Chapter 3 #2
Ash shifts in the driver’s seat, eyes focused straight ahead, like he’s already planning how many bodies he’ll have to bury if this goes sideways.
“It’s just a shift,” Kellan says, tone light. “Smile, serve drinks, seduce a monster.”
I smirk faintly. “You forgot survive.”
“Right. That too.”
Ash’s voice cuts in—low, final. “You don’t have to prove anything tonight, Iz.”
But I do.
Just not to them.
I open the door and step out. The cold hits instantly, cutting through the slit of my skirt like a knife. I don’t flinch. The heels feel steady. My pulse does not.
I lean back in, hand resting on the edge of the open door.
“If I don’t check in every hour…”
Kellan nods. “We’re coming in, guns drawn.”
Ash meets my eyes in the rearview mirror. “We already have a place picked out to dump the bodies.”
I smile softly. “You’re both so romantic.”
Then I shut the door, and their world disappears behind tinted glass.
The staff entrance hisses open when I swipe the ID they gave me. The air inside is cooler, sterile, scented faintly with disinfectant and perfume. The hallway is narrow, lined with slate gray walls and sleek silver sconces.
Everything here is designed for discretion.
No one looks up as I pass.
Perfect.
A woman with a sleek black bob waits at the end of the corridor, tablet in hand, lips pursed like she’s doing the job of three people and tolerating none of them.
“You’re late.”
My chin lifts slightly. “Barely.”
She narrows her eyes. “Don’t let that happen again.”
Noted.
She turns briskly on her heel and walks, and I fall in step beside her.
“You’re Natasha Orlova?” she asks.
“Yes.”
“First shift, cocktail floor. You’re floating tables unless reassigned. VIP lounge is your section. Only approach tables with a black napkin placed on the edge—signals a request for service.”
“Got it.”
“Don’t speak unless spoken to. Don’t flirt. Don’t linger. Don’t make eye contact with anyone who’s more dangerous than you.”
I nearly laugh at that. “Define dangerous.”
She looks at me then—just once. And I see it in her eyes.
She already knows there are people in this building who would tear someone apart for blinking wrong.
“Don’t worry,” I say. “I’ve met worse.”
Her heels click to a stop outside a service door, and she opens it with a scan of her wristband.
The world beyond it is velvet and gold and shadows.
The casino.
The air hums with low music, soft laughter, and something darker beneath the surface—greed. Power. Secrets sliding across glass tabletops and whispered deals tucked behind the clink of ice in crystal tumblers.
It’s beautiful in the way a loaded gun is beautiful.
Everything glitters. Everything threatens.
I step inside, letting the door close behind me, and for a second, I just feel it. The heat of it. The weight. The shift.
Like the floor beneath me knows I don’t belong—but it’s going to let me pretend anyway.
The woman turns back to me, her voice quieter now. “You’ll start on the east lounge. Keep moving. Stay invisible.”
I nod once.
But before she can say anything else, I feel the air change.
Someone approaches.
Footsteps—sharp, precise, unhurried.
And then?—
“She’s been reassigned.”
I turn.
Nikolai.
Same black suit. Same cold eyes. Same quiet control laced through every syllable like a threat. He looks at the woman, not me.
“She’ll be working the western floor. Table thirteen.”
The woman hesitates, unsure. “That’s?—”
“Yes,” he says flatly.
She nods quickly, stepping back without another word.
My mouth is dry.
I find my voice. “What’s table thirteen?”
Nikolai’s eyes shift to me, and for the first time, they hold.
“Mr. Romanov’s table.”
My pulse kicks once. Hard.
Not because I wasn’t expecting this.
But because I was.
Because the second I stepped into this place, I knew. He already saw me.
And now…
He wants to see me closer .
My name sits silent on my tongue. Not Natasha. Not Isabella. Not anything.
Just breath.
I stare at Nikolai, his unreadable face cast in shadow from the chandelier above us, his voice still ringing in my ears.
Mr. Romanov’s table.
My fingers twitch slightly at my side, but I don’t move.
Not yet.
Because this is it. The moment I’ve been burning toward for fifteen years. And somehow, it feels too quiet. Too still.
“What if I don’t want to?” I ask him, my voice calm but cold.
Nikolai’s mouth twitches—something between a smirk and a dare.
“If you’re afraid of him,” he says, voice smooth as ice, “this isn’t the right place for you.”
My spine snaps straighter. “I’m not afraid.”
“Then go,” he says simply. “Serve your table.”
He turns before I can answer, walking away without a glance back. Like he already knows I’ll follow the order.
Like he already knows he wants me to.
I exhale through my nose, slow and steady.
I don’t hesitate again. I move.
