Blackfin stepped back, his eyes gleaming with pure, unfiltered schadenfreude, as if he were watching a particularly satisfying train wreck unfold in slow motion.
Ethan felt a faint but persistent sting of secondhand embarrassment. These two were not merely ruthless, they were actively escalating each other. One was a cutthroat by nature, the other a cutthroat who delighted in raising the stakes simply because he could. Watching them work together felt like being forced into a rigged card game where the dealer kept changing the rules mid-hand.
