Chapter 10 – Mike
I’m in my office that afternoon when there’s a knock at the door.
I frown, looking up.
Sergei doesn’t knock before entering, and the few times Ellie has come here, she didn’t knock either.
“Come in.”
When the door opens, Ellie walks in.
I lean back in my chair, watching her as she steps inside. It’s been over a week since we had sex, and since then we’ve been circling each other carefully, like two people trying not to step on landmines.
After the alliance party, I thought she might loosen up a little.
Instead, she withdrew again.
I stopped trying to approach her. If she’s waiting for an apology, she won’t get one. I don’t regret what happened between us. Not for a second.
And if the opportunity presents itself again—
I’d do it all over.
“I want to talk to you about something,” she says.
My brow tightens. “What?”
She walks toward the chair across from my desk and lowers herself into it. “It’s about Sergei.”
I immediately lean forward, my attention sharpening. “Did he do something to you?”
“No. No.” She shakes her head quickly, her hair bouncing around her shoulders.
“Then what is it?” I ask, my voice quieter but no less focused.
Ellie hesitates for a moment, like she’s organizing her thoughts.
“At the party,” she begins slowly, “I was sitting at the bar for a while.”
I nod once, waiting.
“I noticed Sergei go through one of the side doors. He was gone for about half an hour.”
“That’s not unusual,” I say. “He was working security.”
“I know,” she says quickly. “That’s what I thought too.”
Something in her tone makes me study her more carefully.
“But?”
Her fingers lace together in her lap.
“A few minutes after he went through the door…Anya came out of it.”
My expression doesn’t change, but my mind sharpens.
“And then a few minutes later,” she continues, “Sergei came out too.”
Silence settles over the room as I ponder what she just said. Half of me struggles to believe that there’s a hidden meaning behind it. Anya and Sergei have worked together for me in the past, but in precarious times like this, I must admit it’s suspicious.
“I know you have no reason to believe me,” she continues. “But there’s more.”
She leans forward a little now, her voice lowering.
“I watched them the rest of the night,” she says. “Not obviously. Just…observing.”
“And?”
“They kept exchanging glances. The kind people think no one notices.”
I look down at my desk, my mind already turning through possibilities.
Sergei didn’t tell me he spoke with Anya at the party.
And Sergei always reports things like that to me. Always. That’s how our structure works. Nothing relevant goes unmentioned.
The omission is small.
But small omissions in our world have a way of becoming very large problems.
I nod slowly.
“I’ll handle it,” I say.
The words come automatically. It’s the natural order of things. I investigate. I deal with the threats. I keep her safe.
But Ellie’s reaction is immediate.
“No.”
I look up.
Her posture has stiffened, her eyes flashing with something sharp.
“No?” I repeat.
“You’re not just going to handle it and keep me out of it,” she says firmly.
My brows draw together. “Ellie—”
“The attacks changed my life,” she cuts in. “Twice now, someone has tried to kidnap me. That’s not a small detail I can just ignore while you and your men figure it out behind closed doors.”
Her voice isn’t loud.
But it’s unyielding.
“You don’t need to be involved in this,” I tell her calmly.
“Yes, I do.”
Her hands press against the arms of the chair as she leans forward. “I refuse to be a passive figure in decisions that literally determine whether I live or die.”
The bluntness of it lands harder than she probably realizes.
My jaw tightens slightly.
“This isn’t your world,” I say. “You don’t understand the risks of interfering in something like this.”
“And you don’t understand what it’s like to be the person everyone is trying to take,” she fires back.
The room falls silent.
Her breathing is slightly uneven now, but she doesn’t look away from me.
“I may not understand your world,” she continues more quietly, “but I understand patterns. I understand behavior. I understand language and the way people reveal things they don’t realize they’re revealing.”
Of course.
The forensic linguist.
She sits back slightly, but her gaze remains steady.
“You want to investigate Sergei discreetly?” she says. “Fine. But don’t sideline me like I’m just luggage you’re transporting between safe houses.”
I study her.
The determination in her expression isn’t temporary anger.
It’s resolve.
And that realization irritates something deep in my chest.
“Ellie,” I say slowly, “every time you ignore my instructions, something bad happens.”
Her eyes flash immediately.
“That means you’re not protecting me the way you should,” she shoots back.
The words land like a slap.
“And if that’s the case,” she continues, her voice tightening, “then maybe this whole arrangement doesn’t work for me anymore.”
A cold warning spreads through my chest.
“What are you saying?”
Her chin lifts. “I’m saying maybe I should leave this marriage.”
For a second, the room goes completely silent.
Then something inside me snaps.
I push back from my chair so abruptly that it scrapes across the floor. In two strides, I’m around the desk.
Ellie rises instinctively, like she intends to stand her ground, but I’m already there.
I brace my hands on the arms of her chair, caging her in before she can move away.
“Sit,” I say sharply.
She tries to push past me. “Mike, move—”
I press her back into the chair with controlled force and drop into a crouch in front of her so we’re eye level.
She’s breathing faster now, anger flashing across her face.
“You don’t get to threaten that,” I say, my voice low and dangerous.
Her hands push against my shoulders. “Mike, you can’t keep me here against my—”
“I’m not fucking around, Ellie.”
The words cut through her sentence like a blade.
She freezes.
My hands close around the arms of the chair beside her thighs, trapping her there without touching her.
“You want honesty?” I continue, my voice steady but hard. “Then listen carefully.”
Her eyes search my face, defiant but uncertain now.
“This marriage is not temporary.” I lean closer, lowering my voice. “You are my wife.”
