For a heartbeat, Lila did not move.
He was familiar, yet not. The restraint she had come to recognize was still there, but honed now by something steadier, more deliberate. He looked as though he had stepped fully into himself and decided not to retreat again.
“Mrs. Dove-Lyon,” Lila said first, inclining her head.
“Thank you for coming,” Bessie replied. “I will leave you for a few moments. Titan will see that we are not disturbed.”
She gave Marcus a knowing look before withdrawing.
The door closed softly.
Silence gathered.
“You should not have been summoned like this,” Lila said. “If Fenwick learns—”
“He already knows something has shifted,” Marcus said quietly. “Better that we speak plainly now.”
She looked at him fully then. “You are different.”
“Yes.”
“What have you done?”
“I decided not to let him choose the field,” Marcus said. “Or the terms.”
“That is dangerous.”
“So is allowing him to believe you stand alone.”
Her hands tightened around her reticule. “I do not.”
“No,” he agreed. “You do not. But he must learn that.”
She searched his face, trying to reconcile the man before her with the one who had stood so carefully at her side only days ago.
“And what happens when he pushes back?” she asked.
“He will,” Marcus said. “And when he does, he will find himself without the protections he relies upon. I have already begun removing them.”
Her breath caught. “You speak as if this were strategy.”
“It is.”
“And if he strikes first?”
Marcus stepped closer. Not abruptly. Intentionally.
“Then he will find I am not unprepared.”
She closed her eyes briefly. “I asked you to be careful.”
“And I am,” he said. “But careful does not mean passive.”
She opened her eyes. “You frighten me.”
“Because I refuse to pretend this does not matter?”
“Because you matter,” she said before she could stop herself.