I looked down at it.
“I think this one looks rather simple.”
“It’s a memento of your mother.”
“Evelyn’s mother.”
There were still limits to how far I could play along.
Sera’s hands paused behind my neck for perhaps half a second as she fastened the clasp.
Then she looked at me through the mirror.
“So is yours.”
“Sera, I have a mother.”
“I know. She passed away when you were young.”
Her answer came quietly.
That somehow made it worse.
I stared at her through the mirror with a fierce expression.
“No. My mother is alive.”
Sera’s expression didn’t change.
“Mrs. Gold is alive, yes.”
“Mrs. Gold is my mother.”
“She is Nathan Gold’s mother.”
For several seconds, I genuinely couldn’t think of anything to say.
“And who exactly do you think I am?”
Sera met my eyes in the mirror.
“Evelyn Vale.”
There wasn’t the slightest trace of humour in her voice.
I slowly turned in the chair to face her properly.
“You do understand that Nathan Gold is sitting right in front of you, don’t you?”
“As long as you are in that body, her mother is as good as yours.”
I stared at her.
“That is still a very strange thing to say.”
“Perhaps. But you are wearing her life as thoroughly as you are wearing her body.”
I didn’t particularly like the way she phrased that.
I looked down at the sapphire pendant resting against my chest.
“So what? The woman currently walking around in my body gets my parents now?”
Sera’s gaze softened slightly.
“I didn’t say that.”
“You’re doing a remarkably good impression of it.”
For the first time, she hesitated, then reached up and adjusted the pendant so that the sapphire rested precisely in the center of my chest.
“I am not asking you to stop thinking of Mrs. Gold as your mother.”
I blinked.
That was somehow an even more insane thing to say.
“How generous of you.”
“I only meant that accepting something belonging to Evelyn does not require you to surrender something belonging to Nathan.”
“You could have said that before deciding my mother suddenly belonged to someone else.”
“Perhaps.”
I stared at her.
These women are fucking insane.
And yet, irritatingly, I understood what she was trying to say.
At least I tried to.
I touched the pendant once more.
Evelyn’s mother had apparently given it to her. Whatever game Sera wanted to play with names and bodies, that fact didn’t change.
“Fine. I’ll wear it.”
The watch went around my left wrist, slim and understated compared with the gala jewelry, followed by a narrow bracelet on the other side.
Sera examined the result.
“Good, you look like a proper businesswoman now.”
Ignoring her, I raised both hands.
The sapphire-blue polish on my nails suddenly looked far more deliberate surrounded by the rest of the outfit. Between the earrings, pendant, and my eyes, the color repeated just enough to feel like part of Evelyn rather than a random choice.
“You have always liked the color blue,” Sera said as though she had seen through my expression.
I gave her a flat look.
She remained completely serious, at least outwardly.
I was getting truly tired of this.
“Shoes.”
I looked down at the black heels waiting beside the chair.
Right.
I had almost managed to forget those.
I slipped my feet into them and carefully stood.
The difference from yesterday was immediate. Eight centimetres still changed my posture and shifted my weight forward, but compared with the absurd gala heels, these felt almost reasonable.
Almost.
I took several careful steps.
The pencil skirt limited the length of my stride, the tights changed the way my legs felt against one another, and the heels forced me to place my feet with considerably more care than usual, but none of it was completely unfamiliar anymore.
That realization caught me off guard.
Yesterday, every step in Evelyn’s body had required conscious thought, whereas now I adjusted automatically.
Sera noticed.
“You’re improving.”
“I don’t know whether I should be proud of that.”
“You should be.”
I looked at her.
She said it quietly, without the faint amusement that normally accompanied her comments like that, which for some reason made the words feel heavier.
Before I could think about why, Sera stepped behind me and adjusted the back of my jacket one final time.
“There.”
She moved aside.
“Now look.”
I turned toward the full-length mirror.
For several seconds, I genuinely didn’t know what to say.
The person looking back at me wasn’t the exhausted girl in an evening dress I had first become yesterday, nor was she the strange blonde woman wearing my oversized tank top and shorts.
She was Evelyn Vale.
The black pencil skirt followed the shape of my hips before ending around my knees, the sheer tights giving my legs a smooth dark sheen beneath it. The white blouse was tucked neatly into the high waist, its upper buttons left open enough to reveal a moderate amount of cleavage without making the outfit look remotely casual, while the fitted black jacket sharpened the entire silhouette.
My hair fell in long, polished platinum layers around my shoulders and down my back. The light makeup made my eyes seem cooler and more authoritative, while the sapphire earrings, necklace, and nails gave the otherwise severe black-and-white outfit just enough color to make it unmistakably hers.
Even my posture had changed, partly because of the heels, partly because Sera had spent the last half hour correcting me every time I slouched, and partly because somewhere during all of this, I had apparently started standing the way Evelyn did.
I stared at myself.
Yesterday, I had looked like Evelyn because I was wearing her body.
This was different.
Now I looked like someone who could walk into Vale Group headquarters and actually belong there.