She opens her mouth to argue again, but I don’t let her.
“You don’t get to walk away from this because you’re angry or frustrated or scared.”
My gaze locks onto hers.
“You’re mine,” I say quietly but firmly. “And you’d better accept that and learn how to live with it.”
For a moment, neither of us moves.
The tension between us is thick enough to choke on.
Ellie is the first to break it.
She looks away, shaking her head slightly. “You’re being dramatic.”
I straighten a little, studying her face.
“No,” I say calmly. “I’m not.”
Her eyes flick back to mine.
“I’m being serious.”
I lean closer again, making sure she hears every word.
“You’ll always be mine.”
She scoffs under her breath.
“You don’t even know me that well,” she says. “Our marriage isn’t even a month old.”
A laugh slips out of me before I can stop it.
Her brows knit together immediately. “What?”
I shake my head slowly.
“Did you forget,” I say, “that I’ve been stalking you for years before the marriage?”
The words land heavily between us.
I don’t look away.
“I started tracking you after I read one of your research papers,” I admit.
She blinks, clearly thrown. “What paper?”
“The one you published about linguistic coding inside criminal networks,” I say. “The analysis you did on how certain groups embed instructions inside ordinary conversation.”
Her lips part slightly.
“I attended your conference presentation,” I continue. “Anonymously.”
I remember it perfectly.
The lecture hall. The way she stood at the podium, explaining patterns most people in that room barely understood.
“You broke down the communication structure of three different criminal organizations in under forty minutes,” I say. “And you did it with more accuracy than most intelligence agencies manage in a year.”
For a moment, Ellie just stares at me.
Then something in her expression softens.
“So…you love my work?” she asks quietly.
I huff out a short laugh. “Hell yes.” I shake my head slightly, still remembering how impressed I was that day. “I think you’re very fucking intelligent.”
The faintest color creeps into her cheeks.
And for the first time since she walked into my office, the hostility between us loosens just a little.
She suddenly giggles.
A soft, surprised sound, like she didn’t expect it from herself.
“I didn’t know about that,” she says.
I study her, then I add more quietly, “And I should apologize for something.”
Her brows lift slightly. “For what?”
“For not letting you go back to the university.”
She goes still, clearly not expecting that.
“I know your work matters to you,” I continue. “But right now I’m thinking about your safety first.”
I pause before finishing the thought.
“As soon as this threat is over, you’re free to do whatever you want. Go back to the university. Continue your research. Whatever you choose. And I will support you with everything I have.”
Ellie studies my face for a moment, weighing the sincerity of it.
Then she nods slowly.
“I understand,” she says.
Her voice is calmer now.
“I’ve been keeping in touch with my colleague Samantha anyway. We talk almost every day, and everything at the lab is running perfectly.”
“That’s good.”
“If you want,” I add, “Samantha can come visit you here.”
Her expression brightens slightly. “Really?”
“Yes.”
She smiles. “Thank you.”
The word is simple, but it softens something between us.
For a few seconds, the room is quiet.
Then Ellie speaks again: “I can help you find whoever’s behind the attacks.”
I tilt my head slightly. “How?”
Her posture shifts subtly. More confident now. More professional.
“If they send any threatening emails,” she says, “or voice messages, or even recorded instructions…I can analyze them.”
I hum. I know what she does, but I’m wary about involving her in this. She’s already involved enough.
Ellie continues, “Speech patterns. Linguistic habits. Repeated phrasing.” She leans forward slightly. “People reveal a lot about themselves through the way they communicate.”
I’m listening carefully now.
“A person’s region, education level, emotional state, sometimes even their professional background,” she continues. “You’d be surprised how much information leaks through language.” Her eyes hold mine steadily now. “Forensic linguistics is basically behavioral fingerprinting through language.”
I sit back slowly, considering it.
The conversation has changed completely.
We’re no longer arguing.
We’re working through a problem.
“I’d need access to anything your men collect,” she adds. “Messages. Transcripts. Voice recordings.”
I nod once. “That can be arranged.”
A small spark of excitement flashes across her face, the first genuine one I’ve seen in days.
For the first time since the attacks began, we aren’t on opposite sides of the problem.
We’re facing it together.
And for the first time since our marriage began, Ellie and I are speaking not as adversaries but as equals.
“Don’t worry, Ellie. As soon as I get anything,” I say. “I’ll run it by you.”
She nods. Then she clears her throat softly. “I should go.”
The words are simple, but they break whatever fragile moment had settled between us.
I pull back from the desk with a reluctance I don’t bother hiding. Ellie slowly rises from the chair in front of me.
For a beat, neither of us moves.
We just stand there, looking at each other.
Something quiet passes between us—something neither of us names.
Then she lifts her hand in a small wave.
“Bye, Mike.”
“Bye.”
She turns and walks toward the door. I watch her go, the sway of her hair, the calm confidence in her step, the intelligence that seems to radiate from her even when she isn’t trying.
The door closes behind her with a soft click.
I exhale slowly and sink back into my chair.
For a long moment, I just stare at the door she disappeared through.
Then I drag a hand over my face and let out a low breath.
This is ridiculous.
I have a massive crush on my own wife.
Not just attraction—though God knows there’s plenty of that.
Every time she’s near me, my body reacts like it has a mind of its own.
But it’s more than that.
It’s the way she argues with me without fear.
The way her mind works.
The way she analyzes people like she’s peeling them open, layer by layer.
I lean back in my chair, staring at the ceiling.
Yeah.
I’m in serious trouble.