I let the music block out everything else. Tonight wasn’t about Matvey or my father or Lilian and my half-brothers.
It was about me having fun with my friends and not having to worry about anyone or anything.
The music thrummed through, my heart rate quickening as I swayed to the beat, but my smile faded quickly as I felt aprickling sensation on my scalp. It wasn’t the first time I’d felt it, and I knew what followed each time.
Even here in this room, even with my girls near me, and the music pulsating in my veins, I could not shake it off.
I knew it was him.
Matvey.
I could feel him, like smoke in my lungs.
There was no way he was here, but I knew it wasn’t just anyone else. It was Matvey, and Matvey was always watching. I knew from the moment he proposed marriage to me that I would never be able to escape his watch.
Anya pulled me to the middle of the dance floor. “Come on, Z. This might be your one last chance at having fun forever.”
I chuckled and allowed her to pull me along.
The music surrounded us even louder, the kind that settled into your chest and dared you not to dance along.
I lifted my arms and released them.
Only for a moment.
I spun, my hair whipping, my hips swaying to the beat, and Anya spun with me, wild and lovely.
Arielle caught up, yelling things between swallows of champagne. Marina was already flirting with some DJ-looking guy in a corner, and Sophie was filming fuzzy videos none of us would recall agreeing to.
And for that second—that dizzy, sweet second—I was alright.
Normal.
Free.
But even as I smiled, I felt a chill despite the heat. Like eyes on my back. Like a string around my throat, waiting to be pulled.
I blinked and searched the crowd for a glimpse of him, heart pounding. There was no face I knew. No dark suits. No gunmetal gazes.
But I could feel him. I was certain it was him somewhere in the crowd, watching me.
I turned around, grinning with my hair sticking to the back of my neck, panting and rosy from the alcohol I’d taken. The bass throbbed against my skin in time with the burst of adrenaline rushing through me.
Then I spotted him.
The crowd blurred, the lights strobed, and there, through the sea of dancers, my eyes locked onto a figure in the shadows.
Tall.
Motionless.
Predator-quiet.
Matvey.
He was barely off the dance floor, half hidden in the shadows, dressed in black as if he were the grim reaper here to take my soul.
His eyes were fixed on me, sharp as a blade and cold as steel. His face was expressionless as usual.
