Celeste burned the thief’s card in a silver dish and kept Luca’s signed copy.
“Difference?” she asked.
“One tries to control me through fear. The other exists because I chose it.”
“Remember that when the distinction becomes inconvenient.”
She ordered him to surrender his phone. He hesitated only long enough to notice the hesitation, then placed it in her palm.
The device rang before she could lock it away.
Unknown number.
Celeste answered on speaker.
“Mr. Arden,” a distorted voice said. “Ask your mistress what she stole in Vienna.”
The line died.
Luca watched Celeste. “What did you steal?”
“A ledger from a man who collected people more carefully than art.”
“Was tonight’s painting in it?”
“Its former owner was.”
She gave him the phone but closed her fingers around his wrist before releasing it.
“You want to search my study without permission.”
“Yes.”
“Thank you for answering accurately. Permission denied.”
Heat moved through him at the refusal, swift and unwelcome enough to be honest.
Celeste noticed. Of course she did.
“Report the fear changing your judgment.”
“I’m afraid you’re protecting the thief.”
“And the judgment?”
“That obeying you is making me weak.”
She stepped close, sliding one gloved finger beneath his chin without forcing his head upward.
“Look at me if you choose.”
He did.
“Obedience is not the absence of judgment,” she said. “Tonight it is the discipline to bring your judgment to me before you act.”
His earpiece crackled. A guard reported movement in the west archive.
Luca turned toward the door.
“Stop,” Celeste said.
Every trained instinct demanded speed. Every signed rule demanded that he wait.
Three seconds later, the west archive alarms erupted. A pressure charge blew the lock outward into the corridor where Luca would have been standing.
Celeste released his chin.
“Now you may run.”
Inside the archive, the shelves were untouched. On the floor lay the missing painting, facedown, with a fresh red card pinned through the canvas.
GOOD. HE LEARNS QUICKLY.