The woman who had been utterly immovable a second earlier stopped dead in her tracks. Liora Voss lowered her head, fixing Elias Kane with a stare so dark and heavy it could have chilled the air between them. Those hazel eyes, usually cool and calculating, now held a shadow that might have made anyone else flinch.
Elias, however, behaved as if he hadn’t registered the danger at all. He simply blinked up at her with deliberate innocence, the corner of his mouth lifting in a soft, teasing curve. "Well? Does that an you’ll take for breakfast now?"
Liora raised her hand slowly, dragging the back of it across her cheek with deliberate force, as though wiping away sothing filthy. Her voice dropped to a temperature that could freeze fire. "Do you have any idea what you just did?"
"I know exactly what I did." Elias kept smiling, his arm still looped around hers in the kind of intimate hold that scread lovers. He leaned in just enough to lower his voice, letting amusent thread through every syllable. "Sa as last ti—this one’s a reward too."
"For you keeping company for two whole hours."
Liora’s brows drew tight, the line between them sharp as a blade. "You actually think I want that?"
"You don’t?" Elias’s smile faded in an instant, his expression icing over with clinical detachnt. "Then stop pretending you didn’t hear . I said I want breakfast, so we’re getting breakfast. Unless you’d rather watch get so hungry that my first al ends up being a chunk of your sister’s flesh."
The threat hovered between them, raw and unfiltered. Liora inhaled deeply, the sound almost silent, then answered in a voice carved from granite. "Fine. We’ll get breakfast."
"Thank you, sister~" Elias’s tone flipped back to syrupy sweetness in the space of a heartbeat, his face blooming into a radiant, disarming grin as if the storm had never existed.
"I rember a great little spot right near here. Let’s go try it!"
Before she could respond, he was already jogging ahead, light on his feet and full of energy—nothing like soone who had just been hooked to an IV and burning with fever.
Liora watched his retreating figure, an unsettling sense of unreality washing over her. The boy himself seed to shimr and blur at the edges, as insubstantial as morning mist. The most absurd part was the kiss itself. She hadn’t... hated it.
Far from it. Her cheek still burned where his lips had brushed, the heat lingering like a brand. If she touched it again, she half-expected her own skin to scorch.
[Liora Voss favorability increased. Current: 28%.]
Elias sat in the steamy, noisy corner breakfast spot, one leg crossed lazily over the other, and rolled his eyes so hard it was a miracle they didn’t get stuck. He had long since given up comnting on Liora Voss’s stubborn denials out loud.
He had already ordered everything he wanted and now simply waited, the air thick with the savory scent of fresh broth and sizzling edges. He turned his attention inward. "What exactly did she do while I was asleep?"
Liora would never guess that no matter how carefully she had moved, she could not hide from him. He had two sets of eyes—his own and the system’s.
System Theta recounted every second, every word, every subtle shift in her posture and tone without missing a single detail.
[System Theta: Host, will this interfere with your plan?]
Elias shook his head, his faint smile never wavering. "I was expecting sothing dramatic. Turns out she just accidentally did a favor. I’ve been working the sa angle myself."
The system fell silent, already accustod to the host’s unshakable confidence that everything remained firmly within his grasp.
Lying back and letting things unfold really was the easiest way.
"Still..." Elias’s lips curved with quiet nace. "She had the nerve to touch my phone." He never forgot a grudge.
When Liora finally arrived, sliding into the seat across from him with her usual graceful precision, Elias extended his hand imdiately. "Lend your phone for a second. Mine’s about to die."
Liora’s pulse gave a tiny, involuntary jump. She kept her face perfectly blank, certain her actions had been exposed. "What for?"
"Nothing special. Just hand it over." Elias tilted his head back, the pale column of his throat stretched taut with pure, unearned confidence.
The sheer audacity of the demand almost made her laugh. She had no intention of lending it—until the mory of that feather-light kiss flared hot across her cheek again. Knowing his personality, he was entirely capable of causing a scene right here in public if she refused. After a brief internal debate, she unlocked the device and passed it across.
"Thanks." Elias took it without ceremony and imdiately began scrolling, making zero effort to hide the screen.
Liora glanced over. He was just watching videos. Nothing sensitive. All her important data was locked behind additional passwords he would never crack.
A few minutes later, two steaming bowls arrived. Elias picked up a pair of fork and spoon and lifted one brow. "You haven’t eaten already, have you?"
Liora shook her head. She had been awake all night and had touched nothing. Hunger gnawed at her now.
She pulled out the chair and sat, taking up her own fork and beginning to eat with quiet efficiency. Her custom-tailored outfit—worth more than most people’s monthly rent—looked wildly out of place amid the plastic tables and paper napkins, yet sohow she wore the contrast like it belonged to her.
Before long she finished, setting the bowl aside.
She looked up at Elias. Even while eating he hadn’t put the phone down, scrolling one-handed while steadily slurping noodles. A terrible habit.
After another mont of watching, Elias finally lifted his gaze. "What?"
Liora jerked her eyes away, voice cool and even. "I’m done."
"Wait for . I’ll be finished in a second." Elias hid his small, knowing smirk. She had no idea how obvious that glance had been.
Only once he lowered his head again did Liora allow herself to look properly. Her stare had been fixed on his lips—the sa lips that had been dry and cracked from fever, now glistening with a thin sheen of oil from the broth. They looked plush, almost obscenely pretty, and the sight dragged her mind straight back to the kiss barely an hour old.
This was not a good sign.
It ant she stood at the very edge of the abyss.
Liora dropped her gaze, lashes lowering like a curtain.
At least she had caught herself in ti. She had stopped right at the brink.
It wasn’t too late to step back.
After breakfast, Liora drove him straight to the familiar presidential suite without another word.
This ti Serena Blackwood had arrived first. Elias was the one who walked in more than ten minutes late.
He showed zero remorse. He rely flicked a lazy glance at Serena and remarked, "We’re even now." Referring, of course, to the running tally of who had kept whom waiting.
Then, sweat still beading faintly at his temples from the lingering fever, he reached for the hem of his shirt and started pulling it off. "Let’s get to it."
"Wait."
The sharp slap of a thick folder hitting the marble floor cut through the air.
Elias paused mid-motion, staring at the heavy file now lying at his feet. He already knew what it contained.
Liora’s efficiency really was impressive.
"Open it. Look." Serena’s voice carried no inflection whatsoever. She had spent the night awake as well, channeling every ounce of exhaustion into cold, razor-sharp focus so she could face this confrontation without a single crack in her armor.
Elias crouched, picked up the folder, and flipped it open.
Exactly as expected—surveillance stills of him and Giselle Frost entering the hotel together. He had anticipated this. There was nothing new to see.
He skimd the images in seconds and closed the file again.
The casual dismissal ignited Serena like a match to gasoline. All the forced calm she had cultivated overnight evaporated in an instant. Her eyes were bloodshot, the whites threaded with red, her entire fra vibrating with the effort of not erupting.
She had suspected sothing between Elias and Giselle, but she had never imagined it had progressed this far.
They had gotten a room together.
"Did you sleep with her?!"
Elias lifted his head slowly, taking in the sight of Serena Blackwood—usually the picture of poised tenderness—now trembling on the edge of a volcanic explosion. Inside, he gave a soft, private laugh.
A firecracker this perfectly prid... how could anyone resist lighting the fuse?
He certainly couldn’t.
So he answered with perfect calm.
"We did."
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