Sleep didn't come.
I sat on my bed with the phone in my lap, Jason's message glowing up at me like a little bomb with a smiley face.
The tragic part? He meant it. The more tragic part? His version of keeping me safe was going to dismantle the only safe thing I had left: my name.
Me: Jason, I'm okay. Seriously. Please don't talk to campus security. I'll explain tomorrow. Trust me.
Jason: Fine. But I want the full story.
Bought myself twelve hours. Maybe.
The apartment was quiet. I locked the front door, checked it twice, wedged a chair under the handle for good measure, and made ramen.
Three problems. That was what I had.
Problem one: Jason had apparently spoken to campus security, which meant someone official now had a reason to look at Evie Ross's enrollment file.
Problem two: the mystery texter. My father's people? Possible, but he'd already written me off. Someone inside the Volkov family who didn't want this marriage? That was a darker thought, and I let it sit in my stomach next to the ramen like a stone.
Problem three: Cillian himself. The man who looked at me like I was simultaneously the most frustrating and most necessary thing in his world.
I put the pot in the sink, wiped my mouth with my sleeve, and crawled back into bed. The sheets smelled faintly of his cologne from where he'd sat. I flipped the pillow over.
I did not think about his hands. Or his jaw. Or the way he'd said you're not done like he actually wanted to hear the rest.
I absolutely did not think about any of that.
***
Around two in the morning, my brain decided that if it couldn't sleep, it might as well be useful.
I pulled my laptop onto my chest and typed it. Cillian Volkov.
The results were thin. A Financial Times piece on Volkov Holdings described a sprawling conglomerate with interests in shipping, real estate, and private equity across Northern Europe and the East Coast. A Bloomberg profile mentioned the founding family's roots: Irish on the mother's side, Russian on the father's. Old money married to older money.
All very clean on paper. But I'd grown up in a house where "import-export" meant whatever my father needed it to mean that week.
Cillian's name appeared exactly three times in everything I could find. Two property acquisitions in Boston, one donor list for a children's hospital in Dublin. No interviews, no quotes, no public-facing personality whatsoever. A filing listed his age as twenty-seven, which I read twice. He carried himself like someone decades older.
I scrolled deeper. Most photos were useless, blurred suits at fundraisers, none clearly him. Then I found the others.
They were buried in an old Dublin society page, a charity gala hosted by the Volkov-Moran family. The Moran side was the Irish half, old Galway money. The photos were a decade old.
A woman in an emerald gown, dark-haired, laughing. A silver-haired man beside her. And between them, a boy.
He couldn't have been older than fifteen. Tall for his age, dark hair combed back, same sharp jaw, same green eyes.
But he was smiling.
This was real. Open, unguarded, sunlight caught in it. The kind of smile that belonged to a boy who hadn't yet learned to lock every door behind his expression.
It hit me somewhere unexpected. Below the ribs, in that soft place where you keep the things you don't want to feel.
The woman had his eyes. His mother. The way she leaned into him, one hand on his arm, protective and proud, the kind of tenderness that said this is mine and I'm not afraid to show it.
I wondered what had turned that boy into the man who stood in dark hallways and said you belong to me like it was the only truth he had left.
I scrolled past, and a headline caught my eye. Small, half-buried. Dated two years after the gala photos.
I sat up slowly.
I read it twice. Then a third time, because my brain refused to process it.
My phone exploded on the nightstand.
Elena, with a string of coffee emojis. My heart was still slamming and it took me a second to remember that normal people called each other for normal reasons.
"What."
"It's eight. You were supposed to be here twenty minutes ago. Frank's asking."
8:03. I'd been down the rabbit hole for six hours.
"Evie, seriously. You disappeared yesterday, Lana said your cousin showed up at midnight looking like a Bond villain. People are worried."
"I'm fine. Fifteen minutes."
"Bring your face. I need my emotional support coworker."
***
The café was the same. Elena was behind the counter, wielding the steam wand like a weapon. I tied my apron and reached for the espresso grounds. Elena let me get exactly one cup into the rhythm before she started.
"So." She leaned against the counter, arms crossed. "Your mystery cousin."
