Chapter 1 — Red Gown on Checkerboard Marble

CamilleAdrian! How dare you put your hands on me!

AdrianStay down. Do not get up off that floor.

CamilleShe came at me first! Look at my wrist!

Camille pulled back the beaded sleeve of her gown and held out her forearm, twisting it into the chandelier light to show a faint pink scratch.

CamilleShe cornered me by the west stairs. She tore the beading right off this dress.

AdrianDo you think I'm a fool?

CamilleI swear on my father's name. She swung that decanter at my head.

AdrianLook at her, Camille. Look down at the floor and look at what you did.

Nora lay curled on her side beside the shattered remains of an eight-thousand-dollar crystal decanter, one arm folded under her ribs, glass scattered across the black and white marble around her.

NoraIt hurts... Adrian, I can't breathe...

AdrianDon't try to talk, sweetheart. I'm here. I'm right here.

Adrian went down onto his knees in the broken glass without looking at it, pulled off his dinner jacket and laid it over her shoulders.

CamilleSweetheart? Adrian, why are you calling her that?

AdrianDon't open your mouth again.

CamilleShe is nothing. Her family sold their share of this house in 2009 and everybody in that ballroom knows it.

NoraI didn't touch her... I was bringing up the auction ledger...

AdrianI know you were. I watched you leave the ballroom.

Somewhere below them the orchestra was still playing. A door opened and closed on the floor beneath and the music swelled and dropped away again.

CamilleAdrian, get up. The Governor is standing at that podium waiting for you.

AdrianLet him wait.

CamilleThe Ashford foundation signs the merger tonight. If you embarrass me in front of four hundred people my father will pull every dollar out of this estate by Monday.

Adrian stood up slowly. Camille pushed herself backward across the marble on her elbows until her shoulders came up against the wainscoting.

AdrianSTAY AWAY FROM MY WIFE.

CamilleYou are making a scene over a housekeeper's daughter.

AdrianSay one more word about her family.

CamilleOr what? You'll hit me again? In front of your own security staff?

AdrianDawson. Come up here.

CamilleDon't you dare bring staff into this. Do you have any idea how this will look?

AdrianDAWSON.

Heavy footsteps came up the west stairs two at a time, and a man in a dark suit stopped at the top of them and took in the corridor without a word — the glass, the woman on the floor, the jacket, the shoe lying on its side four feet away.