The message did not leave Seraphina's mind. It lingered in her mind long after she read it. It did not feel like a threat shouted across a battlefield. It felt like a hand placed quietly at the back of her neck, guiding her somewhere she had already been before.
Seraphina read it again while standing in Lucien's office, and the words did not change, but their meaning kept deepening. Adrian had never needed to raise his voice to control a room, and he did not need to explain what he meant now.
He knew enough to be dangerous.
Lucien watched her without interrupting, which was becoming his habit. He did not rush her when she was thinking, and she had started to rely on that silence more than she wanted to admit.
"He is not guessing anymore," she said.
Lucien leaned slightly against the edge of his desk. "No," he replied. "He is narrowing."
Seraphina lifted her gaze to meet his. "He is going to look into everything," she said. "Not just the company. Not just the contracts."
