The woman in the mirror was a stranger, but she was also the most beautiful thing I had ever seen.
She wore a dress made of silk so dark it looked like spilled ink, cut low enough to make a priest blush and tight enough to stop a heart. Her hair was a waterfall of glossy chestnut waves, pinned back with diamonds that cost more than my entire life's earnings. Her lips were painted a violent shade of crimson.
I reached out, my fingers trembling as they hovered over the cold glass. The woman in the mirror reached out too, terror swimming in her eyes.
"Stop shaking," a voice said from the shadows behind me. "Elena Vance doesn't shake. Elena Vance makes other people shake."
I flinched, dropping my hand. Silas stepped into the light. He was a handsome man in a jagged sort of way, like a statue that had been broken and glued back together wrong. He wore a tuxedo that fit him perfectly, but his eyes were dead. They were the eyes of a man who solved problems by burying them.
"I can't do this," I whispered. My voice sounded thin, pathetic. "Silas, look at me. I'm a waitress. I spill coffee on people when I'm nervous. I can't walk into a room full of sharks and pretend to be a queen."
Silas didn't blink. He walked over to the vanity table and picked up a diamond necklace. It was heavy, cold against his palm.
"You aren't a waitress anymore, Maya," he said softly. He moved behind me, draping the necklace around my throat. The metal felt like ice. "Maya owes fifty thousand dollars to the Eastside loan sharks. Maya is going to have her legs broken if she doesn't come up with the money by Friday. Maya is dead."
He clasped the necklace shut with a sharp click.
"But Elena," he continued, leaning down so his breath ghosted over my ear, "Elena is untouchable. Elena is the missing wife of Julian Thorne. And her return is going to save my company a billion dollars in the merger next week. All you have to do is wear the clothes, say the lines, and not get caught."
I stared at my reflection. He was right. I had no choice. The debt wasn't just money, it was a death sentence. Silas had bought my debt. He owned it, which meant he owned me.
"What if he knows?" I asked. "Her husband. Julian. They were married for three years. He'll know I'm not her. The way I walk, the way I smell..."
"He won't," Silas said, straightening his jacket. "Julian and Elena hated each other. They slept in separate bedrooms for the last year. He avoided her like the plague. As long as you are cold, bitchy, and distant, he won't suspect a thing. In fact, if you try to be nice to him, that is what will give you away."
He handed me a small black clutch purse. Inside was a phone I didn't know how to use and a tube of lipstick.
"Rule number one," Silas recited, holding up a finger. "Never apologize. Elena never said sorry in her life."
"Never apologize," I repeated, forcing my spine to straighten.
"Rule number two. Don't let anyone touch you. Elena had a phobia of germs. If a servant tries to take your coat, you drop it on the floor. If Julian tries to touch you..." Silas paused, a cruel smirk touching his lips. "Well, Julian won't try to touch you. He'd sooner touch a burning stove."
"And rule number three?"
"Trust no one," Silas said. He opened the heavy hotel room door. The sounds of the gala downstairs drifted up, faint music and laughter. "Everyone in that ballroom is a liar, Maya. But tonight, you have to be the best liar of them all."
I took a deep breath. The air in the room smelled of expensive perfume and fear. I looked at the mirror one last time. The waitress was gone. The frightened girl was buried under layers of silk and diamonds.
I turned to the door.
"Let's go," I said, and my voice didn't shake this time. "My husband is waiting."
The elevator ride down to the ballroom felt like a descent into hell, only this hell was lined with gold leaf and smelled of expensive lilies.
My heart hammered against my ribs like a trapped bird. Every time the elevator chimed as we passed a floor, I jumped. Silas stood beside me, cool and unbothered, checking messages on his phone. He looked like a man taking a pet for a walk. A pet that might bite him, perhaps, but a pet nonetheless.
"Shouldn't we announce I'm coming?" I asked, wringing my hands before remembering not to. I dropped them to my sides. "won't people be shocked? You said Elena has been missing for three months."
"Shock is the point," Silas said without looking up. "We need the stock prices to stabilize. Nothing stabilizes a market like the resurrection of an heiress. The press is downstairs. The board of directors is downstairs. And Julian is downstairs. We are going to make an entrance."
The elevator slowed. The doors slid open with a soft hiss.
The noise hit me first. It was a roar of conversation, clinking glasses, and a string quartet fighting to be heard over the din. We stepped out onto a mezzanine balcony that overlooked the grand ballroom.
I gasped. I couldn't help it.
I had seen wealth before. I had seen rich people in movies, or seated in the VIP section of the restaurant where I worked. But this was different. This was old money. This was the kind of money that built cities and silenced governments.
Crystal chandeliers the size of small cars hung from the ceiling, dripping light onto the crowd below. There were hundreds of people, the men in sharp tuxedos and the women in gowns that shimmered like liquid jewelry. Waiters moved through the sea of bodies like currents, holding silver trays of champagne.
"Showtime," Silas whispered.
He stepped forward, placing a hand on the small of my back. He didn't push me, but the threat was there. Move or I will make you move.
I stepped to the railing.
It started in the center of the room. A few people looked up. Then a few more. Like a ripple in a pond, the silence spread. It moved outward from the stairs until it hit the walls. The music faltered and died as the cellist noticed the room had gone quiet.
Within ten seconds, five hundred people were staring up at me.
I felt naked. I felt like a fraud. I wanted to run back to the elevator and press the button for the basement, run out the service exit, and disappear back into my life of overdue rent and stale diner coffee.
But then I saw their faces.
I expected to see relief. I expected to see smiles. I expected people to be happy that the missing Elena Vance had returned.
I was wrong.
They looked terrified. Some looked angry. A woman in the front row, holding a glass of red wine, looked at me with such pure, unadulterated hatred that I almost took a step back.
"They hate her," I whispered, barely moving my lips.
"I told you," Silas murmured, a dark amusement in his voice. "Elena wasn't the life of the party, Maya. She was the one who ruined it. Now, walk down the stairs. Chin up. Look at them like they are dirt on your shoe."
I gripped the cold marble banister. I channeled every acting class I had ever taken. I thought of the landlord who evicted me last winter. I thought of the customers who snapped their fingers at me for ketchup. I let that cold, hard anger fill my chest.
I lifted my chin. I narrowed my eyes.
I took the first step.
The sound of my heel hitting the stone echoed in the silence. Click.
I took another. Click.
The crowd parted as I reached the bottom of the stairs. It was like Moses parting the Red Sea, but instead of water, it was a sea of terrified socialites. No one approached me. No one hugged me. They shrank back, creating a wide circle of empty space around me.
A young waiter, clearly new and unaware of the tension, stumbled forward with a tray.
"Champagne, Miss Vance?" he squeaked, his hand shaking.
My instinct was to smile. My instinct was to say, Oh, thank you, that looks lovely.
"Rule number two," Silas's voice echoed in my memory. Don't let anyone touch you. Be cruel.
I stopped. I looked at the tray. I looked at the boy's terrified face.
"Get that away from me," I said. My voice came out lower than my own, husky and sharp. "It smells cheap."
The boy went pale. He scrambled back, nearly dropping the tray. The crowd gasped softly.
It worked. I saw the recognition in their eyes. They didn't see Maya the waitress anymore. They saw Elena the ice queen.
"There she is," a deep voice cut through the silence.
The crowd turned. The circle opened up.
A man was walking toward me. He was tall, with broad shoulders that strained against his black suit. His hair was dark, swept back from a face that was devastatingly handsome but hard as granite. His jaw was clenched tight enough to snap steel.
He didn't look happy to see me. He looked like he wanted to strangle me.
It was him. My husband.