Isla felt the faint thud of the door locking like a pressure change in her bones.

So this was it.

She didn’t move from Adrien’s lap when Mirov entered—Aliana wouldn’t. Instead, she adjusted herself slightly, settling as if she belonged there more than the furniture did. Her chin lifted just a touch, posture elegant, bored, expensive.

Her eyes found Mirov and stayed there.

Evaluating.

Measuring.

Dismissing.

Then Aliana smiled.

Not warm. Not kind. A socialite’s smile—sharp around the edges, designed to remind a man exactly how small he was in her presence.

“Well,” she drawled, her voice honeyed and slow, her accent just right, “if it isn’t the man of the hour.”

Her fingers toyed idly with Adrien’s sleeve as if Mirov were barely worth her full attention.

“You’ve kept us waiting,” Isla continued, crossing one leg over the other with practiced indolence. “Nikolai gets so terribly bored without activity.”

A lazy glance back to Adrien, then to Mirov again.

“But I suppose,” she added lightly, “a man in your… profession needs to make an entrance.”

Isla didn’t let the touch startle her this time. She kept her posture loose, draped elegantly against him, the perfect picture of a woman who belonged exactly where she was. But inside, every muscle stayed coiled, every breath measured. She could feel Mirov’s eyes crawling over them, assessing, searching for seams in the performance.

When Adrien looked up at her with Nikolai’s smirk, Isla let her lips curve slowly—controlled, practiced, not lovestruck but possessive in the way Orlov women were expected to be. Her hand slipped to the back of his neck, fingers threading lightly through the hair there, not affectionate but claiming.

“That’s right,” she purred, eyes flicking to Mirov with a subtle challenge behind the sweetness. “My Nikolai doesn’t go anywhere without me.”

The way she said it—soft, warm, but with steel tucked underneath—made it clear she was playing her part perfectly.

And just faintly, under the veneer of the role, there was the smallest, sharpest tension: she trusted Adrien enough to sit here, to touch him, to stake their cover on him.

But she didn’t trust him fully.

Not yet.

Isla didn’t flinch when the shot landed.

She’d been ready for it—the tension in Adrien’s body, the timing, the way his grip had shifted a half-second before he moved. Still, the sound was softer than she expected, a muted punctuation rather than an explosion. Mirov crumpled to the floor, the life leaving him in a quiet rush that felt almost unreal.

Aliana gasped.

It was sharp, perfectly pitched—just enough shock to sell a startled wife, not enough to invite scrutiny. Isla’s hands tightened briefly at Adrien’s shoulders as if startled, then steadied, her composure snapping back into place as quickly as the act required.

She slid off his lap smoothly and rose, heels silent against the floor as she crossed to the door. A glance through the peephole. Clear. No movement. No raised voices outside.

She turned back, eyes flicking to Mirov’s body, then to Adrien.

Without waiting, she knelt just long enough to confirm the kill—pulse gone, eyes fixed—then stood again, brushing imaginary dust from her dress as if this were nothing more than an inconvenience.

“Clean,” she said quietly. “We leave together. Same pace. Same smiles.”

She slipped back to his side, fingers curling into the crook of his arm, Aliana reassembling herself like armor.

“Congratulations, Nikolai,” she murmured, voice light, teasing, entirely for show. “You’ve outdone yourself tonight.”

Then, softer—just for him:

“Let’s disappear.”

Isla let herself be guided, melting seamlessly back into Aliana as Adrien’s arm settled around her waist. She didn’t look back at the body or the cleaners slipping in with practiced efficiency—that part of the night was already over, filed away where emotion wasn’t allowed to reach it.

In the ballroom, the music swelled again, indifferent and grand.

She laughed softly as they reentered, a bright, careless sound meant for anyone watching. Her hand slid up his shoulder as they joined the edge of the dance floor, and she turned into him without hesitation, letting the rhythm carry them. To an observer, they were exactly what they’d been all evening: rich, indulgent, untouchable.

“You know,” she murmured lightly, eyes flicking up to his, “for a man who claims to bore easily, you clean up chaos rather elegantly.”

Her smile widened just a fraction, playful now, almost genuine. She let her head rest briefly against his shoulder as they swayed, the night air warm, the danger ebbing.

After a moment, she straightened, fingers tightening once at his sleeve—a subtle signal.

“One more turn,” she whispered. “Then we go.”

And when the music dipped and rose again, Isla let Aliana laugh once more, spin once more, committing the last moments of the masquerade to memory—before they would slip away, the ledger secured, the night closing behind them like it had never happened at all.