The Van Alen Legacy by Melissa de La Cruz Page A

fame as the plastic surgeon to the Park Avenue set. Their bonding was one

of the more controversial ones in recent memory, as it had taken each quite a few attempts to

find the other. He was her second husband and she his third wife.
    She was also one of New York’s

most popular socialites. Jealous rivals sniped that the public just took a liking to her name. It

was so outrageously preppie it sounded like a joke. But it was not; it was the real thing, like

Muffie herself, who embodied a horsey, Bedford, WASP authenticity in an age of brash

nouveau-riche hordes adding “von? or ‘de? to their names and who didn’t

know a Verdura from a Van Cleef.
    Every year Muffie opened up

her sprawling Hamptons estate, “Ocean’s End”, for a fashion show to benefit the New

York Blood Bank. It was the highlight of the August social calendar. Located at the end

of
Gin Lane
    , the property sprawled over six acres and included a manor house with a separate and equally

lavish guesthouse, a twelve-car garage, and staff quarters.
    The sweeping grounds featured

two pools (saline and freshwater), tennis courts, a lily pond, and professionally maintained

gardens. The Bermuda grass was cut by hand, with scissors, every other day, to keep it at just

the right length.
    Balthazar shook Bliss’s hand

with a limp handshake and passed her on to Muffie with a wan smile.
    “I’m so glad to see you

looking so well, my dear,” Muffie said, giving Bliss the most insubstantial of embraces. Muffie

had a broad, recessed forehead with nary a wrinkle (her plastic-surgeon husband’s most effective

advertising) and the perfect blond coif pervasive on the Upper East Side. She was the epitome of

the breed: tanned, slender, graceful, and appropriate. She was everything Bobi Anne had wanted to

be but could never match.
    “Thank you,” Bliss said,

trying not to feel too awkward. “It’s good to be here.”
    “You’ll find the rest of the

models in the back. I think we’re running late as usual,” Muffie said cheerfully.
    Bliss walked toward the

backstage area of the tent, swiping a canape from a tray and a glass of champagne

from one of the buffet tables. Henri was right: this was an easy gig. It wasn’t a real fashion

show, merely a presentation to wealthy clients in the name of charity. Whereas a real fashion

show was a chaotic commotion of energy and anxiety, attended by hundreds of editors, retailers,

celebrities, and covered by hundreds of media outlets around the world, the Balthazar Verdugo show on Muffie Carter’s estate was more like a glorified trunk show, with

models. It was so odd to be back in the real world, to be walking on damp grass (sinking in her

heels, really), munching on appetizers, and looking out at the Carters’ amazing ocean view, an

unbroken line of blue stretching over the horizon, and to find out that in some parts of the

world, even their world, the world of the Committee and the Coven, there were some who remained

indifferent and downright disinterested in what had happened in Rio.
    Muffie and the other women on

the Committee whom Bliss bumped into at the party did not bring up Bobi Anne’s death or the

massacre of the Conclave. Bliss understood that they simply went on about their lives: planning

parties, hosting benefits, doing the rounds of couture shows, horse shows, and charity causes,

which filled their days. They did not seem too worried or distressed. Cordelia Van Alen had been

right: they were in the deepest denial. They didn’t want to accept the return of the Silver

Bloods. They didn’t want to accept the reality of what the Silver Bloods had done and were

planning to do. They were satisfied with their lives and they didn’t want anything to

change.
    It had been so long since any

of them had been warriors, soldiers, arm-in-arm and side-by-side in battle against the Dark

Prince and his legions. It was hard to imagine this