ed pastries, Maid Rosa m

steel trash bin with a

rboss," Rosa muttered to the estate chef, wiping soot

g potatoes with a methodical slowness-a menial task they had

other's secret ch

d during the first year of our marriage, when I wa

a and the chef had

il from the prep counter; I quickly scribbled down the exact

r the chef's mixing bowl an

estate smelled of roaste

et phantom of a life that

ecipe and used it to bak

e massive cake into the dining room, claiming to Julian that

ining room and bumped st

late Don's vetera

he old guard, a man who had on

ng his weathered face for a

cating moment before he looked away, hi

w some

thout a single word and

amily dinner in the grand hall under

ir heavily jeweled wives sat

ting her elegant dress, her flawless hair,

was my cousin, Siena. She sat quietly near the middle of the table, offering Chloe disda

le, wearing a plain gray dress,

tal glass with a silver knife. T

ging our legitimate fronts," Dante announc

e the one to ring the ceremonial bell

pted in thund

gging my fingernails into my pa

me the exact time and place of my reckoning

e agonizing meal, I found a small, cheap

d it in with th

arkness with a single text m

ve the logs. Tell me whe

e Ma

syndicate's black site who had ever loo

phone inside the hollow porcelain doll,

lway, and the sound of military boots on the flo

it deep beneath a loose, rotting floorboard under the rusted radiator

closely followed b

Chloe shrieked at t

lessly tore my

ed frame and pulled out a glitt

lcone famil

er directly at me. "She is a deranged kleptom

cold wall, stammeri

it," I whispered, shak

e, then at me, his face a ch

d, weaponizing the staged incident to val

anently until she sign

ged a fine dust of ceiling plaster that caught the moonlight

I caught a final glimpse of Mai

e narrowing crack in the doo

ords silently: I s

k room, listening to the oppr

cage, holding fast to the ment

mething he couldn't bring himself to say. The allies were

ft until the