“All you have to do is believe you’re not Elara Rousseau.”
He said it like a taunt, and that’s what made her grab it. The sturdy material was heavy yet soft. It was smooth and rich, the finest fabric she’d ever seen, let alone held.
This was theonlyway she could preserve her mother’s real legacy. Corinne Rousseau had also been a brilliant chef, and the only way Elara could share that with the world was by abandoning the name she’d destroyed.
The coat. The papers. They were her way out.
Elouise Auclair was an untested recipe, capable of being anything.
If she performed well at the Exposé, her name—hernewname—would spread, and she could find an apprenticeship across the Joyaux. She could leave behind the unpaid rent, the curse of Rousseau, and all the troubles she’d amassed. And one day, when she finally became Directeur, she could build her mother’s dream bakery.
Ifthis damned coat didn’t kill her first.
The fabric slipped over her arms, shaping and reshaping to fit her wide frame and bold curves. It stretched around her middle and huggedher close and warm. No more rashes from hand-me-down clothes, no more buttons bursting off their strings.
It fit perfectly.
The name, Elouise Auclair, flickered as if trying to discern whether she was its true owner.
This was her way out. Forever.
“If I do this, I’m gone.” He went to reply, but she held up a finger. “I won’t come back until I’m a Directeur and able to buy the café.” She kept his gaze locked as she gently pulled the neck of her dress down, just enough to reveal the tattoo. It was ablaze now, licking orange and red flames across her chest. “No more calling for me. I’ll have this removed. We’re finished.”
Of all the reactions, she never expected to see pain across his furrowed face. It was a glimpse past the hardened Restes vagrant to the boy she’d once loved.
Tender. Daring. Protective.
Which made it all the more painful to watch his expression sharpen to ice. “Deal. Try it. Say your name.”
Her mother’s name.
Hernewname.
Elara took a shaky breath, closed her eyes, and let the past go, holding on to only the things she wanted to carry forward. Goodbye to secret rebel meetings and the memory of clutching her mother’s dying body. Goodbye to stolen kisses with Fernand as they crafted plans by candlelight.
She tried to envision the things Elouise Auclair might need: bread lessons with Gaetan, discovering flavor profiles with her mother, a stunning enrollment season performance, the struggles of being a Restes baker.
“I… am… Elouise Auclair.”
She waited, but the collar didn’t cinch her throat; the threads released no poison. Her new name glimmered up at her, content.
Fernand turned on his heel to pour another drink. “One night, and you’re free.”
Carefully, she folded the coat back into the parcel.
Then she faced him, drink raised for one final toast.
“Deal.”
4NIK
Nik followed the Directeurs out of the morgue and into a dusky afternoon where the gabled rooftops of Belleplace were gilded with sunset golds and oranges. Upper-story windows reflected clouds purpling like old bruises, which gradually darkened to the same shade as the rashes on the boy’s body.
Enough.
Whatever work awaited him tomorrow could be addressed then.
Now he was being summoned by Souverain Baptiste Lafontaine, the most powerful man in all of Arts Humains. The man who’d scooped Nik from the gutter and found promise in him.
