Jackson stepped back inside the private lounge, and the change hit him immediately. The music had softened to something low and forgettable.
Most of the guests had drifted away, leaving behind empty glasses and half-eaten appetizers on scattered tables.
The warm golden lights that had once bathed Natasha in an angelic glow now seemed dimmer, quieter, as if the room itself was winding down.
And there she sat.
Natasha.
Alone on the velvet couch, her white dress pooling around her like spilled milk, her delicate hands wrapped around a glass of juice she hadn't touched.
Her gaze was distant, dazed and fixed on nothing. Or perhaps fixed on the way the orange liquid caught the light. She looked exhausted, yes, but even exhaustion looked graceful on her. The slight droop of her shoulders, the way her dark lashes rested against her pale cheeks, the soft pout of her lips as she stared blankly ahead.
Cute.
He stood there for a moment, just watching her, feeling something warm and dangerous spread through his veins.
She wasn't trying to be beautiful. That was the thing about Natasha. She simply was. No effort, no makeup, no tight dresses or desperate smiles. Just her. Perfect, fragile, pure her.
He approached slowly, his footsteps muffled by the thick carpet.
"Are you okay?" he asked, his voice coming out gentle. The way he never quite managed to speak to Fiona. "I'll take you home."
Natasha lifted her gaze to his, those dark eyes swimming with something unreadable. Fatigue, maybe, or surprise at his tenderness. She nodded without speaking, and Jackson felt his heart clench at her silent obedience, her quiet trust.
His eyes flashed with something he didn't name.
***
The drive began in silence.
Jackson gripped the steering wheel, his knuckles pale against the leather, his jaw tight enough to ache. Beside him, Natasha sat quietly, her hands folded in her lap, her profile illuminated by the soft glow of passing streetlights. She looked like a painting. Still, serene, beautiful in a way that made his chest hurt.
Neither of them spoke. The only sounds were the hum of the engine and the occasional sigh of air through the vents.
But Jackson's mind was screaming.
Every thought circled back to the same place. Fiona. The wedding. Tomorrow. The weight of obligation pressing down on his shoulders like a physical thing. He was supposed to marry her. He was supposed to stand at an altar and promise forever to a woman he didn't love, didn't desire, didn't even particularly like.
And Natasha was sitting right beside him.
Natasha, who made his heart race. Natasha, who haunted his dreams. Natasha, who was everything Fiona wasn't. Graceful, delicate, effortlessly captivating. The sister he actually wanted.
His teeth sank into his lower lip, hard enough to taste copper.
Then, without warning, he pulled the car toward a secluded area. A quiet overlook, dark and private, where no one would see them. The tires crunched against gravel as he stopped the engine.
Natasha turned to him, her eyes wide with surprise.
"Jack?" she said softly, her voice barely above a whisper. Confusion flickered across her perfect features.
Jackson turned in his seat to face her fully. The moonlight fell across his face, illuminating the conflict in his eyes. The desperation, the longing, the raw honesty he had kept locked away for too long.
"I don't like Fiona," he said, the words rushing out like water breaking through a dam. "I like you."
His voice cracked slightly on the last word, vulnerability bleeding through. He looked at her with deep affection. The kind he had never once directed at her sister. His dark eyes softened, warmed, filled with something that looked terrifyingly close to love.
Natasha's breath caught.
Inside her chest, her heart leaped. A flash of pure, secret happiness flickered through her. Sharp and sweet and exhilarating. He likes me. He chose me. He wants me.
But her face told a different story.
Her brows drew together. Her lips parted slightly, then pressed into a sad, troubled line. Her eyes, those beautiful dark eyes, filled with something that looked like pain. Carefully manufactured, exquisitely timed.
"Jackson," she said, her voice trembling with false distress. "What are you saying?"
She shook her head slowly, sadly, as if his words had wounded her.
"You're marrying my sister tomorrow," she continued, each word dripping with reluctant duty. "Please don't say nonsense like this."
Don't say nonsense.
But her eyes said something else entirely.
They sparkled.
Jackson turned in his seat to face her fully, the moonlight casting sharp shadows across his handsome face. His dark eyes burned with something raw, something desperate. A hunger he had kept hidden for too long.
"I never loved Fiona," he said, his voice low and intense, each word deliberate, as if he had been rehearsing them in his head for months. "I never loved her. Not once. Do you understand me, Natasha? Not a single day. Not a single moment."
His gaze swept across Natasha's face. Those beautiful features, those dark lashes, those soft lips she kept slightly parted in surprise. His eyes lingered there, on her mouth, tracing the curve of it like a man dying of thirst staring at water.
Natasha felt her heart flutter behind her carefully constructed mask of innocence. She wanted to smile. She wanted to lean closer. But she had a role to play.
"No," she said, shaking her head slowly, her voice trembling with fake reluctance. "My sister... my sister likes you, Jackson. She loves you. I can't. I won't do this to her."
Jackson let out a bitter laugh. Cold, sharp, dismissive. "Loves me? She doesn't even know what love is. She's just desperate, Natasha. Desperate for anyone to look at her. Desperate for someone to want her fat, pathetic body."
Natasha flinched dramatically, pressing a hand to her chest. "Jackson, don't—" she started.
"Why not?" he interrupted, his voice rising with cruel frustration. "It's the truth. Look at her. Really look at her. She's eighty kilograms of disappointment wrapped in a red dress that should have never left the rack. She waddles when she walks. She breathes too loud. She eats like she's trying to fill a void no amount of food will ever fill."
"Please stop," Natasha whispered. But she didn't tell him to take her home. She didn't reach for the door. She just sat there, listening, drinking in every ugly word like poison honey.