BAD HABITS

The clocks chimed six-twenty, marking the official conclusion of my first day at the Hohenzollern estate. I had done more than merely survive the ordeal, I had somehow earned a rare crumb of approval from Dr. Corvin.

Not extravagantly, of course. Maëlys Corvin did not strike me as a woman given to wild hyperbole where professional validation was concerned. She had simply stopped beside my workstation while reviewing the condition report in unreadable silence, and tapped one neatly manicured fingernail against my documentation of the synthetic thread.

"Good eye."That was all. Yet, I had been insufferably, ridiculously pleased with myself for the following forty minutes.

"You're doing it again," Anika broke the silence, pulling on her coat.

I looked up from my terminal. "Doing what?"

"Smiling at a blank screen."

"I had a productive day."

"You've been trapped in a windowless sub-basement since morning." She shook her head, slinging her bag over her shoulder. "That isn't a normal human response. You're terrifying. South courtyard for the staff shuttle. Do not follow the west signs unless you want security officers asking why you're wandering toward the private residential wing."

"I have a map."

"So did I on my first day."She waved and disappeared through the doors.

I remained behind to verify that my daily log had synced with the master server. Then I collected my bag, looped my cardigan over my arm, and headed up the elevator. Late-September sunlight spilled through the massive western lancet windows, throwing long, amber bars across the polished limestone floors. I let out a long breath.

I had done well. The realization sent a small, quiet burst of satisfaction through my chest. Starting new positions had always terrified me more than I liked to admit. There was something uniquely exhausting about walking into a place where everyone already understood the unwritten rules, pretending you didn't feel like an underqualified intruder until, eventually, you weren't one anymore.

Today had been different. Overwhelming, certainly. High-stakes, without a doubt. But deeply exciting. I could actually see a future for myself here. I turned down the hall leading toward the south court, then gradually slowed my pace. The faint scent of tobacco smoke was drifting through a pair of open glass terrace doors. Every instinct honed over years of professional discipline urged me to keep moving straight toward that shuttle.

I didn't.

Dashiell von Hohenzollern lifted a thin cigarette to his lips, the ember glowing sharp red against the dusk. I stopped dead in my tracks. The image was so unexpectedly, jarringly human that for several seconds my brain refused to reconcile it with everything else I knew about him.

Apparently, untouchable princes developed bad habits, too. He turned his head before I could make a decision to leave, and our eyes met through the glass.

The now-familiar, frightening pressure beneath my sternum flared instantly. 

He lowered the cigarette from his lips, exhaling a slow plume of smoke. "Miss." There was zero surprise in his face. 

"Mr. von Hohenzollern," I responded.

My eyes strayed toward the cigarette held between his long fingers.

 "You look disappointed."

Mortification struck me like a bucket of ice water. "I beg your pardon?"

"The cigarette."

"I didn't mean to stare, sir."

"You did."

There was no accusation in his tone. If anything, he sounded faintly entertained.

I adjusted the strap of my bag higher on my shoulder, squaring my chest. "I was merely surprised."

"Why?"

 "I suppose I didn't expect it."

"From me?"

"Yes, sir."

He took another slow drag, the line of his jaw sharpening as he pulled the smoke in. "What, exactly, did you expect?"

I hesitated. The fading golden light caught the razor-sharp edge of his cheekbone. He looked slightly more relaxed than he had in the sub-basement earlier, though 'relaxed' seemed like an overly generous word to describe anything Dashiell von Hohenzollern did.

"Nothing I could appropriately comment on," I replied.

He turned his head and exhaled the smoke out toward the gardens, away from me.

"Diplomatic as always."

"I am trying to remain employed, sir."

"Corvin wouldn't dismiss you for insulting me."

A short, quiet laugh escaped my lips before I had the chance to smother it. "I would prefer not to test that hypothesis on day one."

"Prudent."

Leave now, my brain screamed. Walk away. Instead, against every law of self-preservation, I took two steps forward onto the terrace. Enough distance remained between us that anyone glancing out from the corridor could never mistake the interaction for anything other than a formal exchange.

"Finished for the day?"

"Yes, sir."

"And how did Konrad's fencing jacket survive your inspection?"

"Quite well, actually."

"And Corvin?"

A small, unstoppable smile tugged at the corner of my mouth.

 "She was pleased with you." It wasn't a question.

I stared at him, genuinely thrown. "How on earth did you gather that from my face?"

"People rarely look that insufferably pleased with themselves after merely surviving Maëlys Corvin."

I tried to suppress the smile. Failed. "She told me I had a good eye."

"High praise indeed."

"You sound sarcastic, sir."

"I'm not," he responded, rolling the cigarette between his thumb and forefinger. "Corvin once rejected twenty-six pages of my university thesis because I cited a secondary translation when the original diplomatic correspondence was housed two floors below my bedroom."

I blinked. "She reviewed your university work?"

"She has known me since infancy. Professional boundaries have never prevented her from editing my life."

The image of Dr. Corvin silently appearing beside a teenage Dashiell with a red pen instantly bloomed in my mind. The pure delight it brought me was completely inappropriate.

