The toast was taken up eagerly.
The rules had been laid down. The clock had been set.
I had one hour to find the women.
The platform emptied, and at once the room came alive again, sound and movement surging back into the space. Music struck up from somewhere, lively and insistent. Servants appeared with fresh trays of wine and food. The men began to circulate with renewed purpose.
I moved with them.
To hesitate would mark me as uncertain. To hurry would invite scrutiny. I allowed myself to be drawn into conversation once or twice, answering lightly, deflecting attention withoutseeming to avoid it. Compliments were paid and received without sincerity.
All the while, I scrutinized the perimeter.
I noted the doors that were guarded and those that were not. The staircases that led upward, the corridors that disappeared behind drapery. I watched which men moved with familiarity and which lingered at the edges, waiting for instruction or invitation.
And I searched for Nicky.
He should be here by now if all had gone according to plan. He would have arrived with the men, given time to blend in, to observe. I scanned faces beneath masks, postures beneath borrowed confidence.
Nothing.
A hand brushed my arm.
“Enjoying yourself?” a gentleman asked, his tone pleasant, his interest clear.
“Immensely,” I replied, smiling just enough.
“Will you join me?”
“Not at the moment,” I said lightly. “The night is young.”
He laughed and moved on, unoffended.
Minutes slipped by.
The women who had arrived with me soon began to disperse, drawn away into conversations, into corners, into rooms beyond my sight. Some appeared eager, laughing too brightly. Others were more cautious, their smiles carefully arranged. A few drank deeply, as though courage might be found at the bottom of a glass.
Although I held one in my hand, I did not drink.
The weight of the coming hour pressed against my thoughts. Somewhere in this house, a room had been prepared. Not for pleasure, not for spectacle, but for containment. A place where the nymphs and the votaries would be kept until they wererequired. Guarded. Concealed. Deliberately removed from the revelry below.
I needed to find that space before their fates were sealed.
I had just reached the foot of the main staircase when a figure detached himself from the crowd and stepped into my path.
“Delilah.”
The name was spoken softly, pitched low enough not to carry. I did not need to see his face to know who it was. The tilt of his head, the stillness of him in a house given over to movement and excess—there was no mistaking Nicky.
He looped his arm through mine and guided me into a recessed alcove beside the staircase, a pocket of shadow mercifully free of revelers.
I did not greet him. I waited.
“I searched the first floor,” he said quietly. “All of which is freely accessible. But when I attempted the second, I was stopped. There’s a man guarding the stairs. The upper floor is off limits.”
My pulse sharpened. “That’s where they must be.”
He inclined his head. “I don’t know if he’ll let you pass. He is armed.”
