3. CHAPTER 2
Orion
I could make a list of the things I’d learnt in the last few weeks about my wife-to-be.
On one hand, there was an excessive list of things I couldn’t bother caring about and on the other, a smaller portion of things that actually mattered, but I still filed as none of my business.
I’d spent the entire evening looking through the dossier Severin had forwarded me with everything Stratum had found on Léonie Fernández.
From the air that she breathed, to her very last meal before bed last night.
Stratum was that thorough. I had no regrets investing in the surveillance company when Severin had come to me with the idea three years ago.
I swiped through my tablet, going through pictures and recent video footage of Léonie.
The timestamp blinked in the corner of the video: 16:32. Paris. Thursday. She was walking back from somewhere, without a coat… again. It was the third time this week she was braving the winter breeze, with just a pair of nude trousers and a creme coloured sweater.
“For a fashion consultant, she clearly hates colour,” I whispered to no one in particular.
The thought of her catching a cold unsettled me. Not because it was any of my concern. I simply hated being sick and uncomfortable.
She on the other hand was reckless with her health.
I continued to watch as she moved. Her long black hair getting messed up by the wind, while she ran her hand over it to keep it at bay.
She normally wore her hair in a low ponytail. I don’t remember ever seeing her in any other pictures with her hair down.
I enlarged the feed for a closer look. The camera didn’t capture texture well, but it caught movement as she walked and the dark strands slipping easily through her fingers every time she tried to gather them.
Even through the surveillance feed, I could imagine how soft it would feel wrapped around my fist. My fingers flexed instinctively at the thought of tugging her closer by it.
I instantly killed the thought.
She waved at someone off-screen and laughed.
It was either one of her friends or the boyfriend. I couldn't care less.
Her entire existence so far was predictable.
She ordered an iced latte every morning and never changes her order. A triple dose of vanilla syrup and caramel drizzle. In her words, Je veux que ?a soit un vrai dessert.
Shamelessly a sweet-tooth.
A sweet-tooth who spends every day doing the same things over and over.
She shops for fabrics on Mondays, spends the rest of her week at the fashion studio where she works as a consultant. On Fridays, she takes the long route home, like she's avoiding something or someone.
I’d seen hours of footage, and not once had she done anything that made her interesting.
So why couldn’t I stop watching?
I swipe through a picture of Léonie, her best-friend Céleste Vassier, and her cousin Isolde Moreaux. They were inseparable. I had well over twenty pictures of them together from the last three weeks.
Could tell from the way Léonie smiled when she was around them, that she felt more herself in their company.
I shouldn’t notice a difference in her smile, but I’ve looked through too many pictures of her to note the difference anyway.
Her smile was nothing special.
The audio to the next video was muted. Léonie was at Boulangerie du Lys, sitting between the poised Céleste and unruly-haired Isolde.
She had her back to the video but I’d watched enough by now to tell when Léonie was laughing.
The effortless way her shoulders twitched and she threw her head back.
Her hand to her mouth like she was catching the joy before it escaped.
She stifled the rest of it into a smile and fell back into conversation with her friends.
I watched the waiter—red-haired, dressed in a white shirt and black trousers—stop beside her. She said something to her as she placed the food on the table with the familiarity of someone who knew her by name.
Léonie had the same lunch every Wednesday: Avocado tartine, citrus salad, mint tea with an unreasonable amount of sugar. The tea, I’d noticed, wasn’t limited to Wednesdays. It appeared on weekends too, usually while she sketched or relaxed at home.
At this point, I could recite exactly what she ate for breakfast, lunch, and dinner every day without thinking. Whether she was at the Fernández estate or some overpriced café with her friends, her tastes remained irritatingly consistent. How profoundly uninteresting.
Still, I kept watching.
They moved to a boutique afterward. The trio loved shopping and couture houses loved hosting them, considering that Céleste owned a fashion brand of her own. I’d never understand the need to shop for clothes three times a week but it seemed to be their favorite pastime.
My eyes followed Léonie as she drifted to a rack of dresses but didn’t touch anything colorful as usual. Her hand skimmed a gray sheath dress, then a champagne silk one, and a beige.
I couldn’t decide if I found her obsession with neutrals tedious or reassuring.
