Suddenly a hundred balloons filled with liquid pegged the black limo before them.
Chairwoman Holguín’s limo, if Lila had to guess. Going to the ball incognito had not paid off for her.
“Couldn’t they have done something about these people? It is the Closing Ball.”
“It’s a protest, Mother. I believe that was the point.”
“What point? It’s a national holiday, and this is everyone they could muster? It’s not much of a protest, if you ask me.”
Lila’s clutch vibrated once again, and she checked her palm’s screen. Pick a handsome senator. There’s a better chance of a cute baby that way.
“I’ll talk to Pax about school,” Lila said, dropping her palm into her purse as they pulled up to Bullstow’s ballroom. “I’ll figure out a way to convince him that returning is his idea even if it means changing schools, but I need you to back me up. Trevor wouldn’t have wanted this.”
“No, he wouldn’t have,” the chairwoman agreed as they disembarked. The protestors grew louder now without the limo to mute their cries. “I have every confidence in you, Lila. As for returning to your own duties, I thought you might take half-days for the next few weeks. Spend your evenings relaxing with whatever new friend you make at the ball. It will give you some time to adjust to your new position.”
Lila did not reply to the insinuation.
Bullstow’s grand ballroom loomed before them, a freestanding building of marble before a long silver carpet. Dancing couples had been carved into the exterior walls by several masters, though some dancers had turned to other games, locked in various stages of undress. The lovers gripped their partners flesh so tightly that veins protruded from their forearms. Aroused skin
bunched between their fingers.
They all looked so alive, their faces locked in ecstasy and passion. In truth, Lila had lost her virginity not too long after staring at the sculptures one summer afternoon. It hadn’t been that difficult to find a willing Bullstow boy who was keen to experiment too.
Lila supposed that was the point.
Cameras flashed from across the street, a row of poorly dressed paparazzi and journalists shouting over one another. When the group saw her, the cameras stopped, but the shouting increased to a fervor.
“Have you accepted a role as heir?” one shouted.
“Did someone try to shoot you this morning?”
“Did you consider staying home rather than attending the ball?”
Her mother ignored them.
Lila followed her example, her eyes straying across the roofs across from the Bullstow compound. If her would-be assassin had managed to find one sniper rifle, another might not be too hard to locate.
She wouldn’t be hard to find, either, not when she’d draped herself in crimson cloth.
But no shots rang out as she and her mother stepped onto the silver carpet, each side lined by young boys with close-cropped hair and well-tied cravats. All wore serious expressions and burgundy breeches and woolen coats, embroidered with a golden rose upon their breasts. The flower was the symbol of Bullstow, and the only coat of arms they’d ever known, for they belonged to no family and all families at once.
The boys hid their faces behind bouquets of burgundy and white roses, but from time to time, one of the boys would rush out at an heir or chairwoman and present a gift from his bouquet with a black-gloved hand. Even the youngest boys of seven and eight managed the task alone. Lila would have to offer a compliment to the senators later for the boys’ behavior. She never could have been that still and serious for so long at that age.
No roses came for Lila and her mother.
The farther the pair advanced, the older the boys became, until they reached a section of young men dressed in golden coats, the recent graduates of Bullstow, now interning in their chosen professions. These young men held their bouquets at their chests, keeping their faces free of petals.
Lila finally spied a familiar face. Shiloh’s brunette hair had been slicked back, and his blue eyes followed her movements. He had noticed her since the limo, had been waiting for the pair to reach them. His delicate mouth twisted when Lila turned toward him, and he bowed low, holding up his bouquet for the pair to choose a bud.
Lila ignored the roses. She kissed her little brother on the cheek, for she had not seen him in several weeks. “Are you having a good time tonight, spying on all the ladies?” she whispered, remembering how keen he was to attend his first Closing Ball. Occasionally younger heirs plucked a golden coat from the line and took them inside, sometimes going home with them thereafter.
She’d even done it once as a young heir, mostly to annoy her mother.
Shiloh blushed and cocked a worried brow.
“I’m fine. Don’t you know I can handle myself by now?”
He nodded, then jerked his chin at her coat.