Amelie Savard saw Cécilia in passing when she drove her sister Yvette to the LaLaurie House, where she was apparently in on the teenager’s plan to bring over Yvonne and Simmone for the slumber party.

It remains uncertain how much Cécilia knew regarding her sisters’ malicious intentions towards Amelie or their family’s agreement with the Whitneys, which did not allow for additional guests. Most people aware of the full story imagine that Cécilia regretted not putting a stop to things earlier after the ‘accidents’ Amelie and Emil Kane suffered that led to the girls’ arrests. Cécilia’s sisters subsequently called her and their mother from the Eighth District police station to bail them out of trouble. Cécilia was unable to reach Abélia or their family lawyer at the late hour and did the next-best thing by calling Luke, who brought in his almost-lawyer sister Caroline.

Cécilia still could not do much more than watch as her sisters were formally booked and strip-searched by NOPD, but offered them what comfort she could. She was coldly furious at the treatment they endured and promised that the responsible officers would be held to account for their actions later. She was exceedingly grateful for Caroline’s damage control efforts, who got the girls lawyers and had her uncle Carson (a criminal judge) get the warrants pulled. When her mother and Superintendent Bernard Drouillard arrived to finish sweeping the matter swept under the rug, she did not raise any objection to Drouillard blaming the recovered LSD (which Yvette had intended to drug Amelie with) on Amelie.

Caroline next saw Cécilia at Tulane Medical Center following Yvonne’s and Sarah’s shooting by Richard Gettis. The two conferred over how events had played out and should proceed from there. Cécilia believed all parties shared some degree of responsibility, but that that the majority of it lay with Gettis and Amelie. Cécilia was lukewarm at the thought of not pressing legal authorities (now eager to stay on the aggrieved Devillers and Whitney families’ good sides) to throw the book at Amelie. She relented when Caroline raised how the girl’s aunt Christina Roberts could drag the matter to a public trial, and agreed that a reduced sentence for Amelie would be preferable to putting her sisters through another ordeal—even if, she’d added, Yvette might actually relish a trial. She agreed to sell Caroline’s idea to her mother was apparently successful in doing so, as Abélia did not contest the deal Caroline negotiated with Roberts.

After Emmett Delacroix lost his legs in the Dungeon, he remembered back to better times during a charity gala hosted by Cécilia that he’d talked his way into. He convinced Mercurial “Mouse” Fernandez to seek out Cécilia for assistance in raising the funds necessary to pay off his considerable legal bills.

Mouselooked up Cécilia’s landline number and called her for advice on hosting a charity event in Em’s name. Cécilia was somewhat off-put by the young man’s enthusiastic demeanor, but advised him that hosting events can be expensive and recommended starting a GoFundMe page and hosting a donation drive among friends and family.

Giving that advice would also be to Cécilia’s regret: Mouse thought it was such good advice that he followed her back to her apartment and began singing a love song outside her door. An alarmed Cécilia promptly called the building’s security, who beat Mouse senseless and turned him over to NOPD for trespassing, setting the musician on a collision course of events that would ultimately claim his life. Cécilia filed a temporary restraining order with Carson Malveaux (Caroline’s judge uncle) and spent the following nights at Luke’s apartment, as she no longer felt safe at her own. The couple remained uncertain how Mouse had managed to get inside her building in the first place.

Caroline ran into Cécilia and Luke at the Orpheum Theater. Her brother’s girlfriend coyly deduced that Caroline appeared to be in love, declaring that “a woman without love wilts like a flower without sun—and yet your flower would seem in full bloom. Who is your sun, I must wonder?” Luke wryly added that he’d learned there is “no fooling a Frenchwoman when it comes to romance”. Caroline refrained from confirming Cécilia’s suspicion, but enjoyed a pleasant conversation with the two that was marred by news of Mouse’s harassment. Cécilia feared for her safety and hired ex-SEAL Daniel Hayes as a bodyguard at Caroline’s recommendation.

Cécilia was staying over at Luke’s when they received a phone call from Carson that Mouse was dead,, having stabbed his cellmate in Orleans Parish Prison to death before expiring from his own injuries. Cécilia took no pleasure in the news, but admitted she was relieved she wouldn’t have to see Mouse at the required court hearing to get a restraining order. Luke proposed she accompany him on a business trip to Saudi Arabia to take her mind off things, which she happily accepted.

Cécilia attended Westley Malveaux’s funeral alongside Luke, who found comfort in her arms as he grieved for his brother. Cécilia and Caroline spoke in passing, but the Ventrue was in little mood for conversation.

Caroline saw Cécilia again at the considerably happier Commander’s Palace dinner to celebrate the recoveries of Yvonne Devillers and Sarah Whitney, who were finally both able to resume school. Luke and Cécilia had grown quite close by this time, buoyed by the many hardships and tragedies their families had faced together. They mentioned they’d still taken that trip to Riyadh together, and had pretended to be husband and wife when checking in at their hotel—Roger Ferris had advised them that cohabiting unmarried couples could draw unwelcome attention in the Middle East. Luke surprised everyone by proposing to Cécilia at the end of the evening, though she surprised no one by answering yes. Their families immediately began making plans for a lavish wedding.

Cécilia attended Caroline’s 26th birthday party along with four of her siblings. Yvette mentioned that Cécilia was hurt over how their youngest sister Simmone had developed separation anxiety in the aftermath of the Eighth District station shooting and no longer felt safe around her. The Ventrue’s efforts made Simmone’s first social outing without her mother a success, which Cécilia was deeply grateful for. Yvette and Yvonne also confided in Caroline that Abélia had entrusted many of her darkest secrets to her eldest daughter, including the fact of her rape. The sisters bore no ill will over the fact their mother had not told them this (they’d eavesdropped), citing that Cécilia was the “oldest and smartest.”

When Yvette Devillers subsequently visited Emmett Delacroix on death throw, he taunted her with the revelation of a high school relationship he’d had with Cécilia. The condemned grifter had arranged for Westley Malveaux to sexually harass their sister Adeline at a school dance, which he won Cécilia’s gratitude by “saving” Adeline from. Emmett used that window to insert himself into Cécilia’s life with the goal of seducing her before inexplicably disappearing. He has yet to relay the sordid tale’s conclusion to Yvette.

To come.

Caroline heard occasional bits of news from Cécilia and her mother about how the planned wedding was coming along. Everyone seemed to expect that Luke and Cécilia were going to have children soon, which Cécilia admitted she could understand their eagerness over—both families had seen so much tragedy.

Cécilia invited Caroline over to the Devillers family home for Christmas after she was disowned by her family. The Ventrue discovered during an audience with Abélia that Cécilia knew the truth about the world, which she explained thusly: “Maman told me about your Embrace in September. I’d wanted to reach out to you, what with saving my sisters’ lives before you seemed to fall off the map. But Maman believed you needed… time. Time to deal with things in your own way. Time to learn how the Camarilla’s Masquerade worked, before you saw the… exceptions.”

Caroline remained deeply unnerved by Cécilia’s mother and confounded as to what manner of entity she even was beyond something terribly, terribly dark. Caroline felt she had let the Devillers matriarch taint her mind and poison her soul—yet, at the knowledge that she could finally stop lying around her future sister-in-law, the weary Ventrue could not help but feel relieved.

Following Caroline’s murder of Claire Malveaux, Abélia welcomed the newly-motherless young woman into their family with open arms—as did Cécilia, who was overjoyed to count Caroline among her sisters. The Ventrue, in turn, felt truly loved and accepted among her new family for the first time she could ever recall.

To come.