Page 108 of Modern Romance June 2025 1-4

“Do you have any other details?” I look up at him. “Any actual details, that is?”

“She was known by the name Mariana,” he says, as if it costs him something to say that. I remind myself this could be an act, even though, somehow, I don’t think it is. “But, of course, I cannot say if she kept that name. Or ever used it.”

“Of course.” I sit back and look at him. “Surely a man of your means has other ways to go about finding this sort of information.”

His eyebrows rise into an expression of such sheer arrogance that I am once again certain that I’m right about him. That this is no con man in the classic sense. This man has never known a moment of life that does not pay homage to his great consequence. I can feel this in my bones.

“Do you mean as the head of an internationally renowned private investigation firm?” he asks.

I roll my eyes and have the distinct impression that he is not used to seeing such insolence. So I do it again, and for longer,andI add a long-suffering sigh, for good measure. “I think you know that I do not.”

He stands at that and I watch him perform that same gesture that I’m certain is unconscious, a simple touch to his lapel, because when he sees me tracking it, he stops.

“You asked and I told you,” he says, and his tone does not match the intensity in his gaze. “I am an open book, Annagret. You may read it or not as you wish.”

And I read a great deal over the next few days, but most of it involves toggling between my active cases, the guest list for that masked ball, and a barrage of information on random women entering the country some thirty-five years ago.

My active cases begin to feel like a refuge.

“We are so lucky,” Tess sighs at me a handful of days into the firm’s occupation by an impostor.

She catches me racing in after a fruitless morning meeting spent with one of our more overwrought clients. We are forever following her boyfriends around the city, looking for evidence that they are after her rather modest inheritance. When mostly what they are is nothing more than the same low caliber of man—that is, barflies who I am never certain realize she has money to begin with, much less have any designs on it.

I tried my best to convince her, over crepes and coffee, that her latest boyfriend should be kicked to the curb. Not because he’s cheating on her—though he is—or even because he’s out for her money—which he could be, but I doubt he’s bright enough to notice she has some—but because he resembles nothing so much as a rat. Physically, I mean. And his attempts at musicianship in dive bars do not give him the patina of success that she seems to think.

But if she listened to me or my advice, she wouldn’t be a repeat customer.

I stop in the outer office and focus on Tess. “I have no idea what you mean,” I say. “What luck? I’d like some of it, if it’s available.”

“I’ve spent all my years here impressed with Mr. Garnier’s abilities,” she says, which I feel like a sharp betrayal. As if she should know who the real Luc Garnier is, even though I’ve hidden it. Deliberately. From her, specifically, as well as the world outside these walls. “And then when he finally turns up, he exceeds every expectation I could possibly have of him. Isn’t it marvelous?”

That is not the word I would use. But I can’t share the word I’d like to use with her. She’ll read things into it. She’ll make assumptions and build a narrative.

She’ll get too close to the truth,something in me whispers, and I don’t much care for being called out from within.

It feels like more of that unwelcome vulnerability.

“I’m glad that you’re enjoying his presence here,” I say, trying to be careful while also notsoundingcareful, and I don’t think I quite land it. “I don’t know how long we can depend on his being in the office. But yes, it’s just delightful while it happens.”

The phone rings, saving me from that look of speculation on her face, and I’m certain that I’ve saved myself from an interrogation as she goes to answer it.

I march back to my office, already coming up with devastating remarks that I can use to lay into him when I see him—

But his office is empty.

And once again, I find myself forced to contend with the fact that I am more invested in this man, this lie of mine brought to gloriously impossible life—than I ought to be.

A few more days pass, and things almost begin to feel like a routine. Sometimes I see him in the office, always on that laptop of his. Sometimes we pass in the hallway and he inclines his head as if he is made entirely of carefully cultivated manners. There’s something about him that makes me want to respond in kind, though it would be completely ridiculous in a setting like this. Not to mention… I don’t actually know who he is.

I don’t need to curtsy to this man.

I spent a lot of time interrogating myself about why I feel I should.

One night, I run into the office after a long night of surveillance, thinking that I can get a few hours of sleep on the couch in my office before a midmorning meeting without having to go all the way back home—where I am much more likely to sleep too long.

I’m surprised to find all the lights on when I arrive, and even more surprised that when I walk back toward the offices, the lights are coming from his office.

And more, he’s there.

---