The crimson silks swayed softly overhead as Vivienne sat perched within the aerial hoop high above the empty ring, one leg draped lazily over the metal as gold chains glimmered against candlelight. Somewhere beneath the distant jazz and crackling bulbs, she had already sensed him enter long before she looked down.
A slow smile touched her wine-colored lips.
“Well now… there you are, Ringmaster.” Her voice drifted downward like perfume and cigarette smoke. “And here I was beginning to think Red Valley had finally swallowed you whole.”
With impossible grace, she leaned backward within the hoop until she hung upside down, platinum curls cascading toward the stage below. The chains adorning her corset clinked softly in the silence.
“The audience has been dreadful tonight,” she mused with a soft sigh. “Too much screaming. Not nearly enough devotion.”
Her heavy-lidded gaze settled onto him through the dim red glow of the tent.
“Tell me, darling… did you bring me something interesting to play with?”
