Page 33 of The Last Dance

It was too large, too well appointed, to feel like sanctuary, but the thickness of the walls and the privacy glass made it as close to safe as possible.

I stripped the glass-dusted shirt from his back, tossed it in the trash, and wrapped him in a new one from the wardrobe. He let me, docile, hands limp at his sides.

He crossed to the window, looked out at the grounds. The glass here was triple-thick, bulletproof. He knew it, but he checked anyway.

I went to the bathroom, filled a glass with water, and brought it back. He took it, drank half, then set it down. “You’re safe here.”

He laughed, sharp. “That’s what they say in horror movies, right before someone loses a head.”

I crossed to him, set a hand on his shoulder. He didn’t flinch. “Safe,” I said again.

He nodded, but I could see on his face that he didn’t believe it.

I wanted to shake him, to force the belief into his bones, but I didn’t. I stood behind him, hands on his shoulders, and let the silence do the work. The ruined headrest and the blood on the handkerchief were all the proof he needed. For now, that was enough.

Tomorrow, I would start the hunt.

I pulled out my cell phone and called Lin. “Bring hot chocolate.”

He didn’t ask why. He just said, “Yes, sir,” and hung up.

I watched Iren. He refused to meet my eye. He was processing, running the tape of the ambush over and over in his head. I wanted to force his brain out of the spiral, but I knew better.

So I waited.

Lin arrived with the chocolate in a wide ceramic cup. He set it on the bedside table, close enough for Iren to reach, but not so close as to imply coddling. He bowed—an actual bow, which I didn’t know he was capable of—and left the room.

I sat in the armchair, my hands steepled, and my eyes on the fire.

Iren sat on the side of the bed and sipped the chocolate, then looked at me over the rim. “You’re not going to ask if I’m okay?”

“You’re not,” I said. “So there’s no point.”

He smiled, brittle but real. “I appreciate the honesty.”

We sat in silence, the only sound the tick of the fireplace and the slow, even breaths I forced myself to take. I finally said, “You will not leave the estate.”

He set down the cup. “For how long?”

“Until I say.”

“Is that an order?”

I nodded.

He shrugged. “Fine. It’s not like I have anywhere better to be.”

I watched the light from the fire flicker over the fresh cut on his cheek, the places where glass had marked him, the purple at the base of his neck from where the seatbelt had caught him during the shooting. He looked like a man who’d walked through a war, and survived only by accident.

I hated it.

I stood, crossed to the bed, and sat beside him. He tensed, but didn’t pull away. I put a hand on his jaw, tilted his face up. I looked at the cut, the blood drying in the hairline, the bright green of his eyes.

I ran my thumb over his cheek, gentle for once. He leaned in, just a little, and let the touch steady him.

He finished the chocolate, crawled under the sheet without undressing further, and was asleep in less than a minute.

I watched him breathe. Watched the twitch of his eyelids, the way he curled one hand under his chin. I memorized the pattern of the sheet over his body.