“I’ll go get the Baroness,” Graves says as I leave the dressing room and stride down the corridor toward the foyer. Stone echoes under my Oxfords. Lamp light flickers in iron sconces, throwing long shadows that dance like devils across the vaulted ceiling.
Then I hear her.
The click of a stiletto on stone.
Arianette appears at the mouth of the eastern hall, moving toward the same destination. She stops when she sees me, breath catching.
Christ.
The dress is black silk and tulle, severe and romantic at once. Thin straps bite delicately into her shoulders. The bodice is squared low across her chest, framing the soft swells of her breasts, the baresthint of shadow between them. Corseted waist, then an explosion of netted skirt that ends scandalously high, just above her knees, revealing miles of leg and the fragile architecture of her ankles in those wicked heels. Her braids are twisted in a tight bun, exposing the slender column of her collared throat. She looks like a sacrificial ballerina dressed for her own funeral.
How appropriate.
Heat licks low in my gut, unbidden and unwelcome. I remember the wedding night, how she’d trembled beneath me as I gave her pleasure, the way she’d arched when I finally took her, the way she’d clung to me after, as if I were the only solid thing in her world.
I drag my gaze up to her eyes. They’re lined in kohl tonight, huge and luminous. She offers the smallest curtsy, barely a dip, but it’s enough to make the tulle flutter around her thighs, and I see the dark band of elastic holding up her stockings.
Say whatever you want about the Baroness, she’s a stunningly beautiful woman.
Graves opens the massive front doors. Night air rushes in and I don’t wait. I don’t offer my arm. I simply walk past her, out into the darkness where the car idles like a beast.
He’s right again, I think, as the gravel crunches beneath my shoes.
It’s too soon.
The partition is up.Kendrick pilots the Jaguar through the city, heading toward the mayor’s mansion–a brownstone inconveniently located in South Side. Arianette sits beside me, spine straight, knees pressed together. The scent of her hits me in waves: something soft and floral in her hair, the faint sweetness of the lotion she rubbed into her thighs and throat before we left. It curls inside my lungs and refuses to leave.
Fuck me.
She’s quiet. Too quiet. Her hands are knotted in her lap, fingers twisted so tightly the knuckles blanch. She tries once to smooth therebellious tulle of her skirt; the netting sighs and springs back up, exposing the delicate lace tops of her stockings and a hand-width of skin above. A tease or an innocent accident; with her, I still can’t tell.
I clear my throat. The sound is too loud in the hush.
“You stay by my side,” I say, voice pitched low, meant for her ears alone. “You speak only when spoken to. If anyone asks about the honeymoon, you say it was quiet. Time for the two of us. Nothing more.”
I watch her profile as I speak. She’s afraid to look at me. Good.
“Eat and drink half of what you’re served,” I continue. “Smile. Nod. Give them nothing else. These people aren’t our friends. They’re a consequence of the job.”
“I know how to behave. I was trained, remember?” She turns her head, and I see that her eyes are wide, clear. There’s no glaze of shock tonight, no muddled confusion. Something glints there, resignation, maybe, although that is probably wishful thinking. It unsettles me more than tears ever could.
“What if they ask me about the fire?” she asks, soft but steady.
I meet her gaze. “You tell them it was a tragedy. That you don’t remember much. You remind them your uncle was a good man, and you leave it at that.”
Her throat works as she swallows. She nods once, but we both know Owen Hexley was a fucking bastard.
The car slows as we approach the row of homes, headlights gliding across manicured hedges and iron gates.
“Can I ask you something?” she says tentatively.
I nod, already bracing.
Arianette looks up at me for a long moment before she speaks, those soulful brown eyes fixed on my face. “Is it uncomfortable?”
It’s such an innocent question, carrying a weight she can’t comprehend. There’s no doubt what she’s asking.
“No,” I say. “I’m used to it.”
