He never could.
Down on the ballroom floor, the atmosphere was suffocating for Sophie Clark. She adjusted the heavy silver tray of hors d’oeuvres, her arms aching. She was 23, invisible, and exhausted. Her uniform, a generic black dress and white apron provided by the staffing agency, was a size too large and pinned awkwardly at the waist. She had been on her feet for 10 hours. Her rent was overdue, and her younger brother, Toby, needed an inhaler refill she could not afford until the shift was paid out.
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“Champagne, sir? Madam?” Sophie murmured, weaving through the crowd.
She was a ghost to these people, a prop that held food.
Near the center of the room, a commotion began to ripple through the crowd. The low hum of conversation spiked into sharp whispers. Sophie turned and saw an elderly woman in a vintage, slightly out-of-style velvet gown stumbling near the chocolate fountain.
It was Isabella.
She looked terrified, clutching a small beaded purse like a lifeline. The crowd parted around her, not to help, but to avoid contamination.
Standing directly in Isabella’s path was Beatrice Vane, the wife of a corrupt senator. Beatrice had a face pulled tight by surgery and a heart harder than the diamonds around her neck. She held a glass of red wine and laughed loudly at a joke someone had made.
Confused by the lights and noise, Isabella reached out.
“Matteo,” she whispered, mistaking a waiter for her late husband.
She stumbled. Her hand flailed and struck Beatrice’s arm. The glass of red wine tipped.
It was like a gunshot in a library.
The dark crimson liquid splashed across the front of Beatrice’s pristine white Givenchy gown. The music did not stop, but the silence around them was absolute. Beatrice stared at her dress, her mouth dropping open in a silent scream of rage. Then she looked up at Isabella, her eyes bulging.
“You stupid, senile old hag!” Beatrice shrieked, her voice cutting through the ambient noise.
Isabella flinched, shrinking into herself.
“I’m sorry. The floor, it moved.”
“Sorry?” Beatrice stepped forward, looming over the smaller woman. “Do you know what this is? This is silk. It’s worth more than your entire pathetic life.”
From the balcony, Lorenzo gripped the railing. The metal groaned under the pressure of his hands. He took 1 step toward the stairs, his blood running cold. Then he paused.
The security guards were moving in, but they were hesitating. Beatrice Vane was powerful. No one wanted to offend the senator’s wife.
Lorenzo wanted to see who, in that room of 300 friends and allies, would help his mother.
Show me, he thought, darker than the night outside. Show me who deserves to survive the night.
Beatrice was not finished. She grabbed Isabella’s arm, her nails digging into the elderly woman’s thin skin.
“You ruined my night. You’re going to fix it.”
“Please,” Isabella whimpered, tears welling in her cloudy eyes. “I just want to go home.”
“You’re not going anywhere until you clean this up,” Beatrice hissed.
She pointed a manicured finger at the floor, where a few drops of wine had splattered the marble.
“Get on your knees. Use that rag you call a shawl. Wipe it up.”
The crowd watched. Men in tuxedos. Women in pearls.
They all watched.
It was a spectacle to them, a game.
“I said get on your knees.”
Beatrice shoved Isabella. Isabella’s knees buckled. She began to sink toward the cold, hard floor, sobbing softly.
“I’m sorry. I’m sorry.”
