Blood on the Threshold

The footsteps outside the office stopped. Nova held the phone against her ear and stared at the thin strip of darkness beneath the door, waiting for another shadow to pass across it. Nothing moved. That silence frightened her more than the breaking glass had. Sadie-Rae stood behind the desk gripping a heavy brass bookend with both hands. It was shaped like a horse’s head and probably weighed ten pounds, which made it the closest thing either of them had to a weapon.

Nova lowered her voice. “Damian, somebody is inside the store.”

“I know.”

The certainty in his answer scraped across her nerves. “How?”

“Because I can see him.”

Nova turned toward the narrow office window, though the blinds were shut tight. “From where?”

“Nova.”

The way he said her name stopped the next question on her tongue. His voice had dropped lower, the edges stripped of everything except command. “Move away from the door.”

She almost argued, mostly because she hated how naturally the order came from him and how quickly some part of her wanted to obey it. Before she could decide whether to push back, the knob shifted beneath someone’s hand. Nova moved away from the door just as something slammed into it hard enough to rattle the frame. Beside her, Sadie-Rae jerked the brass bookend higher, gripping it with both hands as the impact shuddered through the small office. “Your stalker better be on his way,” she whispered.

Nova kept her eyes on the door. “Apparently he upgraded himself to surveillance.”

Another impact hit the door, harder this time, and Damian must have heard it through the phone because his voice cut in immediately, calm and precise. “Three steps back.”

Nova’s brows pulled together. “What?”

“Take your cousin and move three steps back from the door.”

There was something in his tone that made heat curl strangely low in her stomach despite the fear clawing through the rest of her. She hated that her body noticed anything about him right now, especially the calm authority in his voice. She hated even more that she listened.

Nova caught Sadie-Rae by the wrist and pulled her backward, counting the distance in her head as they moved. One step, then another, and by the third the office door burst inward. The man who came through barely made it across the threshold. A dark figure slammed into him from the side with enough force to drive both men into the opposite wall. The phone slipped from Nova’s hand and hit the carpet as Damian caught the intruder by the back of his coat, twisted, and sent him face-first into the edge of the desk. Wood cracked beneath the impact, and Sadie-Rae’s scream tore through the office while Nova stood rooted in place, her lungs locked tight and no sound making it past her lips.

The man staggered upright with blood pouring from his nose and reached beneath his jacket. Damian caught his wrist before he could pull whatever he was reaching for. There was a sickening snap. The intruder dropped to one knee with a strangled cry. Damian stood over him in the same dark coat he had worn earlier, except there was nothing elegant about him now. His hair had fallen slightly out of place, one curl brushing his forehead, and his expression had gone so cold that Nova finally understood why her father had written that people were afraid of him.

Damian crouched and removed a handgun from the man’s waistband.

He checked the magazine with practiced efficiency before setting the weapon on the desk, far outside the intruder’s reach. The man spat blood onto the floor. “Drăghici.”

Damian’s face didn’t change, but the way the intruder said his name made Nova hear it differently. This wasn’t a stranger learning who Damian was; this man already knew exactly what that name meant. The intruder laughed through bloodied teeth. “Should’ve known you’d crawl back out.”

Damian caught him by the throat and pushed him against the wall. “You broke into her store.”

The man’s smile widened. “Not her store.”

Something shifted behind Damian’s eyes. Nova stepped forward before she could think better of it. “What does that mean?”

Damian did not look away from the man. “Nova, stay back.”

“No.”

His eyes finally cut toward her. She folded her arms despite the adrenaline making her hands tremble. “You don’t get to show up, break a man’s wrist in my office, and start giving me orders without explaining what the hell is happening.”

Damian’s gaze stayed on Nova for a beat longer, and the hard line between his brows eased before he turned back to the man. The man against the wall laughed again. “She always this difficult?”

Damian’s grip tightened. “She’s alive. That’s what matters.”

Nova’s stomach gave an uncomfortable little twist at the words. The intruder’s amusement faded when Damian leaned closer. “Who sent you?”

“Go to hell.”

Damian reached down and pressed two fingers against the man’s broken wrist. The scream that followed filled the little office. Nova recoiled despite herself. Sadie-Rae whispered, “Jesus.”

Damian’s attention never left the man. “Who sent you?”

The intruder breathed through his teeth, sweat beading at his temples. “Corbea.”

The name meant nothing to Nova. Damian went very still. That frightened her more than the violence had. “Which one?” he asked.

The man swallowed. “Marius.”

Damian released him so suddenly that he sagged against the wall. Nova looked between them. “Who is Marius Corbea?”

The intruder turned his head toward her. Damian moved before Nova even registered the change in his expression. His hand closed around the man’s jaw and forced his face away from her. “You don’t look at her.”

Damian never raised his voice. He didn’t need to. He simply shifted until his body blocked the man’s line of sight completely, broad shoulders cutting Nova off from him as if the decision had already been made. A shiver moved over her skin. She hated the way some small, traitorous part of her responded to that certainty. “Damian.”

His gaze shifted to her.

“I asked you a question.”

