Grim Lovelies (Grim Lovelies 1)

“. . . business, I suppose. They’ll want to discuss new territory lines, and I’ll be damned if I let that decrepit Lavender Witch gain any toeholds in Paris. This city is mine.”

“I assume the lord and lady are coming to dinner, and that girl, the one who plays at being a countess. Who’s the fourth?” Viggo’s voice lowered. “Prince Rennar?”

A shiver caught Anouk at the prince’s name. Rumor was he hardly ever left Castle Ides, the imposing Champs-Élysées mansion from which he governed the Haute, and when he did, it was only to raze some entire country to the ground and then banish its memory from the history books. No one knew exactly how long the Shadow Royals had been working their magic through the world, but Anouk had found references to ancient civilizations—Egyptians and Aztecs and Romans—that contained allusions to peculiarly powerful men and women.

“Rennar?” Mada Vittora’s cheeks were already flushed from whiskey. “No, he wouldn’t deign to come. It’ll be one of the others, some lesser Royal. A duke,

probably.”

Now the Royals’ kingdoms roughly followed political borders, and the various Royal families tended to keep to themselves except for the odd marriage to strengthen alliances and business dealings for trade purposes. They relied on witches to oversee their industries: food and wines, luxury goods, and, above all, the jewelry that Mada Vittora—?the Diamond Witch—?kept enchanted.

Behind Anouk, Hunter Black cleared his throat. She jumped. “Was there something I could do for you, Mada?”

“Ah, my dear. Yes.” She set down her lipstick-stained glass as a grin sliced between her pretty cheeks. Although four hundred years old, she didn’t look a day over forty-five. Sunshine-kissed hair in silken waves to her shoulders. Skin pulled painfully tight over sharp cheekbones. A fortune in plastic surgery, some might have said. Anouk knew better. All it took was a weekly bath of lavender-sage tonic mixed with two thimblefuls of Viggo’s blood.

On the sofa behind his mother, Viggo wore a similar conspiratorial grin until Mada Vittora stood. The moment her back was turned to him, the smile melted off his face. He took a long, hungry draft of whiskey.

“I have a surprise for you, my pretty girl.”

Anouk’s hands froze on her hair bow. Half done, one snaking end of the ribbon falling to her shoulder. “Is it about tomorrow’s party?”

She couldn’t keep the hopeful note from her voice. Anouk was never allowed to attend the parties. None of the beasties were, not even Hunter Black, who usually stalked the shadows of the foyer the whole time, scowling at everyone except Viggo. Parties were for the worthiest members of the Haute, not beasties—?mangy animals that had been whispered into the shape of human boys and girls and given brooms with which to serve. Anouk would stay in the kitchen with Beau, licking spoonfuls of strawberry icing from the mixing bowl, or tiptoe to the stairs to peek between the banisters at the beautiful dancing people.

“No, my sweet. Not about the party.”

Anouk tried not to let her disappointment show. She cocked her head, a question on her lips. Then what?

Mada Vittora placed an icy hand on either side of Anouk’s face. Her smile stretched wide. “Tonight, my darling, you go outside.”

Outside? Into the Pretty World, where the Pretties strolled hand in hand with the sun on their faces amid cars and mailboxes and traffic signals, walking down the tree-lined block and then the block after that and the one after that?

Outside?

“Do you mean it?” Anouk gasped.

“Oh yes. But first, you’ll need a good pair of shoes.”

Chapter 2

Mada Vittora’s closet was the stuff of dreams.

Anouk knew every inch of it; she had laundered every ?dress, starched every collar, dusted each pair of shoes. Thousands of them. Golden heels, red leather pumps, satin slippers with little blue bows.

“You’ll want a sturdy pair,” Mada Vittora said. “Flats. I could swear I had some Chanel loafers in here . . .”

The witch was currently waist-deep in the closet, rooting around like a pig hunting for truffles, her disembodied voice floating back to Anouk, who sat on the bed with her hands clutched in her lap, fingers squeezed together, the pinch of pain assuring her this wasn’t a dream. She tucked in her chin in an attempt to hide her smile. “I’ve never worn shoes before.”

“Nonsense,” Mada Vittora said from the closet. “Just last week you tried on the Bergdorf heels, remember?”

“I mean real ones. Not just for dress-up.” She wiggled her bare toes.

The witch extracted herself from the forest of fur coats. “Here. These will do.” Her hair was mussed, her cheeks flushed, and Anouk was struck by how beautiful she was even when rumpled.

She held up a pair of stiff oxfords.

Anouk reached for them, but Mada Vittora shook her head girlishly. “Let me. They have tricky laces.” She lowered herself to her knees and started to unlace the shoes. Anouk stared at the perfect part in the top of Mada Vittora’s hair. It was always the other way around: Anouk on her knees, hemming her mistress’s skirt or picking lint off her socks, while Mada Vittora towered over her, godlike. It felt topsy-turvy to have their roles reversed, like a bottle of tonic dropped upside down.

“There now,” Mada Vittora said. “Snug, but they’ll do.”