Read Chapter 2: The Invitation

The invitation arrived on cream-colored linen so thick it felt like vellum, sealed with black wax and pressed with a moth—wings spread, antennae delicate. Camille turned it over in her gloved hands, standing in the musty corridor of *Le Figaro*, the morning light slanting through the grimy windows.

“One of your admirers, Delacroix?” Jacques called from his desk, a sour smirk on his face.

She pocketed the card without a word. She knew what it was. For weeks she had tried to angle her way into the Montfort mansion, and now the Marquise had opened the door herself. Or, more likely, a trap had been laid.

The gala was set for Saturday evening, and the card listed no plus-one.

By Saturday, Camille had done her homework. Marguerite de Montfort had not been seen in Paris society for over a decade. The gala was being thrown by her son, Philippe, and for a man who had only recently returned to the capital from his country estate, he was spending lavishly. Lanterns were being strung in the gardens, orchestras hired, chefs imported. The gossip columns called it “the event of the season.”

Camille called it an opening.

She arrived by hired carriage, dressed in a gown of deep emerald silk that left her shoulders bare and her décolletage considerably more than conversational. Her hair was pinned in elaborate loops, threaded with seed pearls. A mask of black lace covered the upper half of her face, leaving only her mouth and chin exposed.

The doorman took her assumed name—“Madame Vasseur, companion of the Duc de Lyon”—without blinking. The lie slid off her tongue like honeyed wine. Inside, the Montfort mansion was a cathedral of excess. Crystal chandeliers dripped with candlelight, reflecting off marble floors that had been polished to mirror shine. The air swam with the scent of orange blossom and expensive perfume, and the low murmur of conversation, punctuated by laughter.

She drifted through the crowd, cataloguing faces. The political elite. The old money families who had weathered the revolution and the Commune. Artists, writers, and one or two faces she recognized from *Le Figaro*’s own crime desk—men who had no idea they were standing across the room from their colleague.

But the Montforts were nowhere to be seen.

Camille accepted a glass of champagne from a passing waiter, holding it more for camouflage than thirst. She moved toward the grand staircase, where the crowd thinned. From here, she could see the portraits lining the wall—ancestors, each in oil, their faces fading into the dark lacquer of the woodwork.

She stopped. A portrait of a man in a blue coat, hand resting on a sword hilt. The placard read *Philippe de Montfort, 5th Marquess, 1762*. She stared. Something about the face felt familiar.

“Admiring the family history?”

The voice came from behind her, low and warm, with an aristocratic drawl that settled somewhere between her ear and her spine. She turned.

He was tall, with dark hair swept back from a sharp widow’s peak, and eyes the color of tarnished silver. His coat was charcoal, cut immaculately, and he wore no mask. He smiled at her, and the expression did not quite reach his eyes.

“I was admiring the artwork,” she said, keeping her voice light. “I have a fondness for the old masters.”

“He was not a master of anything, I’m afraid. Merely an ancestor.” He stepped closer, and she caught a scent of cedar and cold night air. “Allow me to introduce myself. Philippe de Montfort. And you are…?”

“Madame Vasseur,” she said. “Companion to the Duc de Lyon.”

“Ah.” He tilted his head, studying her through those silver eyes. “And is the Duc aware that his companion has such sharp wrists? A jockey would envy them. And such ink stains beneath her nails?”

Camille’s stomach dropped. She kept her smile fixed. “I paint. And I ride. You have a keen eye, Monsieur le Marquis.”

“I have had a great deal of time to develop one.” He gestured languidly toward a side corridor, away from the main party. “Walk with me, Madame Vasseur. Or perhaps I should say, Mademoiselle Delacroix?”

The name landed like a slap. Camille’s fingers tightened around her champagne glass. “I’m not sure I take your meaning.”

“I think you do.” He walked ahead of her, not looking back, and the force of his certainty pulled her forward. The corridor was darker here, lit only by a few gas sconces. They passed a series of doors, all closed. The noise of the gala faded to a distant hum.

He stopped before a painting at the far end of the hall—a woman in a silver gown, dark hair coiled at her neck. In the background, barely visible, was a figure standing in shadow, watching her.

“My mother,” Philippe said. “Marguerite de Montfort.”

Camille studied the face. There was a cruelty in the jaw, softened by time and brushwork. The woman’s eyes were pale.

“She does not attend,” he continued. “She rarely does anymore. The gathering tonight is mine.”

“You are generous with your hospitality.”

“I am curious with it.” He turned, and now the smile had reached his eyes, though it made her colder rather than warmer. “You have been asking about my family for weeks. You have visited three archives, petitioned two intermediaries, and attempted to bribe one of my footmen. You wrote a story about a woman found in the Seine with a mark upon her wrist, a mark you identified—incorrectly—as belonging to our house.”

Camille’s heart beat hard beneath her stays. “The mark was identical to the moth sigil on your invitation.”

“A coincidence,” he said softly. “Or a design.”

“Whose design?”

He stepped closer. Close enough that she could see the faint lines around his mouth, could see that there was no crease of weariness at the corners of his eyes. He looked thirty. The portrait of the 5th Marquess looked thirty.

“That is the question, is it not?” he murmured. “You came here disguised as a courtesan to observe me, Mademoiselle. So observe. Watch. Ask your questions. But know that you walk among wolves who do not sleep.”

From the ballroom, a high keening note rose—a violin, tuning up. The music would begin soon.

“Why did you invite me?” she asked.

“Because you are the first person in forty years to come looking,” he said. “And I wanted to see the face of my death.”

He turned and walked back toward the light, leaving her in the shadow of his mother’s portrait. Camille stood there a long moment, then followed. But as she reached the doorway, something slipped from her bodice and clattered across the marble floor.

Her locket.

She bent quickly, scooping it up, but Philippe had already heard. He froze, posture rigid, and when he turned back, his face had drained of all color.

She clutched the silver locket in her palm, the chain still warm from her skin. The old oval of it, worn smooth by her mother’s thumb, her grandmother’s before.

He took a step toward her, his voice no longer warm, but frayed. “Where did you get that?”

Camille backed away. “It was my mother’s.”

“Where did she get it?”

“She died when I was a child. I don’t know.” She tucked the locket back inside her bodice, her fingers shaking.

“Mademoiselle,” he said, and his voice cracked, just slightly. “I have not seen a piece of that design in more than a century.”

The violin began. A waltz. The crowd roared with applause.

But the music sounded very far away, and the wolf in front of her looked at her as though she were a ghost given flesh.

Camille turned and fled into the light of the ballroom, and she did not look back.