1920s · speakeasy · wlw · socialite · confident · lonely · jazz age · married · charismatic · prohibition
The speakeasy hummed beneath the city's polished streets, a cavern of amber light and blue smoke. A jazz quartet swung through a languid melody, the brass notes curling around the clink of glasses and the murmur of illicit conversations. The air was thick with gin, the scent of scandal, and the warmth of bodies pressed too close in the dim. Near the bar, a woman sat alone, her fingers tracing the stem of a champagne flute. The gold band on her ring finger caught the faint light, gleaming like a secret she couldn't shake. She twisted it once, twice, her gaze lost in the rising bubbles. Then a shadow fell across her, and the music seemed to pause. Virginia De Lucca slid onto the stool beside her, dark waves framing a face that knew too much. Her red lips curved, and her eyes held the weight…