CHAPTER 29

When I got to the dining room, Elodie and Colette stood around the table, Elodie in her black dress and Colette in a gossamer white gown that looked like she was wearing the most glamorous bubbles I’d ever seen.

I kept my face down and fell into a chair. My whole body felt prickly, uncomfortable. My head wouldn’t stop spinning.

I’d stopped by the bathroom on the way down and tried to comb some of the tangles out of my hair, but I knew I looked as undone as I felt. My eyes were bright, my cheeks breathlessly pink no matter how much water I splashed on them, my dress wrinkled and crushed.

Stellan looked just as obvious as I did. When he sat up straight, I saw that he’d buttoned his shirt crookedly. Colette caught me looking at him, and I saw her eyes flick over both of us. She leaned over and whispered something in his ear, and he hurriedly fixed his buttons, then stole a glance at me that I didn’t return.

“Where’s Jack?” Colette said.

I rubbed my face. I told them the shortened version, ending with the fact that I’d told him to get out, and it appeared that he had.

“Unfortunately, that’s a small problem compared to what I just learned,” Elodie said. “We were about to head out to the red-carpet event when we found out that there’s been another attack. Something bigger this time. A bomb exploded at the Emir family’s compound. It killed their younger son.”

“What the hell?” I pulled at a handful of my hair. “Why are they still doing this?”

“Terrorism,” Elodie said calmly. “It’s exactly how Lydia explained it. The Circle will hail the Saxons as heroes when the mandate is fulfilled and the Order disappears. They’re escalating the attacks to stack the final outcome.”

“The second we get my mom, we tell somebody,” I said. “We have to stop them.”

“Then we’d better hurry and find this bracelet. At this rate, they’re going to kill half the Circle.” At the sound of Stellan’s voice, a sense memory came on so strong, it nearly knocked me over. Head pleasantly warm, leaning over his lap to grab his drink. Almost falling off my bar stool, my hand pressed to his chest.

“I know.” I couldn’t look at him. I told myself the renewed flush in my cheeks was just embarrassment at getting drunk and losing control, but the spark and sizzle in every bit of my skin that had touched his said something different.

Elodie stood up. “That brings us to tonight,” she said. “The bomb was the last straw. They’re canceling the rest of the film festival for security concerns. The red carpet tonight is already in full swing, but it’ll be the only event.”

“Which means,” I said, “tonight is our only chance to steal the bracelet.”

• • •

We were already late, so Stellan and I rushed to put on our formal attire. The plan had changed. Since we were now going to have to sneak inside to get the bracelet, we’d need all the distraction we could get. Suddenly, me being recognized had gone from a potential disaster to a necessity. I’d draw the eyes of all the Circle members on the red carpet, plus any regular guests and security who had watched the news in the past couple days, and hopefully no one would notice Elodie creeping in a back door to trip the electricity and steal the bracelet herself. Stellan would be with me and Colette, making sure nobody actually tried to hurt me.

“I’ll do it as quickly as I can,” Elodie was saying. She adjusted a strap on Colette’s dress. “I don’t want you out there for long. And when the lights come back on, you’ll carry on like nothing has happened besides an alarming moment of old wiring plunging the party into a temporary and unremarkable darkness, then you’ll say your good nights and get out before Avery actually gets arrested. And if you do get arrested . . . we’ll cross that bridge when we come to it.”

“That’s fine,” I said. Colette nodded, too. Stellan was tying his bow tie in the mirror above the bar. When he noticed me watching over the top of the little mirror I was using to put on lipstick, his finger snagged on the end of his tie. Both ends flopped to his chest.

“Hopefully we’ll be long gone before they know the bracelet is missing,” Elodie finished.

“It seems too . . . simple,” I thought out loud.

“The best plans are.” Elodie slipped into five-inch heels. “When you see a theft in the movies that revolves around bumping into just the right person at the exact right second to steal a key so someone can hang from the air-conditioning vent and unlock a padlock, you have to know it’s unlikely to work. What happens if the guy with the key has bad prawns and spends the whole night in the bathroom and we can’t find him?”

“All right,” I said. I put my own shoes on. I was wearing a dress of Elodie’s that hit me at midcalf, all intricate gold beadwork from the torso through the slim pencil skirt.

“In fact . . .” Elodie gestured with her red-orange lipstick at me, then at Stellan. “The most complicated part of this plan is that you two have to be a team. After what I saw earlier, I’m wondering if you can handle that.”

Colette’s eyes got wide. Stellan started to defend us, but I got there first. “Drop it, Elodie. Yes. We’ve got it under control.”

She just shrugged.

“Okay. We’re all set except—” I looked around automatically for Jack. The obvious hole in our crew lanced pain through my gut again. “We’re all set. Let’s do this.”