For several seconds they stared at one another, the air between them stretched tight enough to snap. Then Damian released the man. “Marius Corbea worked with the people your father kept records on.”

Nova’s fingers curled against her sleeves. “The people who killed him?”

“Yes.”

The single word struck harder than she expected, even after the letter had warned her what her father had been involved in. Sadie-Rae lowered the bookend slowly. “And now they think Nova has whatever Uncle Robert kept?”

Damian looked at her for the first time. “Yes.”

Sadie-Rae’s face lost what little color it had left. Nova stepped closer to Damian. “I don’t have anything.”

“I believe you.”

“Apparently they don’t.”

“No.”

The man on the floor shifted. Damian looked down at him, and whatever Nova saw in his expression made her realize the conversation was over. She caught his arm before he could move. His body went completely still beneath her hand. “Don’t…please.”

Damian’s gaze dropped briefly to her fingers wrapped around his sleeve before returning to her face. “He came here armed.”

“I know.”

“He broke into your store.”

“I know.”

“He would have hurt you.”

His voice dropped, but Nova kept her hand wrapped around his arm. “That doesn’t mean you kill him in my office.”

Something passed between them then, something heavier than attraction and stranger than trust. Damian studied her for a long moment before glancing toward the hallway. “Luca.”

A man Nova had never seen stepped into view. He was extremely tall and broad through the shoulders, dressed entirely in black, with white hair and icy blue eyes that made him impossible to overlook. From the way he appeared without a sound, Nova realized he had been standing just outside the office the entire time. Sadie-Rae stared. “How many people did you bring?”

“Enough,” Damian said.

Nova’s eyes narrowed. Damian spoke to Luca in Romanian, low and quick. Luca grabbed the injured man beneath the arms and hauled him upright. “What are you doing with him?” Nova asked.

“Taking him somewhere he can answer questions without bleeding on your grandmother’s floor.”

Despite everything, Nova looked down. A dark streak of blood crossed the hardwood just outside the office. Her grandmother would have risen from the grave specifically to complain. Sadie-Rae made a strangled sound that might have been a laugh. Luca dragged the man toward the rear exit. Before disappearing into the hallway, the intruder twisted enough to look back at Nova. “They’ll find it.”

Damian stepped between them. The man smiled anyway. “The old man hid it somewhere. Corbea knows he did.”

Then Luca pulled him out of sight. Nova waited until the rear door slammed before facing Damian. “What did my father hide?”

“I don’t know.”

She searched his face for the lie and found only frustration. That bothered her. “You really don’t.”

“No.”

Nova glanced toward the front of the bookstore, where broken glass glittered beneath the emergency lights. “My father wrote that you notice everything.”

“I do.”

“Then notice me asking you to stop giving me half the truth.”

Damian’s mouth tightened slightly and Nova stepped closer. She had to tip her chin up to meet his eyes, something she resented on principle. “You knew people were watching me. You knew enough to sit outside my store for eleven days. You knew someone would eventually come through that door, and you still haven’t told me why.”

“I knew they were looking.”

“For what?”

“I hoped your father had taken it to his grave.”

“That is not an answer.”

His gaze held hers. “No. It isn’t.”

Before Nova could push harder, Damian reached into his coat and removed a set of keys. He placed them on the desk. “We’re leaving.”

Nova stared at them. “We?”

“You and Sadie-Rae.”

Sadie-Rae pointed the brass horse at him. “I’m sorry, are you kidnapping us now?”

Damian glanced at the bookend. “Not unless you intend to make that necessary.”

Sadie-Rae’s mouth fell open. Nova almost laughed, which felt dangerously close to hysteria. “No,” she said. “We’re not getting into a car with you because you decided we are.”

Damian stepped closer until the space between them narrowed. He didn’t touch her. Somehow that made his presence feel stronger. “When those men realize the first team failed, they will send another. The next men will not knock, and they will not waste time asking questions before they hurt someone.”

His eyes shifted briefly toward Sadie-Rae before returning to Nova. “They already know where your family works.”

That landed exactly where he intended. Nova’s anger didn’t disappear, but fear slipped underneath it. Damian saw it. His voice softened without losing the steel beneath it. “You can hate me in the car.”

Nova held his gaze. “Very generous.”

“I have my moments.”

The faintest hint of dry humor touched his mouth and disappeared. Nova looked toward the ruined front door, then at Sadie-Rae. Her cousin lowered the bookend. “I vote for the terrifying rich guy with backup.”

Nova sighed. “Of course you do.”

Damian picked up the keys. “Stay close to me.”

Nova’s eyes narrowed. “You really enjoy saying things like that, don’t you?”

His gaze moved over her slowly before settling back on her face. “More than I should.”

Heat moved through her before she could stop it. Nova hated that too. She grabbed her coat from the back of the chair. “Get us somewhere safe, Drăghici.”

Damian opened the rear door and stepped aside for her. Damian held her gaze without blinking, his mouth set in a firm line as he leaned closer, his voice dropping low enough that only she could hear it. “That part I can do.”

Nova walked past him into the night, stepping carefully around the blood on the threshold. Behind them, Damian locked Sweetgum & Spine and followed.