//CLARA//

If I had been anyone else, in any other life, I might have been reeling.

A prince. A fortune around my neck. Every woman in the room was trying to figure out how the orphaned heiress had landed the biggest prize of the century. As if luck were the only explanation. Or the Guggenheim shadow I walked in.

I had successfully intercepted Eleanor’s fate. I’d saved her from Bartholomew. She would be safe with Felipe. She would have a title. She would live in a palace in Madrid. She would have a life far from the winter the diary said would freeze her.

Right? Am I doing this right?

The dance with Felipe ended to polite, ringing applause, and as he led me off the floor, I felt nothing but a staggering, soul-deep hollowness. He was still holding my hand, still smiling, the sun to my eclipse.

Felipe excused himself to fetch us refreshments, pressing a light kiss to my knuckles before disappearing into the crowd. I barely had a moment to breathe before they descended.

A wave of silk and perfume crashed over me. Women I’d never spoken to, names I’d already forgotten, all of them reaching out to touch the diamonds at my throat.

"Exquisite," one breathed.

"You must be so happy," another cooed. 𝒻𝓇𝑒𝘦𝘸𝑒𝒷𝓃ℴ𝑣𝘦𝑙.𝒸ℴ𝘮

"A prince," a third whispered, awe and envy bleeding together. "Imagine. A palace with crowns."

I smiled. Nodded. Said thank you in all the right places. But their hands kept brushing my neck, their fingers grazing the necklace, and I felt like a specimen pinned under glass.

A curiosity. A trophy.

"Pardon me, ladies."

The voice behind me made my acid reflux kick. Bartholomew Vanderbilt appeared from the crowd. He bowed deeply, too theatrical, his eyes fixed on my throat like a vulture eyeing a kill.

"I must not let the night slip without a dance with the muse of the evening."

I wanted to puke on his polished shoes. I scanned the room for Felipe, but he was already several feet away, trapped in a circle of men shaking his hand as if congratulating him on a successful hunt.

Casimir was nowhere to be seen. He’d vanished into the shadows the moment the diamonds touched my skin, leaving me alone in the light.

I swallowed the bile rising in my throat and forced a tight, brittle smile.

"I believe my dance card is full, Mr. Vanderbilt."

"Surely there is room for an old acquaintance." Bartholomew’s smile was all teeth. "I’m sure your prince wouldn’t mind you sharing a moment with a friend. Right, Eleanor?"

Friend. As if the word could bridge the distance between his greed and my disgust. I was surrounded. To refuse him now would be a scene Aunt Cornelia would never let me forget.

I caught Felipe’s eye across the room. I saw him cataloging Bartholomew—measuring the man’s wealth against his own—but he didn’t see the danger. He didn’t know the history. He gave me a supportive nod to dance with the snake.

"Alright. If you insist." I didn’t bother hiding my displeasure. "One dance."

Bartholomew’s hand closed around mine. His grip was too tight, his palm damp. He pulled me closer than was proper, his breath smelling of expensive brandy and rot as he leaned into my ear.

"It seems you’re going to be a princess after all," he hissed. "How befitting. Congratulations, Eleanor."

My skin crawled. I wanted to scrub it off.

"No one said I’m going to be a princess," I said flatly. "The prince hasn’t proposed. He only gave me a gift. That’s all. You’re all assuming."

"Perhaps." His smile didn’t reach his eyes. "But society knows how to read the wind. A few months ago, I was so certain you were going to be my bride."

"That was before you mishandled me."

"And I’ve apologized for that."

"An apology won’t fix bullet holes, Mr. Vanderbilt."

His eyebrows rose.

"Such dark words for a lady like you, Eleanor." He turned me, his grip tightening on my waist. "But I must ask...how did Mr. Guggenheim handle the news?"

"What news?"

"Of your impending engagement. He seems rather overprotective of you. I’m sure he didn’t agree easily. Not even with a prince."

"He seems fine to me."

"Does he?"

I stopped dancing. "Are you insinuating something, Mr. Vanderbilt?"

"I’m saying nothing." He pulled me closer, his fingers biting into my waist again. "I’m simply observing. A gentleman and a beautiful woman living under the same roof, no shared blood between them. It’s a very thin line to walk, isn’t it? Being too close. Forgetting where the line is drawn."

My heart hammered against my ribs.

"Let go of me."

"Not yet." His grip tightened. "The dance isn’t over."

"I said let go."

I tried to wrench my hand from his grip, but it became an iron clamp. Too tight. Like ropes.

The panic came without warning, clawing at my windpipe.

His hand on my waist was binding me. The diamonds hanging at my neck felt like fingers. Like something cinching tight. A knife to my throat.

The music warped in my ears, and for a breathless second, I was back in the cellar.

I tried to push him back, but my arms felt sluggish, disconnected from the rest of me. The crowd blurred at the edges of my vision. The candles guttered.

His face flickered, smiling, then hungry, then something I didn’t want to name.

"Let—go—"

The words didn’t sound like mine. I couldn’t feel my tongue. Couldn’t feel my hands. The room was spinning, or maybe that was me.

No one was watching. No one was coming. No one—

"May I?"

A cold voice sliced through the static.

Casimir’s. It was both lethal and controlled. The kind of tone that precedes violence.

Bartholomew’s smile faltered. His eyes flickered between us, connecting dots he had no business connecting. That knowing look curled his lips, but his grip didn’t loosen.

Then Casimir’s hand caught mine, peeling it free. Bartholomew stepped back. The world narrowed to the other hand on my hip, fingers splayed, and the chest at my back.

His lips brushed my ear.

"Breathe, Clara."

That’s all he said. A command. Just the man who had pulled me from death and expected me to keep living.

He spun me elegantly, a swift twirl along the rhythm, but it felt like a gasp for air to me.

Relief rushed in, filling my lungs. My vision cleared, and the numbing feeling evaporated. I hadn’t realized I was shaking until I wasn’t anymore. My hands had stopped trembling at some point, though I couldn’t remember when.

The music shifted into another waltz, and we danced.

Neither of us spoke.

His touch was gentle. Proper. Careful. The way a guardian holds his ward. Nothing more. But his fingers pressed just a fraction tighter than they should have. Enough for me to feel it. Enough for me to know.

We glided across the floor in silence. The music swelled around us, but I heard none of it. Only my own heartbeat. Only the weight of his presence.

But he wasn’t looking at me.

His eyes were on my throat.

On Felipe’s diamonds.

I watched his jaw clench, his throat working as he swallowed—once, twice—as if the sight of those stones on my skin was a poison he had to force down.

His expression turned feral. Like he wanted to rip the diamonds from my flesh with his teeth. To tear the intentions of another man off my body right there in front of everyone. I could see it in the way his fingers twitched at my side, in the way his gaze burned against the column of my throat.

But he didn’t. He just stared at it silently. As if willing it to catch fire. And I let him.

The cold diamonds taunted him with every step. Then the dance ended far too soon. Felipe appeared at my side, breaking the spell. Casimir stepped back, his eyes finally meeting mine for a heartbeat.

They were stormy, dark, and filled something I couldn’t name. Rage, hurt, hunger, all of it tangled together. His lips parted, as if he might speak, as if he might finally say something—

Then he turned and walked away.

I watched him go. The crowd just... ate him. One moment he was there, a storm in a tuxedo, and the next, he was gone.

Felipe was saying something about Madrid. About something that didn’t matter.

Because I didn’t hear a word. All I could feel was the spot on my waist where Casimir’s fingers had been.