"Not doing this."
"Lana said he filled your entire hallway. Like physically. Said he had the energy of a man who's killed someone and then gone to dinner after."
"Lana watches too much true crime."
"She also said you dragged him into your bedroom and shut the door." Elena raised an eyebrow. "At midnight."
"To talk."
"In your bedroom. Where your bra was apparently on the bed."
I closed my eyes. "Lana told you about the bra."
"Lana tells me everything. It's our love language." She dropped her voice. "Evie. Be real with me for a second. Who is he?"
I looked at her, and for one terrible moment I wanted to say everything. The contract. The Volkovs. The wedding dress I'd jumped out a window to escape. But the truth was a door I couldn't open without pulling her through it, and on the other side of that door, people got hurt.
"He's someone from my past," I said. "I'm handling it."
She studied me, chewing her lip. "You'd tell me if you were in danger?"
"Yes," I lied.
She didn't believe me. But she let it go, and we fell into the morning rush.
Twenty minutes in, the door chimed. Jason walked straight to the counter, backpack on, jaw set, shadows under his eyes.
"Evie." His voice was low, serious. "Can we talk?"
"I told you I'd explain later."
"I know what you told me." He leaned on the counter, glancing at Elena before lowering his voice. "I also know that guy isn't your cousin. I'm not stupid. He looked at you like he owned you, and you looked scared."
"Jason. I need you to drop this."
"I can't." His eyes were steady, stubborn. "I went by admissions this morning. Your transfer file has inconsistencies, Evie. I'm not trying to cause problems, but if this guy is dangerous..."
My blood went cold. "You went to admissions?"
"I'm trying to help you."
"You're going to get me killed." It came out sharper than I intended. His face shifted, hurt and confusion running across it. I softened my voice. "Please. The best thing you can do for me right now is stop digging. I mean it."
He searched my face for a long moment. "I'm not giving up on this, Evie. Whatever's going on, you don't have to deal with it alone."
He turned for the door. Elena opened her mouth to say something, but movement outside the window stole every thought from my head.
A black car pulled up across the street. Sleek. Expensive. The kind that didn't belong in a college town.
Cillian stepped out. Dark coat, cold expression, daylight doing nothing to soften him. He looked out of place and completely at home at the same time, like the world had quietly rearranged itself around him.
He scanned the café window. Found me.
Our gazes locked through the glass. My skin prickled. He didn't smile. He tilted his head, expectant, and started toward the door.
Elena inhaled. "That's him. Holy shit, Evie."
Jason was still inside. Five feet from the door. About to walk directly into the path of a man who had promised, less than twelve hours ago, to end him.
And it hit me, standing there behind the counter with my hands still damp from the espresso machine, that I was tired.
Tired in the bones. Tired of flinching. Tired of rearranging my entire life around what men decided to do with me. My father signed a contract I never saw. Cillian tracked me across the country like I was a misplaced asset. Jason was tearing apart my cover story because he thought he was saving me. Running. Dodging. Letting every single one of them set the terms while I scrambled to survive the fallout.
Something shifted in my chest. Not fear this time. Something harder and quieter, like a lock turning.
No more.
If Cillian Volkov wanted a wife, I'd give him one. I'd give him one so convincing, so perfectly played, that by the time he realized what I was actually doing, it would be too late. I had grown up watching women manage dangerous men with nothing but a smile and good timing. I had more than that.
I untied my apron.
"Evie!" Elena hissed.
I pushed through the door. The cold hit first. Then him.
Cillian was ten feet away. His eyes found mine immediately, and for one second the whole street contracted around the two of us.
His eyes narrowed as I kept walking toward him instead of stopping.
I grabbed his hand.
His fingers were warm as they gripped mine unconsciously. The surprise that crossed his face was brief and genuine. Cillian Volkov, momentarily at a loss.
I didn't give him time to recover.
I turned into his side, close enough to feel the warmth radiating off his coat, and looked up at him with the brightest, most adoring smile I had ever manufactured in my life.
"Darling," I said, loud enough for the sidewalk. "I missed you."