Chapter 1 - Elisse #2
They laughed as we clinked glasses, hands steady as I took another sip of the gold liquid. It burned lightly as it slid down my throat, my courage increasing, and my heart beat finally began to slow down.
I let myself breathe, stepping towards the dance floor at once.
Mila and Zhenya followed after me, the three of us beginning to dance.
None of us had come here in search of a man, especially Mila and Zehnya, since the two of them were already in rather happy relationships.
I simply wasn’t looking for one. I had no desire to handle the complications that inevitably come along with dating as a Chernykh. I just wanted to have a good time.
For once, I wasn’t calculating exits or monitoring who entered the room. I let the music guide me, hips swaying with the rhythm, silk panels of my gown shifting around my legs like smoke. Zhenya spun beside me, laughing freely. Mila matched the beat with understated grace.
The anonymity changed everything.
I wasn’t Elisse Chernykh. I was just a woman in gold silk. And I liked her. After a while, we drifted toward the edge of the dance floor, slightly breathless.
“Look at that mask,” Mila murmured, nodding subtly toward a man wearing something that looked carved from obsidian, sharp edges framing his jaw.
“Too theatrical,” I said. “He’s compensating.”
Zhenya snorted. “You can’t analyze people’s insecurities based on their accessories.”
“I absolutely can.”
My gaze moved across the room again, drinking in detail after detail. A couple argued quietly near the bar, the woman’s gown stunning but poorly fitted at the waist. A man with emerald cufflinks clearly trying too hard to appear unbothered.
That is when I saw him. Not because he was flashy. Not because he was loud.
But because he was still.
Amid movement and color and music, he stood like a shadow carved into the wall.
Tall and broad-shouldered, he was dressed in a perfectly tailored black suit that made no effort to draw attention and yet somehow still did.
His mask was a simple matte black with clean lines.
It had no embellishments and no grandeur to it.
It almost seemed as if he didn’t even want to try.
The mask covered the upper half of his face, leaving a strong jaw visible, the faint shadow of stubble catching in the light.
His dark hair was slightly disheveled in a way that looked unintentional and entirely deliberate at the same time.
He stood effortlessly, as if the ticking of time had no effect on whatever it was that was going through his mind.
The glass of scotch in his right hand was steady, and he elegantly took it towards his lush pink lips and took a sip.
I continued watching, noticing how he wasn’t even talking to anyone. He wasn’t even dancing or pretending to socialize. He was simply watching everyone before his gaze shifted and landed directly on me.
It took me a few seconds to snap out of my stupor and realize he was watching me.
The man I had been staring at shamelessly was now giving me the entirety of his attention, and my heartbeat accelerated once again.
I didn’t know what to do. Or how to breathe.
Or how to react in the situation. It felt wrong.
But it felt right at the same time. My own feelings confused me.
The worst part of it all was that I was enjoying the intensity of his gaze on me.
The realization slid over my skin like cold water.
I didn’t look away immediately. Something in me refused to.
I noticed how his posture didn’t change when our eyes met.
He didn’t nod or smirk and didn’t even signal recognition.
He was simply there. Still cold and unbothered except for his dark, dark eyes.
Even from across the room, the intensity in them burned my skin in ways I had forgotten skin could be burned.
Something about the whole thing made me want to turn around and run away, but I stayed rooted to the spot, my body refusing to move.
The air between us shifted.
It felt like standing too close to a live wire.
“Are you okay, Elle? You look like you have seen a ghost.” Zhenya asked quietly, noticing my focus.
I nodded, my eyes still on the stranger across from us. Zhenya and Mila looked at me with confusion, following my line of sight with their own eyes when they finally saw exactly what, or more appropriately, who I was staring at.
“Do you know him?” Mila asked.
I didn’t answer. I just shook my head no.
“Well, with the way the two of you are staring at each other, I think you need to get to maybe dance with him,” Zhenya said, a short laugh escaping her lips. “I don’t recognize him either, so he is probably just a harmless stranger.”
“We don’t know everyone who is a Chernykh enemy, Zhenya,” I replied, my mind already plotting a thousand different ways this could go wrong.
“Well, the good thing is, you are not a Chernykh tonight,” Mila interjected, talking some sense into me.
She was right. I was not a Chernykh tonight. I was simply me. And a part of me wanted this man who was staring at me in a way that made me feel as if he would consume me entirely and burn me with the fire that was evident in his eyes.
My decision was made.