Chapter 69: What’s going on?

The rest of the day moved fast after that. Too fast, almost. One moment the house was full of noise, bags being packed, doors opening and closing, low voices giving orders. The next moment, it was over, and Sienna found herself walking up the steps of a private jet, the evening air cool against her skin.

Manuel did not come with them. He had somewhere else to be. Spain, Marcus had said, something Viktor needed done there, something that could not wait. So it was only the three of them now. Marcus. Viktor. And Sienna.

Sienna held her laptop close to her chest as she stepped onto the plane, the way a person might hold onto something small when everything else around them feels too big to control.

She walked down the narrow aisle, found her seat, and sat down without waiting for anyone to help her. She buckled her own seat belt, slow and steady, then rested the laptop on her lap, her hands still resting on top of it long after the belt clicked shut.

Viktor took the seat across from her.

She felt his eyes on her before she even looked up.

"What," she said, finally meeting his gaze, "you want to handcuff me again?"

"Do I have to?" he asked. His voice was calm, almost amused, but there was something underneath it too, something that sounded like he actually wanted to know. "You seem angry. And I can’t tell what’s going on in your mind. So why don’t you tell me."

Sienna looked away, out toward the small window beside her, where the last bit of daylight was fading into a soft orange line along the sky.

"Can we just have a peaceful flight home, please," she said. "I promise. No funny business."

There was a pause. A short one. Long enough that she almost looked back at him just to see what he was thinking.

"Okay," he said at last. "I’ll trust you, then." A beat. "My previous offer still stands, you know." he meant pleasure in the air, Sienna’s heart skip a beat.

"No, thank you," Sienna said. "I’ll pass." She forced a smile onto her face, small and tight, the kind of smile that did not reach her eyes at all.

"You’re a bad wifey," he said, and there was almost a laugh hiding somewhere in his voice as he said it. He walked away and leaned back into his own seat and pulled the curtain closed beside him, shutting himself off from her, from Marcus, from the rest of the plane.

Sienna let out a breath she hadn’t realized she was holding.

She was alone now, or as alone as she could be, thirty thousand feet in the air, with her laptop on her lap and her heart still refusing, no matter how many times she told it to stop, to slow down.

She appreciated the quiet. She told herself she did, anyway.

After some few hours, they were home.

The plane touched down with a small jolt, tires meeting the runway, the sound of the engines dropping into a low, tired hum. Sienna had fallen asleep somewhere over the ocean, her head resting against the cold glass of the window, her laptop still cradled against her chest like something precious.

It was the landing that woke her, the sudden dip and pull of the plane slowing itself down, and for a second she did not know where she was.

Then she remembered.

It was still very early in the morning when they finally arrived back at the Kessler mansion. The sky outside was that strange color it gets right before the sun decides to rise, not quite black, not quite blue, just tired and grey and waiting.

Sienna walked through the front doors half asleep, her feet moving on memory alone, and went straight to her room.

She never thought she would miss her bed in this house. Not once. Not after everything that had happened inside these walls. But when she finally lay down and felt the familiar softness under her, something in her chest loosened, just a little, like a knot slowly giving up the fight.

She was asleep again within minutes.

When she opened her eyes, the room was brighter. Sunlight had crept in through the curtains, thin lines of gold stretching across the floor. And there, sitting quietly in the chair beside her bed, was Viktor.

He was watching her. Not in a way that felt strange or frightening, but in a way that made her feel like he had been sitting there for a while, waiting for her to wake up on her own instead of disturbing her.

Sienna blinked, still half caught between sleep and the waking world, and pushed herself up onto her elbows.

"What’s wrong?" she asked, her voice thick with sleep. "Am I in trouble?"

"No," Viktor said. His voice was soft, softer than she had heard it before. He reached out, and his hand moved gently against the side of her face, his thumb brushing along her cheek the way someone touches something they are afraid of breaking.

Sienna went still. She did not pull away, though some small, stubborn part of her mind told her that she should.

"I have never asked anything of you," Viktor said, his hand slowly falling back to his lap. "But I want to. This afternoon."

Sienna frowned, sitting up fully now, pulling the blanket up a little around herself as if it could somehow protect her from whatever was coming next.

"What’s going on?" she asked.

Viktor was quiet for a moment. His jaw tightened, just slightly, the way it did when he was thinking through something carefully, weighing each word before he let it out into the room.

"There is a council," he said finally. "A council of big bosses. They are calling for a meeting." He paused, his eyes meeting hers, steady and dark. "And I don’t know who I can trust right now. So I want you to do something for me."