Subject rarely leaves predetermined routes. Bodyguard rotation suggests vulnerabilities at 7 a.m. and 11 p.m. Frequency of university attendance suggests academic commitment as potential pressure point.
I scroll further. My breathing turns shallow, each inhale scraping against the tightness in my chest like sandpaper on raw skin. Bile rises hot and sour in the back of my throat when my vision catches on the ultrasound photo beside my monitor.
Virgin status confirmed through intercepted medical records. HIGH VALUE. Use as leverage against E. Marchetti.
The date on the file stares at me from the bottom of the screen. I pull up a calendar.
Two weeks before the masquerade.
The world tilts. The Rosetti contracts sit in their neat folder inches from my hand but they might as well be on another continent. The fluorescent hum of the office lights sounds like screaming. The toner smell that was sharp and clean thirty seconds ago now turns my stomach, mixing with the jasmine until the air in this small room feels poisonous.
He knew who I was before Scarlet Thorn. Before I became his "jungle flower," before his hands traced the painted vines across my skin and his mouth worshiped my body like I was the only sacred thing he'd ever touched. Before I whispered my name against his lips and gave him the one thing I'd been protecting my entire life.
He knew who I was and what I was worth, and he walked into that club with a plan that had nothing to do with desire and everything to do with destroying my father.
Destroying me.
HIGH VALUE. Use as leverage.
My third condition echoes through my skull so loud I'm surprised the walls don't shake.
You never lie to me again.
He agreed.
The rat bastard looked me dead in the eyes and promised. And the whole time this file existed. The whole time, every kiss and every whispered endearment and every morning he pressed his lips to my belly and called our baby his miracle, this file sat in his system with my virginity catalogued like inventory. My entire life has been reduced to a strategic asset.
I press my palm flat against the desk to steady myself, feeling the cool wood beneath my fingers, grounding myself in something solid while everything else dissolves. My other hand drifts to my belly, an instinct that has become as natural as breathing over these past weeks, and the warmth of my own skin against the place where our daughter grows is the only thing keeping me from flying apart.
The office door opens behind me.
"Hey, baby. Do you have the Rosetti contracts? We need them in the..." His voice trails off.
I don't turn around. I don't need to. The reflection in my monitor catches his silhouette in the doorway, broad shoulders filling the frame, one hand gripping the doorjamb hard enough to turn his knuckles white.
I’m standing far enough to the side that he has no problem looking at all the images I’ve pulled from the file on my screen.
The silence that fills the space tells me everything.
The air between us thickens until the room feels like it's shrinking around us both.
There’s a string of curses followed by my name. "Ilona." My name in his mouth sounds different now. Stripped of the warmth. Scraped raw. “Let me explain.”
"How long were you watching me before that night?" My voice comes out steady in a way that should terrify us both.
The pause that follows stretches long enough to bury a marriage in.
Behind me, I hear the soft creak of his shoe shifting against the carpet, the barely audible catch of his breath, the silence of a man choosing between another lie and the truth he can no longer outrun, no doubt.
"Two months." His voice is hollow.
Two months. While I was studying for exams and drinking vanilla lattes and dreaming of a night of freedom, he was photographing me through long lenses and cross-referencing my medical records. While I was lying in therapy talking about trust and healing and learning to let someone in, he was building a dossier on me for leverage potential.
"You knew who I was. The whole time."
"Yes."
"You approached me on purpose. To seduce me. To use me."