Madame Sterling stepped closer, the massive diamonds at her throat glittering like ice. “Who allowed you near this table?” she hissed, her tone dripping with aristocratic poison. “A clean uniform does not make you one of us.”
Elara blinked, dipping her chin in feigned submission. “Excuse me.”
“Don’t speak,” Madame Sterling snapped, aggressively raising her palm inches from Elara’s face. “You should be grateful you’re allowed into this hall at all.”
Before the matriarch could sneer again, a breathless palace guardsman shoved through the silk-clad crowd. He bypassed Sterling entirely, dropping into a frantic, rigid bow before the gray-clad maid. “Your Grace! I searched the entire palace for you.” He gestured wildly at the silver tray. “Your Highness, why are you carrying this yourself?”
The ballroom’s ambient chatter died instantly. Madame Sterling froze, her hand still suspended mid-air. Her jaw went slack, eyes bulging in pure, unadulterated horror. “Your… Highness?” she stammered, trembling like a dead leaf.
Elara’s docile mask evaporated. Her spine snapped straight, her gaze turning to polished steel. “I was testing this court,” she decreed, her voice ringing with icy, terrifying authority. She raised a hand, pointing a single, unforgiving finger at the shattered matriarch. “You failed. Escort her out of my palace.”
As two more guards seized the hyperventilating Madame Sterling and dragged her toward the grand exit, the first guardsman leaned close to Elara, his lips barely moving.
“Flawless execution, Boss,” he murmured, seamlessly slipping Madame Sterling’s multi-million dollar diamond collar onto Elara’s tray, perfectly concealed beneath a linen napkin. It had been unclasped in the manufactured chaos.
“Get the getaway van ready, Marcus,” Elara whispered back, a wicked smirk ghosting her lips. “The real Princess gets back from Monaco in exactly twelve minutes.”