Anya's heels clicked with a measured rhythm, each step delicate and deliberate, the glint of her pale blue silk gown reflecting the morning light like frost on marble. Her smile was perfection, poised, empty, rehearsed. But Gabriel didn't see her expression.
He smelled her first.
A cloying sweetness, rich and familiar, wrapped around a note that was wrong. That scent, amber, crushed violet, and something darker beneath. The same base as Damian's cologne.
Gabriel's stomach twisted. The hairs on the back of his neck stood up, and a slow heat crept up the side of his face; he could see red now.
I'm jealous. For fuck's sake.
Gabriel forced his breath out through his nose, slow and measured, as if he could exhale the emotion away. He wasn't going to give her the satisfaction. Not a twitch. Not a blink.
Anya's goal was clear: to bait him. To make him move. To expose something raw.
And if he reacted, she'd claim innocence with that careful, court-trained smile.
