Chapter 9 - Anja
The second public appearance feels less like a performance and more like stepping onto a stage I already know the lighting for. This time it’s a private, invitation-only art auction at a sleek downtown gallery. It’s heavy on the city’s elite and light on actual art appreciation.
The kind of event where deals happen in hushed corners, and reputations are made or quietly ruined over expensive champagne.
I’m wearing another carefully chosen gown, deep emerald this time, the fabric cool and slippery against my skin. It hugs my waist and falls in a soft drape to the floor, the color pulling out the green in my eyes according to the stylist.
My hair is swept up again, auburn highlights catching the gallery lights like subtle flames. Simple diamond drops hang in my ears. Nothing flashy. Just enough to look like I belong on Alexey Sokolov’s arm.
He waits for me in the penthouse foyer, in a smoky gray suit tailored to perfection, the crisp white shirt making his brown eyes stand out even more.
Thirty-four years old, and he wears the years like quiet armor with his broad shoulders, steady posture, and that calm, methodical presence that never seems ruffled.
He offers his arm without a word, and I slide my hand into the crook of his elbow. The contact is familiar now.
We arrive at the event, with silence filling the SUV. After leaving the vehicle with the valet, Alexey escorts me inside.
The gallery is all white walls and dramatic spotlighting, abstract canvases hanging like expensive afterthoughts. Conversations hum low and polished. Cameras are discreet yet present, as society photographers circle the main room like sharks.
Alexey moves through it with effortless control, nodding to the right people, exchanging brief, measured words. His hand settles lightly at the small of my back as we pause near a sculpture that looks like twisted metal and regret.
The touch is possessive enough to make the cameras nearby flash. His palm is warm through the thin fabric of the gown, but gentle. Never lingering too long. Never crossing into anything that feels claiming in the wrong way.
I lean into the role, smiling softly when expected, letting my gaze rest on his face just long enough to sell the illusion. Inside, my pulse thrums with a mix of nerves and that menacing but vicious satisfaction I’m starting to crave.
Because Fadir is here.
He stands near the far wall, glass of champagne gripped too tightly, surrounded by a small cluster of men who look increasingly uncomfortable. The moment his eyes find us, his face drains of color exactly like at the gala.
Jaw tight. Shoulders rigid. Rage and disbelief warred across his features as he watched the woman he tried to trap, his convenient little pawn, standing beside his enemy with Alexey’s hand resting possessively at the small of my back.
For one long, delicious moment, our eyes lock across the room. I don’t look away. I let him see the quiet fire in mine. Let him feel the shift. The woman he gaslit and threatened is no longer hiding in his apartment waiting for scraps of approval.
She’s here, polished and poised, moving through his world on the arm of the man who’s systematically dismantling everything he built.
The satisfaction blooms hot and sweet in my chest, sharper than the first time. It feels like breathing after months underwater.
Alexey’s hand presses lightly, guiding me onward as the cameras flash again. He leans in just enough to murmur near my ear, voice low and even, “Steady. He’s watching.”
“I know,” I whisper back. “Let him.”
I smile at Alexey, lay my head on his shoulder as he kisses my temple. It's a simple action, but I know, without even glancing at Fadir, that he's fuming. When my eyes travel to where he's been standing most of the evening, he's gone.
Alexey must've noticed as well, because one of his handsw gentle squeeze my upper arm.
The rest of the evening passes with a hazy surrealness. We circulate. Alexey fields quiet business talk while I play the attentive date, laughing softly at the right moments. Asking polite questions about the art I don’t care about.
His touch remains calculated and impersonal, always for the optics, never for me. Yet every time his palm settles against my back, steady and warm, something dangerous shifts low in my stomach. Dangerous in the way that's not good for me.
I shove it down hard. This is revenge. Nothing more.
We leave before the auction begins, slipping out a side entrance where the SUV waits.
The ride back to the penthouse is quiet, with city lights streaking past the tinted windows.
Alexey doesn’t press for conversation, and I’m grateful.
My mind is still replaying Fadir’s face… pale, furious, and powerless.
Back inside the penthouse, the lights rise softly, the gas fireplace flickering to life with a gentle whoosh. I kick off my heels the moment the elevator doors close behind us, sighing as my bare feet enjoy being free from the heels.
