The gala was his father's idea, and attendance was, as with most of his father's ideas lately, framed as a suggestion with the actual weight of an order. Lucien brought Ezra along under the same threadbare security-consultant cover that fooled precisely no one who looked closely, and for the first hour, it worked well enough — Ezra hovering at a professional distance, Lucien making the necessary rounds of handshakes and empty pleasantries that constituted most of his social calendar.

It fell apart the moment his father's guest arrived.

"Lucien," his father said, steering a woman toward him with the particular satisfaction of a man who believed he'd solved a problem...