Page 135 of Black Reign

I touch the brown wig.

Then the contacts.

There is still another dress hidden with the secondary disguise.

Another face waiting.

Another version of me.

I can become a guest.

Move closer.

Watch Xavier when he isn't looking for Vesper.

Find out who he is when Ghost isn't typing.

Dangerous.

Possibly catastrophic.

I smile despite the ache in my chest.

He thinks Vesper outplayed him once today.

Not yet.

I whisper softly in Italian.

“Vediamo quanto bene conosci davvero il tuo fantasma.”

Let's see how well you really know your ghost.

Then I turn toward the cliffs where I have my blonde wig and bombshell dress hidden. A strapless push up bra with inserts will complete my next costume change. I can’t break now. Not when I’m so close to finding out the truth about my father’s death even if I have to break a heart who was falling in love with a man who doesn’t really exist. At least not the one I had made him up in my mind to be.

The caterer has done her job.

Time to become someone else.

6

The ceremony happens without an assassination. Travers is unbearably pleased with himself.

Kane gets married beneath the arch Vesper photographed from inside my supposedly impenetrable perimeter. Hannah cries. Haverhill pretends he isn't going to, then loses that fight somewhere around the second paragraph of his vows.

Drew elbows me once when Kane's voice catches.

I ignore him.

My attention keeps moving.

Not obviously.

I've recovered enough self-respect for that.

But every woman becomes a possibility.

The harpist is too old.