commands crisp, his presence a bulwark against the creeping dread. But in the quiet spaces between his phone calls and strategy sessions, the fear found me.
It coiled in my stomach as I watched his security team perform a final sweep of the penthouse, their devices humming. It flickered in the reflection of the darkened windows as Lysander showed me, for the third time, the tiny panic button sewn into the lining of the gown I would wear.
“It’s a direct frequency to me,” he said, his fingers brushing the small, hard lump against my ribs. “The moment you feel threatened. The moment he en
