Chapter 27 - The Mistress's Last Pawn
Three days later, rain lashed against the tall French windows of my newly acquired atelier on Rue du Faubourg Saint-Honoré.
The scent of damp wool, raw silk, and freshly printed press releases filled the three-story studio. On the massive mahogany drafting table sat the real vault key, retrieved from Zurich by my security team that very morning. Beside it lay the yellowed, hand-drawn blueprints of my mother’s masterwork: the *L'Oiseau de Feu*—The Firebird Gown, a couture piece woven from spun gold thread that had vanished thirty years ago.
A sharp knock broke my concentration.
My head of security, Marc, cracked the door open. His jaw was set tight. "Madame Clara. There’s someone downstairs. She didn't have an appointment, but she brought something you need to see. She says she won't leave without speaking to you."
"Who is it?"
Marc hesitated. "Chloe."
I set down my tailor’s chalk. "Bring her up."
When Chloe entered the studio, she looked nothing like the smug twenty-four-year-old who had smirked at me from Julian’s passenger seat outside the Milan Grand Hotel. The designer trench coat she wore was stained at the hem, her blonde hair hung limp around her hollow cheeks, and her hands trembled uncontrollably around a battered leather binder.
She stopped at the threshold, intimidated by the towering mannequins draped in velvet.
"You said you'd protect me," Chloe stammered, her voice shaking with terror. "You said if I fed Hector the dummy key, I'd be safe. But someone tried to run my car off the road in Neuilly last night!"
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"Sit down, Chloe," I said calmly, pointing to the leather sofa.
"I can't sit!" she cried, rushing toward the desk. She slammed the binder onto the mahogany wood between us. "Julian is out on bail, Clara! Do you hear me? Someone posted his fifteen-million-euro bond this morning!"
