The gates swing open. The driver—one of Dad's men, silent and stoic—pulls the car up the long driveway. My suitcases are already being unloaded before we even stop.
"Miss Aurora." Marco, my father's head of security, opens my door. "Welcome home."
Home.
There's that word again.
"Thanks, Marco." I climb out and smooth down my dress. The same black dress I wore to Axel's penthouse yesterday. I haven't changed. Haven't showered. Can still smell him on my skin if I try hard enough.
Stop thinking about him.
But I can't. Can't stop replaying those last five hours. The way he held me. The way he kissed me goodbye at the door, his hand cupping my face like I was something precious. The way he watched me leave, expression carved from stone, and didn't ask me to stay, even though I could see it in his eyes.
We're from different worlds.
I told myself that in the car. Told myself that a thousand times on the flight home. Told myself that what we had was temporary, beautiful, over.
My chest still hurts.
"Aurora!" Dad's voice booms from the front entrance. He's standing there in his usual uniform—expensive suit, no tie, commanding presence that makes men twice his size nervous. "About time. I was starting to think you forgot where you live."
I paste on a smile. Walk up the steps. Let him pull me into a brief hug that's more obligation than affection.
"Missed you too, Dad."
"You look tired." He studies my face, and I see the moment he notices something's off. "School run you ragged?"
"Something like that."
"Well, you're home now. Get some rest." He kisses me on the cheek. "Good to have you back, princess."
Princess.
He's called me that since I was a baby. Back when I was younger, it made me feel special. Now it just reminds me that I'm a princess in a world that leaves me no room to be who I want to be.
I suppose I should be thankful for the years my father allowed me to experience freedom. Most women in my world never get this kind of chance.
I head inside. Up the grand staircase. Down the hallway to my room—the one I haven't slept in for four years, the one that still has posters from high school and books I'll never read again.
Everything's exactly how I left it.
I'm the only thing that's changed.
The first week back, I slip into my old routine like putting on a familiar coat that doesn't quite fit anymore.
In the mornings, I work in Dad's office. He's got me analyzing financial statements from his "legitimate businesses"—restaurants, nightclubs, construction companies. All of them fronts for moving money, and all of them need clean books in case the feds come sniffing.
I'm good at this. Always have been. Numbers make sense in ways people don't. You can trace money, follow patterns, and see where things don't add up. It's satisfying to fix the discrepancies, making everything balance.
"This nightclub's running a deficit," I tell Dad on Thursday. "You're paying out more in 'consulting fees' than you're bringing in. But it's not random skimming — it's consistent, same amount, same day of the month, routed through three different vendor accounts. Someone set this up deliberately. It's been running for at least eight months." I turn the laptop toward him. "See the pattern?"
He leans over my shoulder and goes very still.
"That's Dmitri's territory," he says quietly.
"I know. His name isn't on any of it, but the routing pattern goes through a holding company that traces back to a property in his wife's name. I can write up the full trail if you want it documented."
Dad straightens. Studies me for a moment with an expression I can't quite read. "When did you find this?"