Cecilia looked out of the window as the Hijet drove away.
The city blurred past in soft morning colors. Cream and gold and the pale blue of a sky that didn't care what had just happened inside a second-floor cafe.
Her reflection hovered in the glass, translucent and tired, her eyes still rimmed with red and her cheeks still damp with the last traces of tears she hadn't finished shedding.
When she had walked out from Arzhen, she hadn't gone out the front door. Some instinct had guided her feet. Just the human instinct of a woman who didn't want to be chased, to be honest.
She had walked straight through the cafe's ground floor, past the counter, past the abandoned espresso machine and past the kitchen door that swung open with a soft pneumatic hiss.
The cafe staff had been huddled in the back, clearly briefed by their billionaire patron to stay out of sight, and they had stared at her with wide eyes as she walked through.
