paintbrushesandiratzes:
Adele Fairchild’s grip on Jocelyn’s wrist was almost painful as the older woman escorted her daughter down to the festivities. Her mother was dressed in a classy bronze dress that highlighted the flecks of amber in her chocolate eyes. Her pale red hair was braided expertly and it fell across her shoulder in a thick rope. Adele looked sharp and fierce, like she had always looked. A kind of refined sophistication seemed to ooze from her. Whereas her daughter was the opposite.
The dress she had picked out with Lucian hugged her chest tightly. When she had taken a glance at herself before she left her room, Jocelyn had been pleasantly surprised to see that she actually looked as though she had breasts in this dress. The deep, bloody crimson offset her dark auburn curls to perfection which were currently piled high on her head, held together with all kinds of intricate pins. In her heels, Jocelyn stood an entire head taller than her mother, which had put a sour expression on Adele’s impassive face. Lacy dark gloves were pulled up to the middle of her upper arms and black diamond drop earrings glittered around her face. Her lips had been swathed in blood red color and she felt them slipping against each other every time she pressed them together. The Fairchild ring was glinting dully on her slender ring finger, a familiar weight in an unfamiliar time. And she mustn’t forget the intricate fishnet tights pressed against the pale flesh of her legs.
“You look ridiculous,” Adele muttered in her daughter’s ear as they reached the marble staircase that would drop them in the center of the party.
“You should see Celine Bellefleur’s dress,” Jocelyn smirked. “Then you’ll be calling me meek.” Her mother’s mouth pressed into a thin line of muted rage.
“You are representing the Fairchild family tonight, buttercup,” she murmured sweetly, resorting to the old pet name in an obvious attempt to guilt her daughter into submission. “Make your mother proud?” Jocelyn gave her mother a wide smile, her teeth glittering like pearls against the bright crimson of her lips. She curtseyed low, her hands bunching in the plush material of her skirt.
“Don’t I always?” she purred, sarcasm dripping from her every word. She pressed a hot kiss to her mother’s cheek before hitching up her dress and gliding down the marble stairs.
He didn’t care much for these parties. Often, he found them tedious and a bore. Simply another way for their families to show off their wealth — something many of them had much of. The Fairchilds, Valentine thought to himself, were a lovely family. At least the generation that threw this party. He couldn’t say many good things about the one that attended the Academy and was a year below his.
No, Valentine had done far too much thinking when it came to Jocelyn Fairchild. She was insolent, pig-headed and he kept insisting to himself that he was bored with her. If he said it enough, he thought it may actually come true — but, so far, it had not. He found his mind wandering to the girl when his tired mind rested at the end of the night. He found himself scouring the hallways for the lovely copper colored hair she possessed. By the Angel, he found himself asking Lucian about the girl.
There was something truly and deeply wrong with him.
He felt sick about her! She was often insulting him and always had an angry glare or a beautiful, clever retort that slipped past those soft-looking rose colored lips. Valentine swallowed just thinking about them now.
Leaning against the doorframe, he took a sip of his drink — careful not to spill any against his half-mask. The mask itself, understated and sharp, portrayed a raven. He though of Hugin and Munin when he had bought it. It complimented his black suit. The shirt he wore underneath was not a wine color, but a crimson red that looked like dark blood under the soft lighting in the Fairchild manor. His long tie was an even darker red, matching his shirt and suit.
Turning, he felt his lips curl upwards in an unconscious, nearly soft expression. By Raziel, those were those auburn curls he dreamt about attached to a silly little girl he wanted to forget about. Silently, he watched her.
His fate was sealed.
He was damned and it was all Jocelyn Fairchild’s doing.
