NIKO.
Edmund arrived with the kind of look that told me everything before he even opened his mouth. I noticed that careful neutrality, the slight pause at the doorway before Alex dashed out, and the way he adjusted his cuff like he was buying himself time. He didn’t waste time with pleasantries. He never did when my mother was involved. He stepped into my study, closed the door behind him, and sighed like a man carrying a message he didn’t agree with but had been paid to deliver anyway.
“Your mother sent me,” he said finally.
I leaned back against the desk, arms folded. “I figured.”
“She’s displeased,” he continued. “With how you handled things. With how you treated her guest.”
I laughed once, short and humorless. “That’s one way to put it.”
“She says you chose Alex over her,” he con