I watched her reach for a pair of shoes. Off-white. It was the same as the one she bought last week and two weeks before that.
It was either, black, nude, offwhite, or beige. It made me want to gift her something red, maybe.
Something to put some fire in those predictable brown eyes.
But it doesn’t matter. She could wear whatever she likes. Whatever she chose to do was her business. Not mine.
Then the screen flickered to another clip and my jaw locked.
It was Léonie at the terrace of the Fernández estate with the boyfriend, who Stratum details as Yves Dupont-Dupré. Léonie seemed to be fond of this Yves.
He got the same body language preference she gave her friends. Warm. Chatty. I’d learnt he worked at the Office of the Secretary General. A simple administrative job at the Embassy.
Tracks with Léonie’s mundane existence.
I skipped the clip but another came up. I had more footage of them than I’d like. But then, I’d asked Severin for everything on Léonie. I couldn’t escape the visceral discomfort that came with it.
In this clip, they were at a balcony, and Léonie was leaning on the railing. One minute he was talking to her, and she was smiling. Next, he had his lips trailing kisses up her neck. I was about to skip it when I noticed her expression, so I looked closely.
She wasn’t even responding. Her hands stayed folded, her expression totally wrong for someone in love. I’d always skipped their clips. Today was the first time I paid any attention.
Interesting.
I skipped to the next clip. The tab closed before the next frame. I’d seen enough.
My door opened without a knock. Only one person was allowed to enter my home office without knocking.
Severin Kade.
He crossed the room with that silent, measured stride—dressed in a black tailored suit, black shirt, no tie. His brow subtly furrowed as always, lost in introspection.
Hand him a scythe, and it would complete the deathly demeanor.
He looked my way and noticed the footage window vanish from my screen. I didn’t bother hiding it. He didn’t say anything about it either.
Instead, he made his way to the decanter and poured himself a drink, then one for me, setting mine beside my elbow without a word.
He unbuttoned his jacket leisurely, sat and pointed his tattooed hand toward the screen.
“She argued with her mother today.”
“So?”
“You watched it.”
It was the first clip I’d seen when I pulled up her file.
Léonie standing stiffly at a society event, her mother scolding her for arriving under-dressed, for not speaking enough, for not acting like the heiress she’s supposed to be.
Léonie’s smile was a lie the entire time. I could tell from the way it never reached her eyes.
Her mother’s bickering reminded me of mine. It annoyed me more than it should have.
“Her mother’s exhausting,” I muttered.
Severin’s mouth twitched. Amusement, maybe, or incredulity.
“You noticed.”
I didn’t need to answer that.
He kept his gaze on me, then took a slow sip of his drink.
“She avoids those events whenever she can. Unlike the girls your mother pushes at you.”
That was true. She had no desperate ambition. No hollow charm. Not a single venom in her body. Just a quiet girl, who lived to wear neutrals, eat chocolates and laugh all day.
I could live with boring. Maybe I even preferred it.
Severin studied me carefully. The same look he gave me when he was about to ask something sensitive but wasn’t sure how I’d respond.
“What do you intend to do about the boyfriend?”
My jaw clenched at the reminder. Severin collected all the intel on Léonie. Of course he was curious about this specifically.
The existence of the boyfriend remained vague to me. I barely remembered his name. To me, he lived only in clips and pictures. Once I turned them off, he ceased to exist.
“It won’t be a problem once the marriage is set.”
His brows lifted a fraction.
“Meaning?”
“Meaning,” I said, leaning back in my chair while meeting his gaze, “that he’ll disappear.”
Severin considered the statement in silence before tapping on his glass in subtle warning for whatever version of disappear I meant.
“Voluntarily?”
I shrugged. “If he’s smart.”
He kept his expression stoic as he absorbed the information like he always did.
Severin understood me better than most. My thought process. The things I couldn’t voice, especially those I chose not to say to protect myself.
We’ve been each other’s support since we were boys, before he lost his father and had to be raised by mine. He was the brother I never had, and I couldn't have asked for a better one.
Severin took a sip of his drink and nodded in understanding, then shifted the conversation entirely.
“I was just at your father’s wing. Your mother said she hasn’t seen you all day.”
“I’ve been busy.”
He looked down at the tab again, then back to me and smiled.
He had no idea why I was avoiding my father’s wing.