Chapter 1

Then the gallery erupted.

Someone gasped. Someone else laughed. A council clerk dropped a stack of evidence sheets, and the pages slapped across the black stone floor like dead birds.

I stared at Bram's hand around mine.

His thumb had been rubbing the gold engagement ring all morning. Now he twisted it hard enough to cut my skin.

"Take your hand off me," I said.

His grip tightened.

"Don't make this uglier than it already is, Nora."

"You just called me a murderer in front of the whole city. How exactly do you plan to make it prettier?"

He turned toward the council seats, not me. His dark coat fit him perfectly. His hair was combed back. Not one strand out of place.

Bram always looked clean when he ruined someone else's life.

"The evidence is clear," he told the council. "Nora Bell used her curse-reading method to kill Master Hollis. She lied to me, lied to the investigators, and planned to use our engagement to reach the council vaults."

A sharp laugh broke out behind me.

My stomach twisted, but I kept my chin up.

"You forgot the part where you begged me to marry you last night."

Bram finally looked at me.

His eyes were cold now. The man who had kissed me under the archive stairs, who had promised me a home away from council politics, was gone. Or maybe he had never been there.

"I was trying to protect you."

"By holding me down while they searched my office?"

"By giving you one chance to confess."

"You didn't ask for a confession. You handed them my blood report."

The chief examiner raised a gloved hand. "Enough."

I pulled against Bram's grip. The ring scraped my knuckle.

"No," I snapped. "Not enough. He brought forged evidence into this hearing, and everyone here knows it."

The chief examiner's mouth flattened. "Miss Bell, the blood sample bears your seal."

"My seal was stolen."

"From your locked office?"

"Yes."

"And the vault record shows you entered the victim's residence at midnight."

"The vault record was changed."

"By whom?"

I looked straight at Bram.

His thumb stopped moving.

"Ask my fiancé."

The courtroom went quiet again.

Bram's fingers slid from my hand, but only so he could catch my wrist. His nails dug into the pulse point.

"Careful," he murmured.

His voice stayed soft for the crowd. That made it worse.

"You want careful?" I said. "Tell them why your private clerk had access to my evidence room. Tell them why he vanished before dawn. Tell them why your name is on the transfer order."

A council member leaned forward. "Bram?"

Bram did not take his eyes off me.

"She's panicking."

"I'm standing right here."

"You killed Hollis, Nora. You drained the curse from his bones and used his blood to hide your work."

"That's not how my method works, and you know it."

"You taught me enough."

"I taught you how to read residue. You couldn't tell a protection mark from a kitchen burn without me holding your hand."

A few people laughed.

Bram's jaw flexed.

There. That landed.

I saw it in the way his shoulders locked. I saw it in the way his grip shifted from my wrist to the inside of my elbow, where the sleeves hid the bruises he had left two nights ago.

The chief examiner struck the stone table with his seal.

"Miss Bell, you are not on trial for insulting the council."

"No. I'm on trial because the man who wanted my work couldn't steal it without making me look guilty."

Bram stepped closer.

His coat brushed mine. His breath touched the side of my face, warm and bitter with black coffee.

"Say one more word," he whispered, "and I'll tell them about the second victim."

My pulse jumped.

He knew.

Not everything. Not the whole truth. But enough to hurt me.

"You wouldn't," I whispered back.

"Try me."

"You mean the woman who died in your carriage?"

His eyes sharpened.

The pressure on my arm vanished.

I turned toward the council. "Bram Calder was seen leaving the East Gate with a woman named Lysa Vale three nights before Master Hollis died. Her body was found in the river. Her blood carried the same black residue as Hollis's."

The gallery exploded again.

Bram grabbed my shoulder and spun me toward him.

"Shut your mouth."

"Make me."

His hand lifted.

Lucan Thorne caught his wrist before it reached my face.

I had seen Lucan in the courtroom before, always near the Black Seal officers, always dressed in plain black with no council colors on his coat. He never took a seat. He never spoke unless someone forced him to.

Today, he stood three steps behind Bram, one hand locked around Bram's wrist.

His grip looked lazy.

Bram's face said it wasn't.

"Take your hand off her," Lucan said.

His voice was low. No effort. No heat.

That made Bram pull harder.

Lucan didn't move.

"This is a council hearing," Bram snapped. "You're out of place, Thorne."

"Then stop touching the accused."

"She is my fiancée."

Lucan's eyes moved to me.

Gray. Flat. Too observant.

They paused on the red marks around my wrist, then lifted to my face.

"Not anymore," I said.

Bram went still.

The ring felt hot against my finger.

"Nora," he warned.

I ripped my hand from his reach. The stone of the ring caught on his cuff, tearing a thread.

"You rejected me in front of the council," I said. "You don't get to keep the ring."

"Don't be dramatic."

"Dramatic? You brought a death charge to our engagement hearing."

"It was never an engagement hearing. It was an investigation."

"You invited every council family. You had the contract copied in gold ink. You stood beside me and let them toast our future."

"That was before the evidence surfaced."

"No. That was before you thought I was too scared to fight back."

His mouth tightened.

I pulled the engagement contract from the inside pocket of my coat. The paper was folded twice. Bram had signed it that morning. His signature still shone with fresh ink.

I held it up between us.

"You want the council to believe this is all a lie? Fine. Watch."

"Nora, don't."

"You don't get to choose what I do anymore."

I tore the contract down the middle.

The sound cut through the room.

Bram's face changed.

I tore it again. Then again.

One piece landed against his polished shoes. Another stuck to the blood on my knuckle.

"There," I said. "Now you can marry your evidence."

Someone in the gallery whispered my name.

Bram looked at the torn paper. Then at me.

"Do you understand what you've done?"

"I ended a contract you already broke."

"That contract protected you."