The Devil She Never Noticed

~CASSIAN~

The silver butter knife in my right hand felt heavy and well-balanced, and was sharp enough to cut skin if I pressed it even a little harder against my palm.

Across the dining table, my brother...the family's golden heir, the favored son, the legitimate prince...was laughing with his mouth full.

"You remember that summer at the lake house?" Ryker chuckled, taking an aggressive gulp from a thousand-dollar cabernet.

He pointed at me with his wine glass, spilling some liquid near the clean white tablecloth. "Cassian was what, twelve? Father told him he could sleep in the main house, but he spent the whole week sleeping on the boathouse floor because he was too terrified to ask for extra blankets."

Around the table, the elite circle of my father's inner board members chuckled politely. My stepmother gave a light, airy sigh, dabbing her lips with a linen napkin.

"He was always such a quiet boy," she murmured, her voice dripping with the pleasing condescension she'd mastered over twenty years.

I didn't flinch. I didn't tighten my jaw.

I simply smiled....a smooth, practiced slant of my lips that I had spent half my life perfecting in front of bathroom mirrors.

'Keep laughing,' I thought, letting the butter knife slide an inch across the table. 'Keep telling the story where I'm the weak, grateful charity case you dragged out of the dark.'

They liked remembering me that way.

It made them feel merciful.

It made Father feel like a saint for giving his illegitimate bastard a roof, a surname, and a seat at the back of the boardroom.

They didn't see the eighteen-hour days I spent quietly fixing Ryker's catastrophic supply chain mistakes. They didn't see the multi-million-dollar investments I structured under his name so Father would pat him on the back at quarterly meetings.

To the world, Ryker was the brilliant future CEO.

I was the reckless playboy who wasted the family fortune.

I preferred it that way.

A man who thinks you're a fool never bothers to lock his safes.

"Anyway," Ryker continued, wiping his mouth with his wrist, completely ignorant. He leaned in closer to his associate on the right, dropping his voice just enough to pretend he was being discreet.

"I'm heading out early tonight. Got a private consultation downtown."

The associate smirked. "Another contract?"

"Something like that," Ryker laughed softly. "Tightest little blonde you've ever seen. Makes coming home to a cold bed almost bearable."

A cold anger settled deep in the pit of my stomach, serious and silent.

He didn't even care to hide it anymore. He took everything for granted...the company, Father's approval, the empire, even the wife still waiting for him to come home.

They all thought Serena was soft.

I almost had too.

Until last night.

I'd seen the fear in her eyes back in that narrow alley, trembling in a trashy red dress. But I had seen something else, too.

She hadn't run because she forgave Ryker.

She'd run because she hadn't decided how to destroy him yet.

"Cassian," Father's strong, commanding voice cut across the table, breaking my train of thought.

I looked up smoothly, setting the butter knife down. "Yes, Father?"

"The tech audit for the quarter. Ryker says you've been lagging on the reports."

"It's already finalized,"I said softly, my voice without any roughness. "I uploaded the files to your personal drive an hour before dinner."

Father paused, pulling his phone out under the edge of the table. His brow furrowed as he saw the completed, flawless audit sitting in his inbox.

He cleared his throat, adjusting his cufflinks without looking at me.

"Good. See that you stay focused."

Ryker smiled into his wine.

He didn't apologize. He'd never needed to.

Dinner lasted for another thirty minutes of pointless showing off and expensive lies. By the time I finally went out onto the wide marble driveway of the large house, the night air was cool and dark.

I pulled my phone from the inner pocket of my tailored suit jacket, walking toward my car parked at the foot of the steps.

A single vibration buzzed against my palm.

An unknown number appeared, there was no name, only one message came through.

Unknown: 'What do you want from me?'

I looked at the screen for a long moment.

She hadn't asked for protection, she hadn't asked for revenge, she wanted to know my price. A slow smile touched the corner of my mouth.

I typed a single word.

Me: 'Everything.'