The casino stretches out in front of me like a dream designed to trap people in velvet cages.
Golden lighting pools in soft halos over tables where million-dollar games are played with half-second glances and smiles dipped in poison.
Glasses clink. Laughter murmurs. Every person in this room is someone or belongs to someone.
Eyes glance my way, then slide past.
Good.
Let them think I’m no one.
My heels don’t falter as I walk across the floor, weaving between tables. My skirt doesn’t ride up. My blouse stays perfectly in place. I make myself forget how the silk sticks to the tension beneath my skin, how my hands are colder than they should be.
Then I see him.
Rafael Romanov.
He sits at the corner of Table Thirteen, arm resting casually over the back of the velvet seat, suit jacket open like he owns every inch of the oxygen in the room. His shirt is black. No tie. A crystal glass in one hand, untouched.
His head is slightly turned, speaking to someone beside him—a woman with blood-red lipstick and a slit in her dress that makes her legs look like weapons.
Two other men sit at the table. One I recognize from intel—his name’s Mikhail Vasin, Bratva consigliere. The other is a ghost, lean and silent, eyes always scanning.
Rafael’s face is partially hidden behind the low golden light above him, but I still feel it— his presence.
It coils down my spine like smoke, thick and sharp, sliding into my bones before I can brace for it.
He hasn’t looked at me yet.
And still—I can’t breathe.
I swallow once and walk toward them. Each step is deliberate. Balanced. Quiet.
I stop two feet from the table, just close enough to be noticed but not close enough to intrude.
“Good evening,” I say, voice smooth, steady. “Would you like to start with drinks?”
Rafael doesn’t look at me right away.
The others do. Mikhail nods, already placing his order. The woman barely glances up—she murmurs something about champagne. The third man says nothing.
Then, finally…
He turns his head.
And looks at me.
Dark eyes meet mine. Unreadable. Cold. Alive in a way that steals the air from the room.
Not a flicker of recognition.
But something else.
Interest. Focus.
Like I’ve stepped into the crosshairs of a man who chooses what he sees. And he’s already decided to see me.
I don’t blink.
I don’t flinch.
He holds my gaze just a second too long. Then he speaks.
“Whatever you recommend,” he says softly.
My pulse skips.
I nod once, forcing a slight smile. “I’ll return shortly.”
Then I turn, and I walk away.
But his gaze doesn’t leave me.
I feel it.
I feel him.
And I know now—the game has begun.
I keep my spine straight and my expression smooth as I walk away from his table. But inside, I’m already spiraling.
Not panicked.
Not afraid.
Just… shaken.
There’s something about the way he looked at me. Like he was already inside my head, rearranging things. Like I didn’t just enter his space—he let me. Like I hadn’t been the one watching all these years. He was watching me.
No recognition.
Just interest.
And that’s what rattles me more than anything. That I expected fire. And instead, I found stillness.
Stillness that feels more dangerous than any weapon.
I reach the bar, hands steady as I slide behind the counter and pretend my pulse isn’t trying to claw out of my throat.
“You’re new.”
A voice to my left—cool, feminine, with the kind of sharpness that comes from surviving the same floor I just walked into.
I glance sideways.
A blonde in the same uniform, lips painted blood red, leans against the bar. One leg crossed over the other like she owns the room, like she’s seen everything and walked away from it.
“First shift,” I say simply, reaching for a tray.
She eyes me once, head tilting. “And they put you on Romanov’s table?”
My hands freeze for half a second. Just enough.
She notices.
I recover smoothly. “Is that a problem?”
She smirks. “Only if you like breathing easy. Girls don’t last long at his table. Not because he touches. He doesn’t. Not like that.”
I raise a brow. “Then why?”
“Because he notices. And when Rafael Romanov notices something…” She leans in a little. “It either disappears. Or it burns.”
My gaze doesn’t waver. “Then maybe I’ll be the first to walk away.”
She huffs a laugh, low and humorless. “Good luck with that.”
I turn back to the shelves of liquor, letting the sound of crystal and chilled glass fill the silence.
Her words slide into my spine and settle there, cold and curling.
He notices. And when he does…
I exhale slowly.
I scan the rows until I find what I’m looking for. Dalmore 25. A rare scotch—rich, dangerous, smooth, and aged in flame-charred casks. Expensive. Subtle. Calculated.
Like him.
I pour it slowly, carefully, and add the orders from the rest of the table—keeping everything neat, balanced, exact. Then I arrange the drinks onto the silver tray, check the placement, and turn.
My heels click softly against the floor as I cross back into the casino.
The weight of the drinks is nothing.
But the weight of his gaze?
It finds me before I even look up.
I feel it tracking me. Sliding down my body. Not lustful. Not crude.