Kai Arden had failed so many times that failure itself had begun to feel routine. Each attempt followed the same trajectory—certainty, calculation, execution—and then the quiet, humiliating collapse of a theory that could not survive daylight. He had chased patterns that dissolved the moment he reached for them. He had read meaning into pauses that turned out to be nothing more than habit. He had watched shadows that never solidified into shape.
And yet, instinct remained. Instinct did not argue. It did not explain itself. It simply persisted, low and constant, like a pressure behind the ribs. Evidence could be absent. Proof could refuse to materialize. But instinct—his instinct—did not retreat.
Alina Carter had been in his house for weeks now, and in that time she had done nothing he could openly accuse. She did not wander into his room. She did not hover near his study. She did not pry, did not ask questions that edged too close to his private life, did not test boundaries the way an infiltrator would. If anything, she was almost careful to the point of restraint. Too careful.
Kai had built his life on reading people. He understood ambition, deception, and hunger. He knew what it looked like when someone wanted something badly enough to risk exposure. Alina displayed none of that. She moved through the house as though she belonged there—but not with entitlement but with adjustment as if she were learning the rhythm, not imposing herself upon it. That, more than anything else, unsettled him.
The absence of missteps did not reassure him. It sharpened his unease. That night, the house had settled into its familiar quiet—the soft hum of electricity, the distant tick of the old clock in the hallway, the muted city noise pressing faintly against the windows. Kai had been halfway down the stairs when he noticed her.
Alina stood near the far window of the living room, her back angled slightly toward the rest of the house. The light from outside traced a thin silver edge along her profile. Her phone was pressed to her ear.
At first, there was nothing remarkable about the sight. People took calls. Guests took calls. There was no rule against privacy. But then he noticed how she was standing.
She wasn't relaxed. Her shoulders were drawn in, not slouched but tight, as if held in check by effort. Her free hand was clenched loosely at her side, fingers flexing once before stilling. She wasn't pacing or fidgeting. She was listening carefully.
Her voice, when she spoke, was low—lower than necessary. Not hushed in embarrassment, not softened by emotion. Controlled and deliberately pitched just beneath audibility. She turned her head slightly, glancing over her shoulder, then toward the hallway, then back again, as if mapping sound rather than space.
She moved closer to the corner, positioning herself where the walls swallowed echoes. Turning her back fully now, not casually, but with intention.
Kai stopped mid-step. He told himself he was imagining it. That proximity had sharpened his perception, that suspicion bred interpretation. But instinct did not loosen its grip. He took another step. The floorboard creaked.
Alina stiffened. The reaction was immediate and unmistakable—her spine straightened, her shoulders locked, her breath paused. Within seconds—too quickly—she ended the call without any delay.
She turned, phone disappearing behind her back, her hands clasped together as if she had been caught mid-act and was still deciding how to explain it. The smile she offered him was polite, practiced, and slightly delayed.
"Oh—hey," she said.
The word hung awkwardly between them, a flimsy veil for whatever she'd been doing a heartbeat before. Kai searched her expression, tracking the nervous shift in her eyes and the forced stillness of her posture. She was definitely hiding something—the guilt was written in the sharp tension of her jaw—but the secret itself remained frustratingly out of reach.
"Are you okay?" he asked. It was an ordinary question.
She shrugged lightly, a careless roll of her shoulders that didn't quite match the tension still present in her posture. "Yeah. What might happen to me?" The answer came too quickly, without thought, as if rehearsed.
Kai let his gaze sweep over her once—from the line of her jaw to the set of her hands—then moved past her without another word. He could feel her watching him until he disappeared.
Minutes later, she headed toward the kitchen. Kai sat at the dining table, tablet in hand, posture relaxed, eyes lowered. He didn't look at her directly. He didn't need to. Her phone lit up. The shift in her body was immediate.
She glanced toward him—quick, sharp—then turned away, stepping deeper into the kitchen, placing distance between her voice and his presence. The walls muffled sound, but not intent.
"…Yes," Alina said quietly. "I know."
There was a pause.
"No. Not now."
Kai rose from his chair, careful with his steps. He didn't rush. He didn't try to hide. He merely shortened the distance. She heard him anyway. Her awareness snapped toward him, senses sharpened, eyes flicking in his direction. He was close now—close enough to see the way her fingers tightened around the phone.
She ended the call. Again. Kai stopped just behind her, not invading her space, not touching. Just present.
"Bad timing?" he asked.
She hesitated. It was only a second—but it was enough. "Something like that," she replied.
This time, she didn't hide the phone. She held it in front of her with both hands, thumbs hovering near the screen as though anticipating another interruption. Almost immediately, the device vibrated.
She didn't answer. Instead, she cut the call and looked back at him. The phone vibrated again. Then once more. She exhaled slowly, deliberately, as though releasing tension she had been holding back with discipline rather than nerves.
"You're getting a lot of calls tonight," Kai observed.
"Am I?" she said, a fraction too fast. "Didn't notice." She slipped the phone into her pocket. That was when something shifted inside him.
Not that she was guilty, but that she was careful. Careful in a way that suggested she knew she was being observed. Careful in a way that adjusted to his movements, his presence, and his attention and that changed everything.
Later, when she passed him in the hallway, her phone buzzed again. This time, she didn't stop. Didn't check it. Didn't answer. She kept walking.
Kai remained where he was, watching her disappear down the corridor, the quiet hum of suspicion returning like a familiar shadow. The calls were one thing, and the laptop was another.
From the first morning, it had been there—open on her bed, screen glowing faintly in the early light. When Kai knocked on her door to call her for breakfast, she had looked up at him not with the groggy confusion of someone just waking, but with the alertness of someone already deep into thought.
Her laptop rested against her knees. Fingers poised. Eyes locked.
"Breakfast," he'd said.
She'd startled—just slightly—then closed the screen a little too quickly before nodding and smiling.
At lunch, it sat beside her plate. During dinner, it hovered near her reach. If she wasn't typing, she was reading. If she wasn't reading, she was thinking about returning to it. Her gaze drifted back to the screen even in the middle of a conversation, as though something there demanded constant vigilance.
Kai tried, more than once, to glimpse what held her attention. Every time, she adjusted. If he came up behind her, she shifted position. If he leaned casually nearby, she angled the screen away. If he asked what she was working on, she smiled and closed the laptop entirely, fingers lingering on the lid as though sealing something away.
Once, when he moved closer under the pretense of reaching for a glass, she stepped between him and the screen, body aligning perfectly to block his view.
Kai began to notice the pattern everywhere—in how she positioned herself in rooms, in how she oriented her body toward exits, in how she paused before answering certain questions. She wasn't hiding clumsily. She was managing exposure. That was what unsettled him most. Because amateurs hid out of fear. Professionals hid out of habit.
Late one night, alone in his study, Kai stared at the city lights beyond the window and acknowledged what he had been resisting. He could not do this himself anymore. Every attempt he made collapsed inward. Every theory he built dismantled itself under scrutiny. His presence altered her behaviour too directly. His attention had become a variable.
If there was truth to uncover, he needed distance. He picked up his phone. "Ryan," he said when the line connected. "I need you to do something."