Chapter 5
The elevator to Victor’s penthouse didn’t stop at any other floors.
Ava watched the numbers climb, her overnight bag heavy in her grip.
“Relax,” Victor said. His reflection in the polished doors looked perfectly composed. “It’s just an apartment.”
“Your apartment. Where I’ll be sleeping.”
“In the guest room. With a lock on the door.”
“Right. The lock.”
The doors opened directly into his foyer. Floor-to-ceiling windows showed Manhattan spread below like a circuit board, lights glittering against darkness.
“Guest room is down the hall,” Victor said, taking her bag before she could protest. “Second door on the right. Bathroom attached.”
The apartment was nothing like she’d expected.
She’d pictured something cold. Artifacts from centuries of existence. Dark wood and older darkness. Instead, there were books everywhere, stacked on the coffee table, lined on built-in shelves, piled on the kitchen counter like they’d escaped from the study and were making a break for freedom.
“You read,” she said.
“Extensively.” He set her bag in the hallway. “Are you hungry? We missed lunch.”
They’d finally managed the shopping trip without work intervening. Three hours at Bergdorf’s with Victor’s black credit card and a personal shopper who didn’t blink when he said, “She needs everything.”
Everything had turned out to be six bags currently sitting in her new closet. Her closet. At his apartment.
“I could eat.” She wandered to the windows. “Do you cook?”
“I manage.” He moved to the kitchen and opened the refrigerator. “Pasta?”
“Sure.”
She watched him work. He’d removed his suit jacket, rolled up his sleeves. The muscles in his forearms shifted as he chopped garlic. She’d seen him review contracts, command conference rooms, face down ancient demons. Watching him cook felt more intimate than any of it.
“Can I help?”
“Wine’s in the rack by the window.”
She found a red, located glasses in the second cabinet she tried. The domestic rhythm felt borrowed.
“We should talk about Monday,” Victor said, sautéing garlic in olive oil. “When we arrive together.”
“The performance continues.” She poured wine, slid a glass across the counter.
“Lilith will be watching. The other partners too. We need to be convincing.”
“Haven’t we been?”
“Three days of avoiding each other after Tuesday’s dinner hardly screams new relationship.” He glanced at her. “You were the one who disappeared.”
“You were giving me space I didn’t ask for.”
“Fair.” He added pasta to boiling water. “So what do we do about it?”
“Practice. Spend actual time together. Figure out how to be around each other without it being awkward.”
“And the physical aspect?”
“We should probably get comfortable with that too. For Monday.”
He drained the pasta, mixed it with garlic and oil, added fresh basil. They ate at the kitchen island with the city lights as backdrop, talking about nothing important: demon law, her parents’ restaurant, his opinions on historical periods.
“The Enlightenment was overrated,” he said. “Everyone was very pleased with themselves.”
“This is good.” She gestured at the pasta with her fork.
“You sound surprised.”
“I didn’t picture demons cooking.”
“We eat. We sleep. We do most things humans do.” He refilled her wine. “We just do them for much longer.”
After dinner, they moved to the living room. Ava took one end of the leather sofa. Victor took the other. A foot of space between them.
“This is ridiculous,” she said. “We look like teenagers at a school dance.”
“What would you suggest?”
She moved closer before she could overthink it, settling against his side. He tensed. Then slowly relaxed, his arm coming around her shoulders.
“See?” she said. “Not so hard.”
His thumb traced patterns on her upper arm. “You’re not afraid of me.”
“Should I be?”
“Most humans would be.”
“My survival instincts have always been questionable.” She tilted her head to look at him. “Ask my mom about the time I tried to pet a rattlesnake.”
“You didn’t.”
“I was five. It was sunbathing on a rock. I thought it was pretty.”
He laughed, a real laugh, surprised out of him. “What happened?”
“My grandmother grabbed me before I could reach it. Gave me the lecture of a lifetime about looking versus touching.” She fingered the jade pendant through her shirt. “She knew, didn’t she? About all of this.”
“I think so. The Kunlun jade, her warnings about hungry things.” His thumb kept tracing patterns. “She was trying to prepare you.”
“She told me to always wear it. That it would keep me safe.”
“She was right.”
They sat in silence. The city hummed below. His fingers kept moving on her arm, tracing patterns that made it hard to think.
“We should practice kissing,” Ava said.
“Probably.”
Neither of them moved.
He turned to look at her. She turned to look at him. His gaze dropped to her mouth, then back up. The moment stretched.
