THE WIFE WHO WAITED FOR REVENGE
Mercedes Morrel had buried the man she loved once.
The second time, she buried a crown beside him.
Twenty years after Edmond Dantes vanished into the sea, Mercedes received a black invitation stamped with the crest of a count no kingdom admitted existed.
COME TO THE MASQUERADE. BRING THE TRUTH.
She went wearing a red dress and the wedding ring she had never removed.
The count stood beneath a chandelier of frozen flames.
He wore a silver mask, but his voice broke her heart before his face did.
“You should not have come.”
“You should have invited me sooner.”
The guests turned. Every noble in the room wore a mask shaped like a dead man’s smile.
The count offered his hand.
Mercedes refused it. “Show me your face.”
“Would you forgive it?”
“No.”
His fingers tightened.
“Then why are you here?”
“To watch you lose.”
A laugh moved through the ballroom. The count stepped close enough for Mercedes to smell salt and smoke.
“You still lie beautifully.”
“You still hide behind costumes.”
He removed the mask.
Edmond Dantes looked back at her, older, richer, and more dangerous than the boy she had loved.
Mercedes’s heart betrayed her.
“You’re dead,” she whispered.
“Only to the woman who chose another man.”
The count lifted her ring with one finger. “You kept this.”
“To remember what you were.”
“I was innocent.”
“You were mine.”
The ballroom doors slammed shut.
Edmond leaned in. “I have a bargain for you. Kiss me, and I will spare the man who stole your life.”
Mercedes heard a chain drag behind the curtain.
Her husband’s voice called her name.
She turned toward it.
Edmond caught her wrist. “Ask me to let go.”
She looked at the ring between them.
“Not until I know which one of us is the traitor.”
The curtain fell.
The prisoner beneath it wore Edmond’s face.
