Chapter 6
He hasn't meant to come early. He never did. But something made him arrive before others —before the staged smiles, the empty laughter, the games everyone played with crystal glasses and veiled threats.
He stood near a sculpture, no one paid attention to, glass of something expensive on hand, eyes moving across the crowd with quiet calculations.
It was always the same. The same faces. The same politics. The same women, bold and bored, and glancing his way with painted mouths and false intrigue.
Then —
She walked in.
No fanfare. No diamonds. Just a long black coat, too modest for this kind of place. A girl with eyes like frost and iron.
She didn't fidget.
She didn't stumble.
She just looked —at the gallery, at the walls, at the people —like she was memorizing everything, just Incase it disappeared.
Anton watched her quietly, unreadable as always. But inside something shifted. Not desire—he was too disciplined for that.
It was something older. Stranger.
Recognition.
She reminded him of a silence he hadn't felt in years. The kind that used to hang in this mother's studio, in the hour just before dawn.
He watched the way she refused to shrink, even as the crowd whispered and measured her with her eyes. She didn't belong here. That was obvious. But she didn't run.
He respected that.
He hadn't moved in ten minutes. And that —he noticed —was rare.
"You are staring," came Markov's voice at his shoulder.
"Am I ?"
"You want me to find out who she is?"
"Already did."
Anton turned slightly. Set his glass down. Adjusted the cuff of his suit.
"Bring me her name on paper," he said. "No noise"
He didn't go to her —not yet.
He waited.
Because something told him she wasn't the kind of girl you approach like all the others.
You let her notice you first.
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She'd been here less than ten minutes, but it felt like an hour. She kept her hands tightly clasped in front of her, fingers pressed just enough to keep them from trembling. Her breath was steady. Her expression calm.
She knew how to disappear in a room, even when standing in plain sight. Years of working behind bars, of dealing with drunks, with stares, with pity —had thought her that stillness had its own armor.
But tonight it wasn't pity she felt on her skin. It was heat. Like someone was watching her. Not the usual stares —the shallow passing kind that people throw without thought.
No. The gaze had weight. She didn't look, not yet. She studied the painting in front of her —something abstract and cold. She let her eyes trace meaningless shapes and colors while every nerve in her body tensed under the pressure.
Someone powerful was watching her. She didn't know how she knew —she just did. The same way you know when a storm is coming. It sits in the air. It changes the rhythm of your lungs.
Finally, she let herself glance across the room. He stood by the sculpture. Dark suit. Pale light. Still as stone. Their eyes met. Just for a breath. Just long enough for her chest to tighten.
She looked away before he did. Not out of fear but refusal to play a game, she hadn't agreed to. She reached for a glass of champagne from a passing tray, eve n though sh hated the taste. She took a sip cause it gave her something to do. Something to hold on to.
But her heart was no longer steady. And something inside her whispered, You shouldn't have come.
She kept to the edges. Not because she was timid —but because she'd learned that it's where you see the most truth. From the corner of the room, people showed themselves more honestly: the fake emailed that wilted when backstage turned, the subtle power plays, the women laughing too loudly at jokes that weren't funny.
She studied the art when she needed a moment to breathe. Memorized details. Let her eyes rest on color when conversations grew too sharp.
A professor introduced her to someone —a man who smiled with his mouth but not with his eyes. Nastya gave polite answers, kept her voice soft and made herself just interesting enough to be forgotten. She could feel him weighing her, classifying her, dismissing her by the third sentence.
She didn't care. She wasn't there for them.
She felt the presence before she saw him again. Still near the sculpture. Still watching —Anton.
He didn't follow her. He didn't approach. But his gaze brushed her, like a hand across her spine.
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Anton moved like a ghost through the room —silent, dark, commanding. He spoke when necessary, nodded when expected. He exchanged the right words with the right people: a business heir here, a political wife there.
They all tried to impress him. He let them.
He didn't care for art but he understood power. This room was full of people pretending to have it.
"Appearances'" Viktor Reznikov once said, "are currency. Spend them wisely "
So Anton smiles when needed. Tipped his glass. Let the lies drip honey.
But the girl in black. She was the only thing not performing. Every time his eyes returned to her, it wasn't curiosity—it was calm. Like watching snow fall on an empty street. Something he couldn't own or manipulate.
He noticed how she tilted her hair slightly when listening, how she kept her hands folded, how she made herself small without seeming weak.
"You've barely said a word tonight," someone teased at his elbow.
" I prefer silence " he replied, "it doesn't lie"
He caught her looking at him again. she turned away just before their eyes could lock.
Smart girl