"I wish I had known that this afternoon," I admitted.

His gaze slid back to mine. "Why?"

"I might have been slightly less intimidated."

"By me, or Corvin?"

I realized my mistake the second the trap sprung shut. "Dr. Corvin."

"Liar."

My eyes widened. Dashiell took another drag from his cigarette. I turned my head toward the gardens, desperately trying to ignore the ridiculous, blistering warmth flooding my cheeks. "You are remarkably, unfairly confident, sir."

"I've been accused of far worse."

"I imagine so."

The ghost of a smirk twitched at his lips. He leaned over and crushed the remainder of his cigarette into a stone ash receptacle set into the wall.

"You never told me your name."

"My name?"

"Yes, your full name."

For some reason, the request felt far more intimate than it had any right to be.

"Zhenevieva Borghese," I murmured.

 "Zhenevieva ." He pronounced it perfectly. Not the awkward, hesitant approximation most people offered on their first attempt. 

A slow, terrifying heat rolled down my spine. I cleared my throat, forcing my voice to remain grounded. "Yes."

"French?"

"Partly. My mother's preference."

I suddenly became deeply, intensely interested in a row of oak trees by the fountain. "You pronounce it correctly."

"Shouldn't I?"

"Most people don't bother."

"Most people are lazy."

There was something so effortlessly, casually arrogant about the statement that it instantly yanked me back from whatever dangerous ledge my thoughts had begun wandering toward.

I looked back at him, raising an eyebrow. "That is an extraordinarily unforgiving assessment, sir."

"Is it inaccurate?"

I considered it for a fraction of a second. "No."

"Then there we are."

There we were, indeed. He reached into his trouser pocket and pulled out a silver cigarette case.

"May I ask you a question, sir?"

"You've been doing reasonably well so far."

A tiny, involuntary smile touched my lips. "Is smoking permitted for Grand Circuit athletes?"

Dashiell selected another unlit cigarette. "Yes."

"I would have assumed it compromised lung capacity and athletic performance."

"It does for humans, werewolves? Not so much ."

I waited for an elaboration. He offered absolutely nothing.

"So you simply don't care?" I asked.

His eyes lifted slowly to mine. There it was again, that sharp, dangerous shift in the air where I became acutely aware that I had overstepped the boundary of formal decorum.

"I apologize," I threw out quickly, taking a half-step back. "That was intrusive."

He rolled the unlit cigarette between his fingers, his gaze holding mine captive. "You apologize frequently."

"I have known you for less than a day, Mr. von Hohenzollern."

"And?"

"And you are Dashiell von Hohenzollern."

"That seems to concern you considerably," he murmured.

"It concerns anyone with basic situational awareness."

"Not everyone apologizes every time they disagree with me."

"Perhaps they have better employment contracts."

A sudden laugh escaped him, so startlingly attractive that it did something utterly catastrophic to my pulse.

His pale eyes settled on my face. "Do you always worry this much about behaving correctly, Zhenevieva?"

"No," I responded firmly.

His dark brow lifted.

"At work," I amended quickly.

"Ah."

"I take my career very seriously."

"I noticed," he mused. Dashiell's gaze dropped briefly to my mouth. Or perhaps I had hallucinated it entirely.

"You should stop looking at me like that," he murmured.

Every coherent thought in my head evaporated instantly. "Like what?"

"As though you're trying to decide whether you like me."

Heat exploded across my entire face. "I am doing no such thing!"

"No?"

"No, sir."

A slow curve touched his lips. The man was flirting with me. Worse, he knew that I knew, and he was thoroughly enjoying my panic.

"I see," he murmured.

Mortification fought a violent, losing battle with something far more reckless blooming in my chest.

I tightened my grip on my bag, taking a full step back toward the open glass doors. "This has been a very pleasant conversation, Mr. von Hohenzollern."

"Has it?"

"I really must catch my shuttle."

 "Of course."

I gave him the most rigid, dignified nod I could manage under emotional duress. "Good evening, sir."

"Good evening, Zhenevieva."

My name followed me straight through the terrace doors.

By the time I reached the elevator, my heart was beating far too fast for a woman walking at an entirely respectable pace.

This was complete insanity.

He was my employer's son. An Alpha heir. A man born into enough wealth, power, and political influence to make my entire existence look economically theoretical. And, unless every major news network in the country was lying, he was practically engaged to Lady Evadne Varenne. I had a career I cared about, a supervisor I desperately wanted to impress, and a position I had worked years to secure.

I was not going to risk my entire future because Dashiell von Hohenzollern possessed lethal forearms, an absurdly dangerous voice, and the devastating ability to pronounce my name correctly.

No. Tomorrow, I would work. If I ran into him, I would be polite, professional, and completely distant. Ideally from a totally different wing of the estate.

I reached the south courtyard just as the shuttle doors hissed open. Dashiell von Hohenzollern and I were going to stay as far away from each other as humanly possible.

The immense relief I felt upon making this decision would have been far more convincing if a small, traitorous voice in the back of my mind wasn't already praying that I failed.