All I had to do was step inside.
All I had to do was make someone fall in love before he knew the truth… that I was Lucy Benette, disfigured daughter of a disgraced viscount and the woman who’d gone mad enough to nearly kill her own child.
My pulse beat wildly as I adjusted my mask—cheap paste gems instead of diamonds, but convincing enough in the candlelight.
I inhaled once, sharp and shallow, crossing the courtyard like a thief in the night.
I just needed to slip inside unnoticed.
That truth pulsed louder than the violins, louder than the laughter spilling from painted mouths and flushed throats. Invitations were checked at the door. Names were announced with ringing authority and titles unfurled like banners. I hovered at the edge of the entrance, heart frantic, as I watched perfumed women glide past on the arms of men who had never once known hunger a day in their lives.
I timed it carefully.
A Marquess arrived late, red faced and bellowing at his wife in tones so public and indelicate that one would think he wanted the entire county to know their grievances. Their quarrel sent a ripple of delighted horror through the crowd as guests surged forward like crows to a carcass, desperate for a single ounce of fresh gossip.
The commotion crested, the butler raising his voice in a futile attempt to announce them properly. In that small, miraculous lapse of order, I took my chance.
I slipped through the crowd.
No name. No title. No invitation.
Just nervous desperation and the borrowed anonymity of a mask pressed cool against my feverish skin.
The stale air inside hit me all at once. Far too many pressed bodies, champagne and wax from a hundred candles dripping gold down crystal chandeliers large enough to crush a person outright. The music throbbed through the marble floor, up into my bones, until I felt it more than heard it.
Laughter curled around me, sharp and slightly cruel. Everywhere I looked there was movement—skirts spinning, hands grasping, bodies leaning far too close in the half-approved intimacy of a masquerade.
I kept my head down at first, heart hammering loud enough to drown the strings of music. I was terrified that someone… anyone… might recognize me. It was foolish to be here. Reckless. Dangerous.
I knew these people. I had grown up among them. I knew the tilt of familiar shoulders, recognized the cadence of their voices. I was aware of the way their heads tilted when gossip ripened on their tongues. I had once moved in their circles. I had once been just like them… and a single recognition would destroy me.
So I did what any sensible sinner would do when amongst saints.
I went straight for the champagne.
The refreshment table gleamed at the edge of the room, crowded with half-empty glasses and sugared fruits glistening like jewels. I seized a flute of champagne with perhaps too much eagerness and drank deeply, welcoming the burn as it slid down my throat.
One glass did nothing.
The second steadied my hands.
By the third, the room began to soften at the edges, like a cruel painting smudged just enough to make the subject bearable.
I exhaled, my shoulders loosening as I dared to lift my gaze. No one had stopped me. No one had reached for my arm or demanded my name. Masks hid everything. Most importantly, past sins. Tonight, wealth and desperation looked remarkably similar beneath the gilt and velvet.
I wasn’t trembling anymore and that was a good start.
Encouraged, I let myself wander.
The masquerade was not a single room but spilled into many. Doors opened to alcoves thick with shadows and hushed conversations, balconies where couples tempted scandal, gaming tables where gold passed hands with careless abandon. Cards shuffled stiffly. Dice clattered like teeth.
Gilded masks adorned the pillars, their hollow eyes catching the light as though something sentient watched through them. From the gallery above, a string quartet played a slow, haunting melody that trembled at the edge of something unholy—beautiful, yes, but just off-key enough to raise the hairs on one’s neck.
Guests drifted through the candlelight in a dizzying blur of color and perfume. Silk and satin whispered against marble floors, laughter chimed like distant echoes, and every face was half-concealed, half-revealed. Beauty and monstrosity blurred until I could no longer tell which was which.
As I threaded through the crowd, a gentleman in a fox mask caught my hand. He bowed so deeply that hisfeathered ears brushed my skirts before he rose to place a gentle kiss on my gloved knuckles.
“May I have this dance?”
