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“I’ve got eyes on Monsieur Delecour,” Maria murmurs into the rim of her glass.
The man isn’t hard to spot, even beneath his technicolor mask amongst all the glitz and glamour. A flawless marble floor glitters in the candlelight, its smooth surface amplifying the soft notes of a string quartet settled in the corner.
Delecour preens at the center of the ballroom, dipping and twirling a red-haired woman clad in all black beneath his arm to tempo. She dons a similarly feathered façade but with a certain je ne sais quoi that he lacks, meticulous in its subtlety yet just as sharp at the edges. Just as dangerous.
Anyone who knows anyone knows that an invite to this party requires ruthlessness. Tenacity. Obscene wealth and a rise to power spectacular enough to attract the right kind of attention.
Within this sea of masks, there isn't a single innocent dove in disguise.
The comms device in her ear comes alive. “Intel suggests our would-be assassin isn't a fan of public executions. You've got some time until Delecour retires to his room. Why don't you mingle in the meantime and enjoy the party?"
"I know how to do my job, Phil."
"You could use the reminder." His teasing rings loud and clear, but so does his affection. "It's okay to let loose once in a while."
"I'll keep it in mind," Maria drawls, adjusting the lapel of her finely pressed suit.
The tie she picked out pulls tighter than she's used to, distractingly confining.
Her mask, an off-white piece with lace and golden braiding, obscures the top half of her face and itches against her skin.
"See that you do."
He isn’t wrong to worry after her latest string of missions with little to no rest in between, but she's got a good feeling about this one. This might be the one that pushes her up the ranks once and for all.
As the beginning notes of an upbeat waltz draw nearby wallflowers from their perch, a feminine voice at her ear asks, smooth as silk, "May I have this dance?"
It's the woman from earlier, having drifted from Delecour's attention. This close, her emerald eyes glitter beneath a row of sequins and jet black feathers, accentuated with swirls of silver that draw focus to the cut of her cheekbones.
Her lips are painted red to match the curls framing her face, rich as blood.
Maria swallows down the remnants of champagne, sweet on her tongue. "I'm not much of a dancer," she confesses, thrown at the spike of adrenaline coursing through her when the woman's eyes trace the motion of her throat.
"Perfectly fine." A gloved hand trails along Maria's exposed forearm, down past her wrist to occupy the spaces between her fingers. Delicate. Deliberate. "Just follow my lead."
She's a vision in the candlelight—her perfectly-fitted black satin dress flowing along her curves, reminiscent of freshly cooled obsidian glass. However, something lurks in the depths of her eyes that tells Maria she isn't nearly as brittle in structure.
That same unnamed force, an allure that transcends words, is what prompts Maria to push away from the wall she'd previously taken refuge against.
Deadly lips curl into a smile at her acquiescence, leading her along as promised.
Maria's professionalism keeps her primary objective from slipping out of sight completely, yet she finds herself unable to pull her gaze from the curve of this woman's collarbones or the light flush of her cheeks creeping below her mask. They move in tandem as the rest of the room fades away, entranced in this strange, newfound gravity that's taken hold between them.
Like a puzzle piece fitting into place.
It eventually draws them closer until they're pressed flush against each other with the woman's arms draped around Maria's neck, the tips of her fingers combing through raven strands.
When the woman licks her lips and leans in, Maria swears her heart stops.
Warm breath brushes against her cheek, closely followed by the delicate press of soft lips at the corner of her mouth that sparks a flame within her veins. It's an invitation—a gentle tease and a challenge, daring Maria to ask for more.
And she does, chasing the pull with a soft graze of her lips across soft skin, her senses overwhelmed by the pure passion of the moment, fingers gripping tight at her hips.
Until a nearby scream jolts them apart.
Through a flurried tangle of legs and fabric, Delecour lies motionless on the floor, face-up with a gaping mouth and unseeing glossy eyes.
A second. She'd only taken her eyes off him for a second, and in that time, he'd been hunted down and taken out with a precision befitting a surgeon. The public manner of his execution is a message in itself—a warning to a crowd full of individuals with far-reaching influence and equally terrifying conviction.
It says: none of you are untouchable.
To attempt something like this and get away with it, someone must have gotten to him earlier. Someone he must've danced with previously.
Someone like a woman dressed to kill.
Maria whips around with an accusation balancing on the tip of her tongue—only to discover the glaring absence of her previous dance partner.
A trace of sweet perfume lingers in the air as a parting gift.
"Hill," Phil demands in her ear. "What happened?"
"Delecour's dead," she forces through gritted teeth, pushing her way to the edges of the crowd.
"What?"
"He's dead, Phil," she curses. "I got distracted."
Something solid jostles in her pants pocket that hadn't been there before. Her scrambling fingers dip inside to scrape against the outline of a capped syringe.
A slip of paper flutters to the ground when she extracts her hand.
On the surface is a message in red ink, still fresh and signed off with an hourglass symbol. The sight of it burns, pulsing in time with the fleeting echo of lips on her cheek.
See you around, Agent Hill. x