Mia
She hated the way his scent stuck to her skin - cedar and command - as if her body didn't know this was supposed to be a performance. A job. A mission.
Lucas Drax wasn't supposed to be interesting.
He was a target. A uniform. A chess piece on the wrong side of the board.
And yet...
She leaned against the balcony's cool stone, watching him retreat into the ballroom. He didn't look back.
Good.
She couldn't afford softness. Not now.
Not when the world thought Lina Loas sent her here with a peace offering instead of a scalpel.
But her pulse still hadn't slowed.
And her lips still felt like they were holding back a truth she didn't want to name.
Lucas
He poured a second drink he didn't want.
The music returned to its dull hum, but the heat of her hadn't left his hands.
That woman - Mia - she was not what she claimed. But what unsettled him more wasn't that she was lying.
It was how much he wanted to let her lie.
Just a little longer.
She danced like she didn't care who was watching.
Spoke like she was flirting with danger.
Looked at him like she already knew how he'd break.
He needed to shake this off. Return to his post. Read the reports. Stick to the mission.
But he'd felt something tonight - not trust, not attraction. Something far worse.
Recognition.
Both of them.
They returned to the party at different times.
Different paces.
Same tension riding low beneath their skin.
Across the room, neither made eye contact again.
But in the crowd, something shifted.
Just beyond the line of diplomats, servers, and security, a figure slipped past unnoticed - dressed in formal black, eyes too sharp for comfort, lips twitching as if he'd heard a secret.
He didn't speak.
Didn't stop.
But Mia felt it - that flicker of something familiar, something unfinished.
A ghost she hadn't seen in years.
Or a man she'd only heard of in classified whispers.
Lucas's spine stiffened, unaware of what - or who - had just brushed by.
Neither of them saw the man disappear into the shadows behind the gilded curtain.
But the story had just started.
And now, it was already too late to stop it