For one fragile second, hope bloomed in Roxana's heart.
Then Alexander straightened, easing her hand away as professionalism slid back into place like a perfectly tailored suit. The laughter faded. The wall returned.
"I'll speak to Maximilian Whitmore myself," he said calmly, adjusting his tie. "Can you hold off on any action from your side until then?"
Her fingers fell from the silk of his tie.
"…Fine," Roxana said, already retreating. "Be quick."
She gathered her files and walked away without looking back.
The moment she turned the corner, her tears spilled, hot, traitorous, and unwelcome. Her chest ached worse than her pride ever could.
What did you expect, Roxana? He's not going to choose you over his sister!
She wiped her eyes, took a deep breath, straightened her spine, and continued down the corridor. Alone.
***
Duncan clicked as many pictures as his trembling hands would allow.
There it was. Undeniable. Historic.
The six-foot-nine Hunter Alex, terror of courtrooms and politicians alike, was bowing to a five-foot-eight woman who had him by the tie.
Bowing.
Duncan swallowed hard. He should probably check the weather. This felt biblical. Forty days and forty nights of rain. Plagues. Frogs. Fire. He should look up Noah. Or at least Google "ark blueprints" before it was too late.
Maybe a bunker. Or a spaceship to Mars. Except he wasn't rich enough for Mars. Or a bunker. Or probably even a decent umbrella.
"How long are you going to stand there?"
Alexander's voice sliced through his spiral.
Duncan flinched, but not before hitting send.
Mission accomplished, Your Majesty/Princess Demon.
He straightened instantly and scurried to Alexander's side like a man who valued his livelihood and his continued existence.
Alexander paused.
Just for a moment.
He turned his head, eyes lingering down the corridor where Roxana had disappeared.
Duncan froze.
Oh no.
No. No. No.
Is that… longing?
On Hunter Alex's face?
Duncan stared, unblinking, his soul slowly leaving his body.
That was it. The end times were officially here. He should have invested in a bunker. Or at least emergency rations. Maybe he could still get a ticket on a rocket if he sold a kidney. One kidney should be enough.
Because if Alexander Hunter Preston could look like that over a woman…
Civilization was doomed.
"Investigate Maximilian Whitmore," Alexander said. His voice was steady, clipped, returning to the man who dismantled lives for a living, as if he hadn't been staring down a corridor moments ago like something had followed him out of his past.
"I want to know where he was, how he ended up at the same restaurant as Catherine, whether they crossed paths before last night. I want everything. From his first breath to this very second."
Duncan nodded, already moving.
Alexander had planned to investigate Whitmore the moment his sister had called him that one.
At the time, he hadn't taken it seriously. Catherine had told him about her "past life". About an enemy king. A man who ruined her. He had listened, like a good brother should, patiently and gently, while quietly chalking it up to an overactive imagination of a young one, her trauma of losing their mother dressed up as myth.
Until she spoke.
Latin.
Not clumsy. Not memorized. Not academic. Perfect grammar wasn't what had unsettled him. It was how easily she bent the language, how it flowed from her mouth like a command, like a habit… As if she had lived in it. As if it answered to her.
She was three.
Three.
Even prodigies didn't do that. Alexander knew. His IQ sat comfortably at one-forty-nine, and Latin had taken him years, and even then, it always felt rehearsed, borrowed and dead when he spoke.
Catherine's was not. She had trouble speaking English, but not Latin. She filled the gaps in her vocabulary with a dead language. It was alive and authoritative, as if she'd once ruled with it, as if she truly was the Queen she spoke of.
Perhaps she had noticed his disbelief, because she never spoke of it again. Not once. And Alexander, who never forgot anything important, had never forgotten either.
Until today.
Until she woke in a hospital bed and tried to stab a man while screaming in the same language.
Was it confusion? Trauma twisting faces together until enemies wore the wrong skin?
Or…
Alexander's jaw tightened.
No.
Past lives aren't real. They couldn't be.
And yet…
His fingers curled slowly into a fist as Maximilian's name echoed again in his mind. Even the name was the same.
Whatever this was…coincidence, delusion, or something far more dangerous, he would find the truth.
Duncan nodded. "About that… I just received a message. They recovered more footage the water didn't destroy."
Alexander's jaw tightened.
The footage he had already seen had been difficult enough to sit through. Each second felt like a personal failure, like he had arrived one moment too late. What more had his sister endured?
"Also," Alexander said, his voice controlled but sharp beneath the surface, "find out if Maximilian Whitmore has involved his family. Send a get-well fruit basket. And arrange a meeting with him."
If there was anything to resolve, Alexander would handle it himself. Catherine had already been through enough. She would not be dragged into this again.
Duncan turned to leave, already mentally reorganizing his life.
"Duncan."
He stopped.
"The Sentinel Gala next weekend," Alexander said, his finger lingering on his tie. "That's a black-tie event, isn't it?"
Roxana's eyes flickered through his mind. Sharp. Knowing. Pleading. He would not mind being her date.
Duncan felt like lightning had struck directly through his skull. "Yes?" he answered carefully.
Two days ago, his boss had received the invitation to the most prestigious military event on Capitol Hill and had thrown it into the trash without blinking. Alexander Hunter Preston despised military families almost as much as he loathed politicians, which was saying something.
So why was he asking now?
"Prepare a tux for me," Alexander said. "And postpone all my meetings next weekend."
His gaze drifted, unguarded, back toward the corridor Roxana had disappeared down.
His hands clenched.
His last meeting with Roxana's father surfaced in his mind, unwelcome and sharp. Alexander's expression hardened, eyes narrowing as something resolute settled into place. Without another word, he turned and walked away.
Duncan stared at his retreating back.
His boss was attending a military gala.
Duncan swallowed.
Yes. That confirmed it.
The world was absolutely going to end.
****
Catherine looked down at her phone. The images showed her brother bowing to Roxana.
Her lips curved into a smile, her heart lifting with a warm, unexpected excitement for him. She knew him. She knew the way Alexander loved. When he gave himself, it was with devotion, with loyalty that bordered on reverence. And his eyes in those pictures… he knew it too.
But as she stared at the screen, the smile faltered. Her vision blurred.
Something small and bitter stirred in her chest, a sudden ache she had not invited.
Yes, she had four brothers. But Alexander was different. He was her person. The one she trusted without thought, without fear. The one she leaned on instinctively, the one who always stood between her and the world. It was always that way.
If he married… I'll be left alone.
The thought cut deeper than she expected.
Don't be selfish, she told herself, hastily wiping at her eyes. He deserved his own life. His own happiness. She had no right to resent that.
The door opened.