She wondered what they would do to her, if they ever found out why she and her mom were really here. Her grip on her purse tightened until her knuckles cracked. She knew the answer: they would destroy her with the same ruthless elegance that made up the rest of their lives.

Mrs. Fuller glanced belatedly around the room, then set the boxes down as she registered Calliope’s presence. “Calliope, my dear! Elizabeth Fuller. How lovely to meet you.”

“Thank you so much for having me,” Calliope said.

Mrs. Fuller just smiled and nodded. “Where’s Avery?” she asked her husband and son.

Mr. Fuller moved to the couch and leaned back, one ankle crossed over the other knee. “Who knows?” he mused, seeming unconcerned. Atlas stayed oddly silent.

“Well, then, which do you think that I should wear?” Mrs. Fuller went on, returning to the gleaming white side table where she’d placed the two velvet boxes with their priceless contents. After a moment, Calliope realized that the question had been directed at her.

Her mouth felt suddenly dry; her eyes flicking back and forth between the showstopping gems, both sets of which probably belonged in a museum, rather than on a wealthy socialite’s earlobes. “The clear ones,” she decided, finally. “The pink are a little heavy with your dress.”

Mrs. Fuller turned her plain but expertly made-up face back and forth, studying her reflection in an insta-mirror that had materialized out of nowhere.

“You’re right,” she concurred. “But someone should wear the pink ones. It would be a waste not to.”

Calliope could never in her wildest imaginings have anticipated what happened next. To her complete and utter shock, Mrs. Fuller held out the earrings—toward her. “Do you want to try them, Calliope?” she offered.

Calliope opened her mouth, but no sound came out. “Oh, I don’t know,” she finally stammered, though she could practically hear her mom’s voice in her ears, hissing at her to stop stalling and take the damned earrings. She’d just been too surprised to react properly.

Mrs. Fuller smiled. “They would look striking against your hair. Stones this color have to be worn by us brunettes, you know.” She gave a little wink, as if she and Calliope were allies against an army of diamond-stealing blondes, and dropped the earrings onto Calliope’s bare palm as easily as if they’d been a couple of chocolate candies.

This couldn’t be real. People didn’t act this way on their own, unbidden. Calliope thought of all the times she’d been given expensive things in her life, always by boys who were trying to get into her pants, and then only after a great deal of persuasion and manipulation, of dropped hints and innuendos and excruciatingly thoughtful conning. Yet here was Atlas’s mom, offering up the most expensive, exquisite items Calliope had ever laid eyes on, without any sort of prompting at all.

Calliope didn’t understand. She’d only met the woman five minutes ago. Maybe Atlas’s judgment of her character was good enough for Mrs. Fuller, she thought uneasily. Or maybe the Fullers were genuinely nice people.

Her mind flashed to that waitress at the Nuage; to the old man in India; to poor adoring Tomisen, Brice’s friend, whom she’d taken a “loan” from and left without a backward glance. They had all trusted her, and she’d cheerfully turned around and violated that trust. Maybe they had been genuinely nice people too.

Calliope wouldn’t know, because she’d never stuck around long enough to find out.

She felt shame rise up in her throat as if it were a physical thing, horrible and blocky, like that time she’d tried to swallow one of Mrs. Houghton’s rings and almost choked on it. What on earth have you been doing? her mom had screamed, giving her six-year-old shoulders a little shake.

What on earth had she been doing all these years? Calliope thought, as some core part of her worldview began to crumble. She felt like she was looking at herself from the outside in, as if she were seeing herself through someone else’s contacts. It made her dizzy.

Somehow, mechanically, she unscrewed her own small drops and fastened the spectacular pink diamonds into her ears. “They’re beautiful. Thank you,” she whispered, leaning toward the insta-mirror. The stones were radiant against the smooth curve of her cheek. She wanted them and she hated herself for taking them and she couldn’t look away from them.

The doorbell rang, and everyone momentarily forgot Calliope as a sudden influx of people poured into the room. The hum of voices grew louder, all of them laughing and complimenting and greeting one another.

“Flicker to Mom,” she whispered, turning aside, and closed her eyes against the dizziness as she began to compose under her breath. “Mom, you’ll never guess what I’m wearing.” Forget Nadav; they would have to leave in the middle of the party, catch a flight down to South America. These earrings would set them up for several years, at least.

She couldn’t finish the sentence. Calliope knew this was her chance, the kind of opportunity that would come along only once in a lifetime, and yet here she was, freezing up like a complete newbie.

“Callie,” Atlas said as he pushed his way toward her, and Calliope let out a strange sigh of relief. She would finish the message later. “A few of my friends are here. I’d love for you to meet them.” He nodded toward the entry hall, which was becoming even more packed, filled with teenagers and adults in their perfectly creased tuxes and elegant black or white gowns.

Calliope had always loved moments like this; glamorous and expensive, money softening the edges of it all. But looking at all the people gathered at the Fullers’, she felt strangely bereft. These weren’t her friends, this wasn’t her laughter and gossip, and this certainly wasn’t her boyfriend standing next to her. She was just borrowing the whole scene the way she was borrowing the pink diamond earrings.

And this time, she knew, the eventual moment of reckoning was going to hurt.

“Of course,” she said to Atlas with a forced smile. “Lead the way.” She gave her head a little toss as she followed him, feeling the heavy weight of the earrings that she no longer wanted to steal.

She would let herself indulge this fantasy—would pretend that she was a normal girl, at a party with a cute boy in a tux—for just a little bit longer.

WATT

WATT STUDIED THE party, which swirled and flowed wildly around him, with unabashed astonishment.

A black-and-white parquet dance floor sprawled on each side of the canal, reminding Watt of a shining chessboard. A hundred languages fell discordantly on his ears, too many people speaking at once for Nadia to even bother translating. Above him soared the two massive towers of The Mirrors, rising up into the darkness to new dazzling heights.

For the first time, Watt felt like he finally understood the name; this was like a dream city, full of mirrors and reflections. Every last detail on one of the towers—every archway, every glittering square of glass, every curve in the railing of a balcony—had been cunningly doubled on the other side, in alabaster carbonite or smooth dark nyostone. Even the movements of the serving staff seemed choreographed to echo one another across the expanse of the canal.

Everywhere Watt looked were women in black or white gowns, men in designer tuxes. There wasn’t a single stitch of color in the whole evening, not even the bright red of a cherry at the bar. The effect was striking, like a work of art—as if Watt had stepped into one of those old two-dimensional holos where everything was rendered in shades of gray.

Nadia, what do you think Cynthia meant by all that, earlier? He hadn’t been able to stop thinking about the way she’d asked him to stay—and kissed him. What would he do when he saw her again? He felt a feverish anxiety at the thought, guilt and confusion roiling through him all at once.

“You know what it meant, Watt,” Nadia replied, whispering the words into his eartennas.

Watt was startled into alertness. Nadia sounded accusatory. Did I do something wrong?

“All I know is that the situation has changed, and that it’s becoming increasingly difficult for me to anticipate the outcome.”

Girls are always complicated, he thought, a bit resentfully.

“People aren’t like tech, Watt. They aren’t predictable, and they malfunction far more readily.”