Page 70 of Maksym

“It has been mine since the parking garage.”

The words struck him. I saw it. His face did not show much, but I was learning that much with Maksym was not nothing. A slight tightening near the eyes. A line at the jaw.

“I will not use you as bait,” he said.

“No,” I replied. “You will use me as counsel, witness, and problem.”

Remy smiled slowly. “Problem?”

“A legal term of art,” I said.

“It is not,” Taras said.

“It is when I use it.”

Maksym looked at me for a long moment.

Then he sat, and I felt the shift in him. Not retreat. Calculation. The king accepting that the woman beside him was not a relic to place behind glass, no matter how loudly his instincts objected.

“Public emergence,” he said. “Controlled setting. High political cost for interference. We force Lucian to understand that reaching for you now means placing his hand inside a trap.”

“Preferably one with cameras,” I said.

“No electronic recording in many Council spaces,” Remy said. “Too easy to manipulate with magic. But there are sworn records. Witness scribes. Binding testimony under oath. Memory seals in some proceedings.”

I closed my eyes briefly. “Of course, there are magical depositions.”

Remy’s grin returned. “Baby, you have no idea.”

“That sentence should worry me more than it does.”

Maksym’s fingers tapped once against the table. “There may be an opportunity sooner than expected.”

I turned my head toward him. “That sounded ominous.”

“It was practical.”

“Those are often the same thing when spoken by powerful men.”

Maksym accepted the hit without flinching. “My younger brother Nikolay, has been involved in an incident that will require review before the Supernatural Council.”

I waited. He did not continue fast enough.

“Maksym.”

He inclined his head. “Nikolay killed a wolf shifter Alpha during the rescue of his fated mate.”

I stared at him.

“A wolf shifter Alpha,” I repeated.

“Yes.”

“During the rescue of his fated mate.”

“Yes. Who is also a wolf shifter.”

“She is also a wolf shifter?”