Map of Fates (The Conspiracy of Us 2)

I watched the clothes, but I mostly watched the people. Making sure nothing happened. Wondering where the Saxons were.

After a bit, the line of models ended, and the last of them came to the end of the catwalk, made a sharp turn, and strutted back up, stopping along the back of the stage. A white-haired man with sunglasses stood in the center, waving. Behind him, a mob of women dressed in black passed out glasses of champagne—to him, to the models, to the people in the first few rows of the crowd, including us.

The white-haired man spoke to the crowd in French. They laughed, and then he switched to English. “And I’d like to extend a special welcome to our honored guest. Cole Saxon, your family’s support has been invaluable to our brand this year.”

Cole appeared from backstage, smiling his smarmy fake smile. So that’s where they were. But Lydia wasn’t with him. I glanced to the back of the room and saw that Jack and Stellan had both noticed, too.

As one, the whole crowd raised their glasses of champagne in a toast, and I sipped mine without tasting it.

I didn’t really want to negotiate with Cole. Lydia was the mastermind—it was her we needed to talk to. Or my father. But if creepy Cole was all we had—

And then a glass shattered, and a woman screamed.

I crouched low and yanked my mom and Colette down next to me. Jack and Stellan both rushed forward, along with people who must have been bodyguards for other guests.

One of the models at the front of the room gasped and screamed again, even louder. It took me a second to understand what she was looking at. Another model was on her knees. She was clutching at her throat, and as I watched, she looked up, bloody tears seeping from her eyes. She coughed twice more, violently, collapsed, and went still.

The whole room stared in shocked silence.

Two models down from her, another girl cried out, and when she took her hands from her eyes, there were streaks of crimson down her cheeks.

I met Stellan’s horrified gaze, then Jack’s. Elodie screeched to a halt behind them, her shirt loose to accommodate her bandages.

I didn’t know how Cole had done it, but I knew what this had to be.

The virus.

The music kept playing, a wild electronic remix, and then it seemed to hit everyone at once. People screamed, jumping out of their chairs. A champagne flute shattered at my feet, spraying my legs with sticky liquid and bits of glass.

Someone a few seats down from me coughed and convulsed, her eyes the very definition of bloodshot, and then she collapsed—right into Jack and Stellan, who were pushing through the crowd in my direction. The white-haired man himself touched his face, then took off his sunglasses. Red tears were streaming down his cheeks.

I found Cole, making his way toward the door in the midst of the chaos. There was more than satisfaction on his face. There was pure, horrifying elation. Between us, half a dozen people lay dead or dying, some of them with frantic loved ones sobbing over them.

“You guys!” I screamed, but Jack and Stellan were laying the dead girl on the floor and couldn’t hear me through the terrified shrieks of the crowd.

I pushed toward Cole myself. “What did you do?” I screamed.

Cole raised the champagne glass he was still holding, a manic grin stretching across his face.

I suddenly understood. I looked back at Luc and Colette, Circle members, frozen with glasses of champagne still in their hands. “It’s poisoned,” I yelled. Cole must have kept a little of our blood somehow, and a little was all it took.

Cole was disappearing out the door. “Jack!” I screamed again. “Stellan!” I didn’t have a weapon on me, but somebody had to catch him. I even looked around for the injured Elodie. Finding none of them in the tidal wave of bodies, I was about to run after Cole myself when his eyes got wide. He grinned like he’d just seen something delightful.

I didn’t really want to see what made him that happy, but I had to look.

There were plenty of people Cole could have been looking at, but my eyes found her immediately. My mother doubled over in a hacking cough.

Still, it took me a second to understand.

And then my whole world came apart.

“Mom!” I forgot all about Cole, and tripped over my own feet sprinting to her. I reached her just in time to catch her as she fell to her knees, coughing. She looked up, and red tears were forming in the corners of her eyes.

“Mom!” I screamed. “No! No no no!”

Just like with every other person who’d been infected, bloody tears started down her cheeks. It had taken a little longer, but there they were. Her eyes went wide, and she reached up to my face and tried to say something that ended in a choking cough. Then she went limp.

“No!” I shrieked again. I shook her. “Mom!”

Jack pushed me roughly out of the way and felt for a pulse. “CPR,” he said, and compressed her chest. I leaned over her, breathing into her lungs. My own mouth filled with the taste of her blood, my eyes with tears. Chest compressions, frantic. Another breath. More compressions, for minutes, hours, a lifetime. I could tell people were gathered around me, but I didn’t care.

“Mom!” I sobbed.

Colette dropped to her knees, taking my mom’s hand, staring at her soft, now-blank face. “I thought she wasn’t Circle.”

“She’s not!” I gave her another hysterical breath. “This shouldn’t be happening! Maybe it’s not the virus. Maybe it’s something else. Call an ambulance!” I wiped the blood off my mother’s face. “She’s hurt. We have to stop the bleeding. She needs to go to the hospital. Call somebody!”

Hands came around mine, stopping them. “Kuklachka,” Stellan said gently. “She’s gone.”

“No. No! She just needs help. She’s going to be okay.” I looked around frantically. “Help! Somebody—”