Alexey shrugs out of his suit jacket, draping it over the back of a chair, then moves to the marble island where a stack of ledgers and his laptop wait.
He rolls up his sleeves and settles onto one of the stools, brown hair slightly tousled from the evening, his jaw with the proverbial five o'clock shadow, and the quiet competence radiates from him as he opens the first ledger, pen in hand, reviewing columns of numbers with focused calm.
I should head straight to the guest suite, allowing the night to fade. Instead, I find myself lingering near the island, watching him.
The way the low pendant light catches the sharp line of his jaw, drawing my eyes to his scar. The steady movement of his hand as he makes small notations. The broad set of his shoulders under the white shirt, relaxed but never lax.
He reviews the ledgers in silence, methodical and unhurried, the same way he does everything. No turmoil. No raised voice. No sudden mood swings that leave me bracing for the next explosion.
I catch myself staring.
The unwanted feeling stirs again, warmer this time, more insistent.
The memory of his hand at the small of my back tonight, gentle yet steady through the silk.
The way heads turned when we entered the gallery.
The quiet safety I felt walking beside him amid all those powerful people, even with Fadir watching like he wanted to drag me back by my hair.
Furious at myself, I snap before I can think better of it.
“You’re basically ancient, you know that?”
The words come out sharper than I intended, laced with sarcasm to cover the dangerous warmth blooming in my chest. I cross my arms, leaning against the opposite side of the island. For some unknown reason, I had the need to bring up our age difference.
“Thirty-four. Practically geriatric compared to me. All this quiet competence and ledger-reviewing at ten o’clock at night. Most guys your age are still figuring out how to do their own laundry.”
Alexey lifts his gaze slowly, chocolate eyes meeting mine across the marble. There’s no anger, no offense. Just that small, knowing half-smile that tugs at one corner of his mouth. It's the one that makes something traitorously soft twist in my stomach. He sets the pen down without hurry.
“Ancient,” he repeats, tone dry but level. “Noted.”
He doesn’t push. Doesn’t flirt back or turn it into something else.
He simply picks up the pen again and returns to the ledger, calm as ever. The professional line we agreed on stays firmly in place, exactly as he promised the morning after the deal.
No blurred edges. No expectations. No taking advantage of the fact that I’m living under his roof, dependent on his protection, while we tear Fadir’s world apart.
I stand there a moment longer, cheeks heating with a mix of embarrassment and frustration at him for being so unflappably steady, at myself for noticing.
For the way I still wake up some mornings expecting to hear Fadir’s voice calling from the master bedroom, smooth and manipulative, only to remember I’m across the hall from a man who has never once crossed that line.
Despite me wanting him to.
Alexey’s quiet presence has become its own kind of constant. The roof over my head. The resources. The steady hand at my back for the cameras. The way he listens when I offer intel without treating me like I’m fragile or disposable.
It terrifies me how safe it feels.
I push off the island, muttering something about needing sleep, and retreat to the guest suite. The emerald gown pools on the floor as I change into an oversized t-shirt and slip between the crisp white sheets.
The penthouse is silent, and I’m frustrated.
Sleep doesn’t come easily. I lie there staring at the ceiling, replaying the night. Fadir’s drained face. Alexey’s hand was warm and sure against my back. The way he reviewed those ledgers in perfect quiet competence, and never demanding anything more from me than the deal allowed.
The age gap I threw at him like a shield. Thirteen years that should make this easy to dismiss. He’s older, dangerous, and part of the same world I ran from.
Yet he’s never once made me feel trapped. Never raised his voice. Never made the professional boundary feel like a cage.
The quiver in my chest refuses to die. It’s not gratitude anymore. Not entirely. It’s something warmer, more dangerous, that has no place in a revenge plot.
I roll over, pressing my face into the pillow.
This is supposed to be about hurting Fadir. About walking away with enough money to start over, far from here. About proving I’m not the broken girl who lets men use her.
But tonight, alone in the stillness of the night, I can’t stop seeing Alexey’s steady eyes across the gallery. The quiet way he keeps choosing the professional line, even when I snap at him like a cornered animal.
He’s nothing like Fadir. That might be the most terrifying realization of all.
***