Chapter 2 The Price of Time

Rafael

Silence was the only form of power that still interested me. The rest - money, influence, fear - was a consequence. And on that night, facing the reports stacked on the table, silence was the only thing that spoke to me frankly.

There was a traitor within the pack. Someone was leaking information about routes and deliveries. Someone who knew my schedules, my men, my way of operating. I didn't buy people; I bought time. And time, like any valuable currency, needed to be spent strategically.

Heitor Duarte's entry into the quartermaster's office was the fuse I needed. The boy wasn't the mastermind - he was the bait. Someone pushed him into my cameras, expecting me to react instinctively. They were wrong. I didn't react. I observed.

That's why I was there, in that glass-enclosed room over the city center, with Maia Duarte sitting across from me, her hands clasped as if holding her own destiny. She didn't look at me with fear, which was already a problem. Fear was predictable. Stubbornness was not.

"The contract is simple," I said, sliding the folder towards her. "One year of union. Exclusivity. Silence."

She leafed through the pages with a practiced calm. She had the hands of someone who had stitched up wounds before. A hint of pride resided in her raised chin.

"Exclusivity," she repeated, without lifting her eyes. "Of the body, the speech, or the life?"

"Of everything my name will touch." I leaned back in my chair, measuring every syllable. "That includes you."

She took a deep breath, the air caught between what she wanted to say and what she knew she couldn't. Her Omega instinct revealed her discomfort, but her head - cool, analytical - fought against it.

"What if I want to back out?"

"You won't want to." I didn't say it out of arrogance, but out of calculation. "I guarantee what I promise, Maia. Protection. Debts cleared. And a surname no one dares to touch."

Her gaze cut through me, curious, suspicious.

"You talk about marriage the way you talk about a war treaty."

"It is what it is." I leaned my body forward. "Alliances serve to prevent enemies from invading."

She pushed the folder back, her fingers firm on the paper.

"You don't need a wife. You need a façade."

The smile that came to me wasn't of mockery. It was of respect.

"Perhaps." I raised my gaze to hers. "But an intelligent façade is more valuable than a foolish army."

For a moment, no one spoke. The clock struck 11 PM without pity. Outside, the city spun to the rhythm of the traffic lights. Inside, I watched every micro-gesture - the involuntary tremor in her collarbone, the controlled breathing. Maia wasn't fragile. She was disciplined.

"I don't have a vocation for being an ornament, Mr. D'Ávila," she said, breaking the silence.

"Lucky for me." I opened another folder, the one that truly mattered. "Ornaments break easily. I need someone who can bear the weight of the name they'll carry."

She narrowed her eyes. "And what exactly do you gain from this?"

"Time." The sound of the word hovered between us like a sentence. "Enough to find out who is digging the ground out from under my feet."

The answer seemed to intrigue her. She leaned back, crossing her arms. "So I'm part of a trap."

"Of a strategy." I corrected, without changing my tone. "Which is quite different."

She laughed softly, without humor. "That sounds almost worse."

"It depends on the point of view." I closed the folder. "The strategy is what keeps your siblings alive."

The blow landed. I saw it in the way she averted her eyes for half a second, enough to confirm where it hurt.

I stood up. "The Mark will be before the next moon. That is the maximum deadline I accept."

"I haven't accepted anything yet." She raised her voice, firm, her heart beating fast enough to be heard by any Alpha within a ten-meter radius.

I bowed my head, an almost courteous gesture, but there was steel in the response. "Then start deciding quickly. At dawn, you move."

"Are you giving me orders, or threatening me?"

"Neither." I walked toward her, the sound of my boots echoing on the marble floor. I stopped a handspan away. "I am notifying you."

She held my gaze, which surprised me. Most would have lowered their eyes by now. Not Maia. There was something wild in the way she faced her own fragility, as if challenging it were the only way to remain whole.

"You are the type of man who got used to winning through fear." Her voice was a taut thread. "You just haven't realized that fear has an expiration date."

I smiled lightly. "And you are the type of woman who thinks courage is not shaking. You will learn that courage is staying even while shaking."

She blinked, as if the sentence had struck her the wrong way, and then she stood up as well. We stood face to face, the world reduced to the narrow space between our bodies. Her scent was of hospital and a rainy night - clean, yet dense, as if the air itself resisted being tamed.

"Tomorrow at dawn," I repeated. "I'll send a car. Take the essentials. The rest doesn't matter."

She was about to protest, but something in my tone - perhaps the certainty that I would not back down - made her silent.

When she turned to leave, I let her go. There was nothing more to say. She crossed the door with the bearing of someone who had just signed a war.

The city was still sleeping outside, but I was not. I had a new name to protect and a faceless enemy to hunt. And now, by all indications, I also had an Omega who didn't know how much she was about to become a piece - or a weapon - in my game.

The price of time, after all, has always been high. And I've never been afraid to pay it.