A Scandal Made At Midnight

‘Nothing like yours, I’m sure.’ Liane eased the plastic off the gown. Her mother might have pretensions of her and Manon catching the attention of an eligible man like Alessandro Rossi, but their limited budget did not stretch to ball gowns that would serve such a purpose.

The powder-blue dress had been her mother’s and a local seamstress had updated its debatably classic look. Amelie had insisted it was still in style, but Liane had her doubts. So did Ella.

‘Thank goodness you got rid of the ruffles,’ she said as she eyed it critically. ‘Otherwise it would have been pure nineteen-eighties, and not in a good way, unfortunately.’

‘I know.’ Liane suppressed a sigh. She was used to looking like a wallflower, with her pale, washed-out looks—or so her mother said—but wearing a forty-year-old dress took even that to its limits. ‘I don’t really mind. I’m not one for parties anyway, Ella, you know that. And no one will be looking at me anyway, I’m quite sure.’

‘Still, this is the party of the year,’ Ella protested. Liane couldn’t help but notice she didn’t even argue her second point. ‘You can’t wear something you could find in a thrift shop.’

‘Ouch.’ Liane pretended to wince. There was too much truth in her sister’s words. Even with the seamstress’s help the dress looked far too dated and worn, bagging about her bosom and hips, the material possessing the unlovely sheen of cheap satin. But what did it really matter? As she’d said and Ella had silently agreed, no one would be looking at her. They’d all be looking at Ella, and she was glad of it.

‘Look, you can’t wear this,’ Ella declared as she slid her phone out of her pocket. ‘Not to this party. It might be fine for Manon—she really doesn’t care about dresses—’

‘She’s wearing black, as she always does.’ Manon loved her work as an administrative assistant in a law office and couldn’t care less about fashion or finding a husband. She was only going because their mother had absolutely insisted and, as they both knew when it came to their mother’s machinations, it was easier to go along than to resist. Easier to stay silent than protest against her constant barrage of criticism, because her daughters disappointed her as much as her husbands had.

‘Of course she is. Let me text my designer friend. I think she was working on another gown, and it would be perfect for you. Violet to match your eyes.’

‘Oh, I don’t know,’ Liane protested, not wanting Ella to go to such trouble.

‘I’m telling you it would be perfect—’

‘I’m not wearing something transparent,’ Liane warned her.

‘Of course not,’ Ella answered with a laugh as her fingers flew over her phone. ‘That one’s for me. Trust me, Liane, it really will be perfect. You’ll be the belle of the ball!’

‘Hardly,’ Liane returned. ‘That’s a position reserved for you.’ Ella took to the spotlight naturally, and always had, much to Amelie Ash’s ire. Liane knew their mother had always wanted her and Manon to be more like Ella, sparkling and sociable and charismatic, even as she’d disdained and even despised her stepdaughter for being exactly how she was. As for herself? She’d be happy enough to stand unnoticed on the sidelines as she watched Ella take the world by storm. Still, she decided with a smile, she was feminine enough to feel it would be nice to wear a pretty dress while she was doing it.

The party was in full swing as Alessandro Rossi stepped out of the elevator onto the penthouse floor of Hotel Rossi, his family empire’s flagship hotel in the centre of Manhattan. From the open doors of the ballroom he heard the tinkle of laughter and crystal, the strains of the seventeen-piece orchestra. All around him the city stretched out, a carpet of darkness lit by the golden blur of streetlights, matched by the glitter and sparkle of crystal chandeliers and champagne flutes, not to mention the hundreds of thousands of dollars’ worth of jewels dripping off most of the women in the room. The Rossi Ball, the first of its kind, had been hyped to be the event of the year in the city, as it had to be. The publicity was the only reason he was having this tedious affair in the first place.

Straightening his black tie, his eyes narrowing as his hooded grey gaze swept the crowded room, Alessandro stepped into the ballroom—and then froze when he heard a tiny strangled yelp. What the...?

‘I’m so sorry,’ a woman said. Her voice was soft, with a gentle trace of a French accent. ‘I didn’t mean to get in your way. I do apologise.’

