There were forty-three cameras in this house, and Kate Basset knew exactly how to avoid every single one of them.

The spaces between them were the only places she could do anything that was hers.

She stood at the kitchen island, fingertips resting on cold marble, peeling an orange. The citrus oil stung a paper cut on her thumb. Outside, October rain smeared the garden into a gray wash. The camera above the copper fixture blinked its red rhythm. Three-second interval. Steady as a pulse that never slept.

Victor calls it protection. Every time he disappears for a few days, he leaves one of his men behind like a reminder. Don't touch. Don't move. Don't forget who you belong to.

This time, though, she didn't recognize the name.

His voice came through the house speakers at noon, filling every room even when his body was in another city. He preferred it that way.

"I'm extending through the weekend. Ren will have the car if you need it."

She didn't need it. She never needed it. Everything arrived.

"Also," he said, "I'm sending Luca Ferrara to the house. He'll stay in the east wing while I'm away."

She turned the orange in her hands. Juice running over her knuckles.

"Who?" She didn't bother hiding it. Kept her voice neutral and soft. Testing.

"New enough," he said. "He'll do. He's a good kid."

"You're upgrading or downgrading?" Kate asked.

A pause.

"Does it matter?" Victor's tone sharpened.

"It always does."

The call ended. She ate the orange standing up, juice dripping from her wrist onto the marble. The camera recorded her eating. It did not record the small, precise smile that followed.

A note on the kitchen counter. His handwriting, neat, controlled, like everything else.

"Back Thursday. Ren will drive you if you need anything. Don't need anything. - V"

She folded it once and added it to the pile. Little notes from a man who preferred instructions over conversations.

He showed up exactly at four. The new "good kid" was punctual.

She heard the gate buzz from the second floor, where she'd been reading the same paragraph of a novel for twenty minutes. By the time she came downstairs, Ren had already taken his bag to the east wing and Luca was standing in the foyer.

He didn't look like Victor's usual men. Too still. Too stiff. Like he wasn't waiting for instructions, but deciding which ones mattered.

His hands hung at his sides without a single unnecessary movement. His collar sat against his neck at a precise angle. Functional clothes, clean, nothing flashy. A man built for purpose, not presentation.

His eyes didn't move, but she could tell he'd already mapped the room. Cameras included.

Then he looked at her. Direct. Piercing. Like he was deciding whether she was the assignment or the complication.

"Mrs. Leone."

"Kate," she said. "Unless you're planning to report to me."

A pause.

"Luca Ferrara."

"I figured."

Another pause. This one longer.

"You're new."

A muscle in his cheek shifted. "I'm here to do my job."

"Which is?"

"Make sure nothing happens to you."

She tilted her head.

"From you, or for you?"

He didn't answer that. He picked up his bag. Stepped past her, close enough that she didn't have to move. She didn't move. Neither did he. For a second too long.

Soap and clean skin. No cologne. Just warmth, like cloth left in the sun.

Then he walked toward the east wing, and she stood in the foyer listening to his footsteps on the marble. Measured. Even. Each one placed with a certainty that had nothing to do with the floor.

Victor sends men like him when he wants to remind her she's being watched. Or when he wants to test if they can handle proximity. She wasn't sure which one this was yet.

Upstairs, she pressed her forehead to the cool glass of her bedroom window and watched the east wing lights come on. One floor below. One wall between them. No cameras.

She shouldn't be thinking about that.

She did anyway.

She didn't know Luca Ferrara. That was the problem. Victor didn't send men he hadn't tested. So either Luca had passed, or she was the test.