Celine fought back the urge to smile. This was precisely the reason she and Pippa had been drawn to each other before setting sail. Neither of them harbored delusions when it came to the opposite sex. Of course Celine wanted to know why Pippa did not yearn to find a match, but she knew better than to ask.
A petite blonde with a heart-shaped face and sapphire-blue eyes, Pippa drew ample notice wherever she went. Men often tipped their hat to her appreciatively. Even more importantly, she possessed a mind as sharp as a tack. It should have been the work of a moment for her to find love. But instead of settling down in her homeland, Pippa had braved the wilds of a new country, far across the Atlantic.
The day they met, this had struck Celine as highly curious. But she kept her thoughts to herself. She had no intention of taking part in the discussion that would likely follow. If she asked, they would ask in return, and these were questions Celine did not want to answer. Any interest in her past—beyond the bare minimum—was a thing to be avoided at all cost.
For numerous reasons.
The afternoon Celine had embarked on the Aramis, it had not escaped her notice that all the girls on board were light-skinned, most without a hint of foreign blood among them. Antonia—the girl from Portugal—possessed a complexion that easily browned in the sun, but even she had spent most of the journey below deck to ward away any suggestion of color.
If they knew where Celine’s mother was from. If they knew she was not fully of Anglo-Saxon heritage . . .
It was a secret she and her father had kept from the moment they’d first arrived in Paris thirteen years ago, when Celine was scarcely four years old. Though France was not as infamous for its racial divide as America had been in recent years, it nevertheless harbored a seething undercurrent of tension. One that often implied how inappropriate it was for the races to mix. This notion proved true the world over. In areas beyond New Orleans, there were even laws forbidding people of different colors from congregating in the same room.
Celine’s mother had been from the Orient. Upon completing his time at Oxford, her father had followed his passion for languages to Eastern shores. He’d crossed paths with Celine’s mother in a small village along the southern coast of a rocky peninsula. Celine had never known where, though she’d often inquired as a child, only to be rebuffed.
“It doesn’t matter who you were,” her father had argued. “It matters who you are.”
It rang true then, like it did now.
As a result, Celine knew precious little about her mother. The recollections she had of her first few years of life along a Far East coast were fleeting. They flickered across her thoughts from time to time, but never fully took shape. Her mother was a woman who smelled of safflower oil and fed her fruit each night and sang to her in a distant memory. Nothing more.
But if anyone looked closely—studied Celine’s features with a practiced gaze—they might notice the edges of her upturned eyes. The high planes of her cheekbones, and the thick strands of dark hair. The skin that stayed fair in winter, yet bronzed with ease in the summer sun.
“Your name is Marceline Béatrice Rousseau,” her father would say whenever she asked about her mother, his brow stern. “That is all anyone need know about you.”
Celine had molded this into a motto by which to live. It did not matter that it left half the pages of her book empty. It did not matter one bit.
“Is this for sale, mademoiselle?” a young woman asked loudly, as if she were addressing an imbecile. Her light brown eyes darted to one of Celine’s lace-embroidered handkerchiefs.
Startled, Celine responded in a curt tone, the words falling from her lips before she could catch them. “I should hope so, or else I have no idea what in hell I’ve been doing here for the last three hours.”
To her left, she heard Anabel gasp and Pippa swallow a snicker. Celine grimaced, then tried to smile while angling her head upward, only to be blinded by a flash of sunlight.
Undeterred by Celine’s rudeness, the girl standing on the opposite side of the rickety table grinned down at her. A jolt of discomfort passed through Celine’s stomach when she took in the full breadth of the young lady’s appearance.
In a word, the girl looked exquisite. Her features were like those of a doll, her brunette head high and proud. Eyes the color of rich honey gazed down at Celine with steady appraisal. At her throat—pinned to a fichu of Valenciennes lace—was a stunning ivory cameo surrounded by rubies. Across her shoulder lay a delicate parasol with a fringe of seed pearls, its rosewood handle engraved with a fleur-de-lis set in the mouth of a roaring lion. It matched well with the girl’s Basque-style bodice, though the entire effect proved a bit outmoded.
The girl let her lace-gloved fingers graze over a handkerchief’s scalloped edging. “This is superb work.”
“Thank you.” Celine inclined her head.
“Reminds me of something I saw the last time I was in Paris.”
It was impossible to miss the excitement on Pippa’s face. “Celine studied under one of the premier couturières there.”
Celine pressed her lips together, cursing her pride. She never should have shared that particular detail with Pippa.
“Which one?” The girl raised her eyebrows at Celine.
“Worth’s,” Celine lied.
“Along Rue de la Paix?”
Celine swallowed. Then nodded. Already she could feel the urge to run from her skin take hold, and she had not even disclosed anything of significance. Nothing that would tie her to the events of that fateful night in the atelier.
“Is that so?” the girl said. Her dainty features set with conviction. “I’ll take them all.” She waved a hand over the handkerchiefs, as though she were casting a spell.
“All?” Anabel sputtered, the ends of her yellow ribbon fluttering in the heavy breeze. “Well, far be it from me to dissuade ye . . . Time and tide waits for no woman, and all that.”
While Anabel collected the handkerchiefs to tally the total, Celine gazed at the girl standing before them, perplexed by the sudden turn of events. Something about her unnerved Celine. Like a memory she should recall. A word lost midsentence. A thought unraveling midair. The young woman allowed Celine’s perusal, her grin growing wider with each passing second.
“If you studied with a couturière, are you able to design gowns?” the girl asked.
Again, Celine nodded. “Mais oui, bien sûr.”
“Merveilleux!” She leaned closer, her eyes glinting like warm chalcedony. “I’ve been struggling with my current modiste, and I’m in desperate need of a costume for the masquerade ball on Mardi Gras next month. The Russian Grand Duke is to be the special guest this year, and I will need something memorable to mark the occasion. Something bright white and reminiscent of the French court before the revolution, I believe.” She wrinkled her nose, as though she were about to share a delicious secret. “Really—despite all the ridiculousness with the pig chasing and the perfume—I do think it was one of the finest times for women’s fashion in recent history, panniers and all.” The girl drummed her gloved fingers along the edge of the wooden table, her head tilted in consideration. “I suppose you would need to measure me in order to begin the process?”