Four People in a Ballroom

Chapter 9:

There is an art to watching people lie.

It is a restorer's art, really. You look for the hairline crack beneath the varnish, the brushstroke that does not belong. You learn to stop seeing the painting and start seeing the surface.

So I watched.

I watched Serena Whitlock glide across the atrium toward us with Adrian at her side, and I saw her smile arrive a full second before her eyes did. I watched Julian's fingers tighten on my arm, relax, and tighten again. A man trying to breathe naturally and failing at it.

"Julian," Serena said, extending a gloved hand. Her voice was cool silk. "What a pleasure. I don't believe we've spoken since the last board dinner."

"Serena." He took her hand and released it at exactly the correct speed. "You look wonderful. And this must be the famous Adrian Cross."

The two men shook hands.

I have rarely seen anything so civilized or so lethal. Julian smiled with his whole handsome face. Adrian smiled with none of his. The handshake lasted two seconds, and in that time I saw Adrian's knuckles whiten before he let go.

"Mr. Hartwell," Adrian said. "Your family's hotels are well regarded."

"Kind of you to say."

"And this," Serena said, turning those pale eyes on me, "must be the wife."

The wife. Not Mrs. Hartwell, not Lena. She said it the way one might say the help.

"Lena Marlowe," I said, and held out my hand. "I'm so pleased to meet you."

Her fingers closed around mine. They were cold even through the silk. I felt, quite distinctly, the faint pressure of a test.

"What a striking dress," Serena said. "So vivid. It must be vintage."

"It was my grandmother's."

"How sweet. One so rarely sees a woman wear her grandmother's clothes to a gala." A delicate pause. "It must be comforting, to hold on to the past."

The barb was so smooth that for a moment I almost admired it. A woman who could stab you with her gloves on.

"It is," I agreed pleasantly. "Sometimes the past is the only thing that doesn't lie to you."

A flicker, gone before I could name it. Serena released my hand with a small, tight smile.

"And what do you do, Ms. Marlowe?"

"I restore old buildings."

"How useful."

"It is," I said. "People think ruins are dead things. Usually they're only waiting for someone who knows where the damage really is."

Beside me, Julian let out a short, strangled laugh. "My wife is passionate about plaster."

"I can see that," Adrian said.

It was the first thing he had said to me directly. I turned, and he was looking down at me with an expression I could not quite read.

"Ms. Marlowe," he said. His voice was low and level, a deep river under thick ice. "I understand you're the engineer restoring the Orpheum."

"Word travels."

"I own the building across the street." He lifted one shoulder. "I've watched the scaffolding go up. I've wondered about the person at the top of it."

Serena's hand tightened on his sleeve. "Adrian doesn't usually notice scaffolding."

"No," Adrian said, without taking his eyes from mine. "I don't usually."

A silence fell, brief and gleaming and razor-edged.

Then the quartet began a waltz.

"How lovely," Julian said brightly, too brightly. "Shall we, darling?"

"Ms. Marlowe," Adrian said, as if Julian had not spoken, "would you allow me one dance? I'd like to ask about the Orpheum's cornices." He turned his head toward his fiancée. "Serena, you won't mind?"

I saw Serena's face do something extraordinary.

It did not change. That was the remarkable thing. It stayed perfectly smooth, perfectly gracious, perfectly lovely. But somewhere behind her pale eyes, a door slammed.

"Of course not," she said. "Julian, you must keep me company. I'm told you know everything about the museum's endowment."

"Delighted," Julian said weakly.

Adrian offered me his arm.

I placed my hand on his sleeve, over fine dark wool, over a forearm as hard as iron. We walked out together onto the floor, past the glittering ring of onlookers, and I felt two hundred pairs of eyes follow us like searchlights.

"Smile," he murmured. "You look like you're about to go into surgery."

"I am about to go into surgery."

"Then at least pretend you enjoy the anesthesia."

My laugh escaped me, startled and genuine. His mouth twitched. His hand settled at the small of my back, light, steady, correct.

The music swelled.

We began to dance.