Considering he’d stepped on her foot, he had a feeling he was the one who’d got in the way. He hadn’t even seen her. Alessandro’s eyes narrowed as he glanced down at the woman in question—barely coming to his shoulder, with white-blonde hair piled on top of her head and a small, slender figure encased in swathes of gauzy violet. She was standing behind a potted palm by the door, which was why he hadn’t seen her. That, and because she was also rather petite. She tilted her head back to gaze up at him with eyes the same colour as her dress as she tried not to wince. She was, he realised, hopping on one foot.

‘I apologise. I hope I didn’t break your toes?’ He’d meant to sound charmingly wry, but the woman gave him a level look.

‘Only my pinkie toe, which I can live without, although I might walk with a limp from now on. Don’t you need pinkie toes for balance?’ She spoke so sombrely that for a horrified split second he thought she was serious—and then her smile emerged, reminding Alessandro bizarrely of a cuckoo clock—it popped out and then it was gone, and it left him smiling in return, strangely lightened.

‘I thought you were serious,’ he told her.

‘I think I am.’ Again with the glimpse of a smile, so fleeting and precious, making something long dead flicker inside him, come to life. ‘But don’t worry, I’ll live. Clearly this is a punishment for my pride. I shouldn’t have let my sister convince me to wear these ridiculous shoes.’

Alessandro’s mouth quirked. ‘It’s been my experience that most women wear ridiculous shoes.’

‘What an insulting generalisation.’ She wasn’t laughing but it felt like she was, and it made him want to laugh as well. Strange. He generally wasn’t one for levity. ‘I assure you I am the proud owner of several pairs of sensible shoes, and not one even slightly ridiculous pair.’

He nodded towards her feet. ‘Excluding these.’

‘These belong to my sister.’ She reached down to lift the hem of her gown to show him the shoes in question, along with a pair of slim ankles. The shoes were stiletto-heeled and dyed violet to match the dress. ‘Truly ridiculous,’ she proclaimed with another smile, this one reaching her eyes.

Alessandro had certainly seen more ridiculous shoes in his time, but he decided not to say as much. As reluctantly charmed as he was by this funny, elfin woman, and as much he had an odd longing to prolong the conversation, he needed to begin the tedious and unpleasant business of meeting and greeting his guests, get the necessary publicity photos and then make a strategic retreat. Focus on the task at hand, as he always did, with resolve and determination. No distractions, no temptations, nothing to deter or derail him from his chosen course.

‘Very fetching, I’m sure,’ he told her, his tone instinctively several degrees cooler than it had been previously.

He watched, feeling an inexplicable sense of loss, as a shuttered look came over her face, like a curtain coming down, all the light and sparkle suddenly gone. She let go of her dress so the hem hid her feet, the gauzy material brushing the floor. ‘Thank you, indeed. Clearly I’ve already taken up too much of your time. I do apologise.’

Before he could reply, she took a step back and then another, the crowd swallowing her up within seconds while he simply stared. Strange woman. Beguiling woman. No, he told himself, just strange. And rather mousy, really, with all that pale hair and skin. Colourless, although her eyes had been extraordinary, like amethysts...

He gave himself a mental shake as he turned back to the ballroom. He needed to stop thinking about some nobody woman who would do nothing to further his cause. The only reason he was here was to generate positive publicity for the Rossi brand—a prospect that filled him with both determination and ire.

He hadn’t realised when he’d taken over as CEO of the sprawling family empire from his father last year just how much the hotel side of the business had started to falter. Leonardo Rossi had seconded his son to Rome for ten years, to oversee their European assets and investments, the main source of the Rossi wealth. While Alessandro had been solidifying their financial business, his father, no doubt too busy with his latest amour, had let the hotel empire’s flagship hotel in America run nearly into the ground, simply through mismanagement and indifference. It was stunts like this one that were supposedly going to save it, according to the consultant Alessandro had hired.

‘The Rossi brand has become associated with stuffy, old world gentility,’ the branding specialist, a woman who barely looked out of grad school, had told him bluntly several months ago, when Alessandro had flown into New York to find the flagship hotel only half full at one of the busiest times of the year. ‘At least in America. People want to stay somewhere exciting and cutting edge, somewhere young and new.’

‘The Rossi brand is over a hundred years old,’ Alessandro had pointed out dryly. ‘We are never going to be young and new.’

‘Which is why it’s time for a reinvention.’