Then he cupped her face, thumb brushing her cheekbone. Slower than in the conference room. Deliberate.
“May I?”
“Yeah.”
He leaned in and kissed her softly. Testing. She kissed him back, and he made a sound against her mouth and pulled her closer, one hand sliding into her hair, the other finding her waist.
She opened for him. The kiss deepened, turned urgent. He tasted like wine and she wanted more of it, wanted more of him. Her fingers curled into his shirt, dragging him closer until there was no space left between them.
His hand tightened in her hair, angling her head back. She gasped and he swallowed the sound, kissing her harder. His other hand slid up her spine, pressing her against him.
She couldn’t think. Couldn’t remember why this was supposed to be practice.
She swung a leg over, straddling his lap, and felt him hard beneath her. His hips jerked up involuntarily and he groaned into her mouth, a sound that shot straight through her.
“Wait.” He caught her hips, holding her still. “Ava.”
“What?” She was breathing hard. So was he. His pupils were blown wide, his gaze gone molten.
“We need to stop.”
“Why?”
His grip tightened on her hips. She could feel him fighting for control.
“Because in about thirty seconds, I’m going to forget this is fake.”
She went still.
Then she climbed off his lap, face burning, and stood.
“The guest room,” she said. “I should—yeah.”
“Ava…”
“Goodnight, Victor.”
She walked down the hall and closed the guest room door behind her. Leaned against it.
Fifty days.
Monday morning.
Ava checked the mark in Victor’s bathroom mirror for the third time. Still there. Still faintly luminous against her skin. She buttoned her blouse and tried to remember how to breathe.
Victor was waiting in the foyer. Charcoal suit. Perfect composure. Like Saturday night hadn’t happened.
“Ready?”
They’d spent Sunday in careful avoidance.
Breakfast at a café near his building where Ava had pushed eggs around her plate while Victor read the Financial Times like it contained the secrets of the universe.
Neither of them had mentioned the night before.
Neither of them had needed to. It sat between them like a third person at the table, taking up all the oxygen.
The walk through Central Park had been worse.
They’d maintained a careful foot of distance, commenting on the weather, the trees, a dog that ran past them chasing a ball.
Safe topics. Hollow words. When Victor’s hand had brushed hers reaching for the same park bench armrest, they’d both flinched like they’d been burned.
Dinner had been Italian, chosen because the restaurant was loud enough that silence didn’t feel oppressive. They’d discussed the menu in detail. The wine list. The architecture of the building across the street. Anything to avoid the obvious.
At one point, Victor had said, “About last night…”
“We don’t have to talk about it.”
“I think we should.”
“I think we really shouldn’t.”
He’d let it drop. They’d eaten tiramisu without tasting it and gone back to the penthouse, where Ava had retreated to the guest room with a book she didn’t read and Victor had disappeared into his study. She’d heard him pacing until well past midnight.
“As ready as I’ll ever be.”
The town car waited at the curb. Ava slid in first, pressing herself against the far door. Victor took the opposite corner.
He made three phone calls during the ride. She stared out the window and pretended not to notice how his voice softened when he talked to other people. Warmer. Easier. Like conversation came naturally with anyone except her.
When he hung up the third time, she said, “Those could have been emails.”
“They could have.”
“But then we’d have to talk.”
He didn’t answer.
The car stopped. Victor came around to open her door, and his hand found the small of her back as they crossed the lobby. Security nodded them through without a second glance.
The elevator ride took sixty-one floors. Neither of them spoke.
When the doors opened onto the reception area, Derek looked up from his desk, saw them step out together, and nearly dropped his cappuccino.
“Oh.” His eyes went wide. “Oh, wow. Okay.”
“Morning, Derek.”
“Morning. Yes. Good morning.” He was still staring, gaze bouncing between them like he was watching a tennis match. “To both of you. Together.”
Victor’s hand stayed firmly on her back. “Is there a problem?”
“No. Nope. No problem at all.” Derek grabbed a stack of files and fled toward the copy room, coffee sloshing dangerously.
Behind them, the elevator chimed.
Lilith stepped out in crimson silk, gold glinting at her throat and wrists. Her gaze found Victor’s hand on Ava’s back and stayed there.
“Victor. And Ms. Feng.” She walked toward them, heels striking marble. “How domestic. Arriving together like newlyweds.”
“Lilith.” Victor’s voice was flat.
She stopped in front of them, studying the space between their bodies. “Curious.”
“We have a meeting,” Victor said.
“We do.” She gestured toward the partner elevator. “Shall we?”