The Conspiracy of Us (The Conspiracy of Us 1)

A tour bus that had been blocking my view pulled away—and I did a double take at the glass pyramid in a vast courtyard. “The Louvre?” I said, surprised. The building was easy to recognize from pictures.

But rather than walking toward the main entrance at the pyramid, Stellan’s boots crunched across the fine gravel toward one of the side arms of the complex. He murmured into the microphone attached to his earpiece and glanced back at me. “Coming?”

I hurried to catch up, the straps of my prom shoes digging into my heels. “Could we maybe go sightseeing later?”

Stellan stopped. “Do I look like I want to play tour guide? We’re not sightseeing. There’s an informal meeting going on, and I’ll have to take you through it. Unknown teenage family members are to be seen and not heard, understood? Or in this case,” he continued under his breath, “maybe not even seen until you’re cleaned up, but I guess it can’t be helped.”

I hugged the bag over the stain on my chest and followed him. It was a beautiful morning. Paris in springtime—the sayings about it were true. We walked down the side of the Louvre, past tourists taking pictures and eating ice cream on expanses of new-green grass. A group of kids giggled and played tag in what looked like a maze of hedges. I could still see the Eiffel Tower, far in the distance against a sky dotted with clouds.

Stellan stopped at an unassuming set of double doors with men standing at attention on either side. One of them spoke to him in French, then held the doors for us, and Stellan gestured ahead of him. I took a deep, centering breath and walked inside.

The first thing I saw was a machine gun.

I recoiled automatically, but it was just a security checkpoint. The guard holding the gun across his body ushered me through a metal detector, and a stern woman on the other side patted me down. The low hum of conversation and background piano music beckoned from a nearby entrance hall.

The music grew louder as we stepped through a high archway draped in red velvet curtains. People milled around a drawing room covered in more red velvet and gold than a PBS period drama. Even though it was before noon, I felt incredibly underdressed.

This didn’t look like a mafia gathering. I supposed government officials could take over the Louvre for a brunch party, though. A gray-haired man with wire-rimmed glasses spoke to Stellan as we walked by. Stellan just gave him a tight smile and gestured down a hallway, but I couldn’t help but glance over my shoulder as we moved on. The man looked exactly like Edward Anders. As in, the vice president of the United States. This man was shorter than I would have imagined Anders, but the resemblance was uncanny.

I hurried to catch up with Stellan as he stepped into a smaller drawing room with the same gold-trimmed red velvet brocade on the walls and chandeliers dripping with crystal. I did my second double take of the morning when I saw Padraig Harrington on a bench, deep in conversation with a man wearing a white turban. This time, I was sure it was him. Padraig Harrington was the most famous golfer in the world, nearly as well known for his tabloid antics as he was for the distinctive scar on the side of his face, which was turned toward me right now.

Lara would die. She was obsessed with celebrity gossip. I was still staring when Padraig Harrington looked around the room and caught me. He grinned and gave me a wink. I felt my cheeks blaze.

“Are you going to tell me any more about the Circle?” I said to Stellan. If that was Padraig Harrington, maybe that other man really was the vice president. What would that mean? Was this a fund-raiser for a French politician? I never imagined being connected to anyone who attended events like this. “Which of these people am I related to?”

Stellan held up one finger until he was finished speaking into the small microphone on his lapel. Even though he’d combed it back, his blond hair fell into his face. “I’ve just been told the Saxons are arriving tomorrow. My orders are to keep you here until told otherwise.”

I deflated a little. If they cared enough to send a private plane, I’d hoped they’d have someone here to meet me.

Wait. “Did you say you’re keeping me here?” I wondered out loud. “For how long?”

Stellan was already walking away. “You’re not going to question everything I say, are you? It’s growing tiresome.”

I started to reply that keeping me in the dark was also growing tiresome, but I shut my mouth and watched him climb the stairs ahead of me. His slim dress shirt was tucked into still-wrinkled black pants, which, on him, looked like they were meant to be that way. Stellan was different from how he’d been on the plane. The teasing note to his voice was gone. I hadn’t gotten anything out of him before; I could tell I really wasn’t going to now that he was in work mode.

We wound our way past a series of small rooms off the main corridor. The whole party hummed with power and wealth, but if I hadn’t known better, I’d have said people also seemed . . . paranoid. The guests darted glances over their shoulders as they talked, and you didn’t have to be a body language expert to see all the strained smiles, the tension in gestures. I couldn’t help but wonder what exactly this meeting was about.

Stellan stopped in front of one room, where a line of people waited to talk to a hugely pregnant woman with a pale, striking face and a severe blond chignon.

A slim girl wearing black pants and a black jacket and holding a clipboard appeared from inside. She narrowed her eyes and eased the door partway shut behind her when she saw me. She was probably about my age, but at least six inches taller, and seemed to be part Asian and part European, with wide almond-shaped eyes, a blunt blond bob that was obviously dyed but perfectly highlighted, and heavy bangs. Since I’d just seen Padraig Harrington, I assumed she was a French actress or model, so I was surprised when Stellan said, “I’m taking her to a room on the fourth floor. Are they made up?”

“Of course,” the girl said, her voice unexpectedly husky and bored. She made no show of pretending she wasn’t giving me a once-over, then frowned and switched to French.

“Avery’s a guest,” Stellan answered in English. “Distant family of the Saxons, waiting here until they arrive. What are you doing?”

The girl tapped her clipboard. “Keeping track of baby shower gifts. So far we’ve been promised artwork, highly trained military, next year’s Olympics . . .”

“Her assistant of all people shouldn’t joke about it,” Stellan said, glancing in at the blond woman. “It’s important for all of our futures.”