Chapter 18 Chapter 18

Chapter 18 Chapter 18


The dance ended at eleven, some disagreement between the school board and the parent committee that nobody cared about had pushed the closing time forward by an hour, which meant Chloe's carefully planned midnight kiss had been quietly dismantled by administrative timing before Jax even had the chance to cooperate with it.

I found out about this from Mika at ten forty-five.

"She's devastated," Mika said, leaning close so only I could hear. "She literally timed the whole thing."

"She'll be okay," I said.

"She made a whole mood board, Sienna."

"She'll still be okay."

I watched Chloe across the room. She was standing with Jax, her face doing its best to look unbothered, her hands folded in front of her in the way they folded when she was trying not to show a feeling. Jax was listening to whatever she was saying with his arms crossed and his head slightly down, present.

He hadn't looked at me since we came back from the garden.

I turned back to the room.

Liam found me at ten fifty.

He came through the crowd with that easy walk, the one that he uses to part people without effort, the one that said I belong at the front of every room I enter. His mask was off. His tie was slightly loose. His face was everything it always was warm, handsome, the smile that had said I choose you in front of everyone at Westfield's orientation mixer.

I smiled when he reached me.

"Ready to go?" he said.

"Almost." I tilted my head toward the dance floor. "One more song."

He looked at me for a half second, checking the surface, same as always.

"Yeah," he said. "Okay."

He took my hand and we walked onto the floor together.

The last song was slow.

Of course it was. Someone at the DJ booth had decided that the end of a Valentine's dance needed a slow song, which meant everyone had paired off and the floor was full of couples in the specific amber glow that made everything look like a memory being made.

Liam's hand settled at my waist.

My hand went to his shoulder.

We moved together the way we had moved together a hundred times. Comfortable, practiced, the choreography of two people who knew each other's rhythms. His chin rested against my temple. I could feel his heartbeat when we were this close, steady, easy, the heartbeat of a boy who had looked his girlfriend in the face all night and felt nothing complicated about it.

She never pushes back, he had said.

I let my hand rest on his shoulder.

I did not push.

I thought about the folder on my phone. The twelve-second clip. The sound of his voice in the garden saying boring and easy to manage while fairy lights hung above him like something from a story.

I thought about Jax watching me press record.

I thought about nothing important sitting in a locked folder, patient as a held breath.

And then I stopped thinking about any of it and I danced.

Liam pulled me slightly closer near the end of the song. The automatic, comfortable closeness of a him.

"Good night," he murmured against my hair.

"Really good," I said.

I meant it. Just not the way he thought I meant it.

Chloe caught me near the coat check.

She was alone for thirty seconds , Jax had gone to get her coat, which was the kind of thing that made her glow even when she was also quietly disappointed about the midnight situation. She stepped up beside me and bumped my shoulder with hers.

"Hi," she said.

"Hi yourself."

"Good night?"

"The best," I said.

She studied my face for a moment. "You look.." She paused, choosing. "Different."

"It's the dress," I said.

"Maybe." She bumped my shoulder again. "Whatever it is, I like it."

She meant it kindly. She meant it as warmth, as the specific kind of warmth that Chloe had always offered uncomplicated, genuine, no conditions attached.

I held it for a second.

"Thanks, Chlo," I said.

Jax came back with her coat.

He held it open for her without being asked and she slipped her arms in and looked up at him with the expression she kept for him specifically, open, a little wondering, the expression of someone who couldn't quite believe their luck.

His eyes moved to me over her shoulder.

One second.

No expression.

Just the reading look. The look that said he was still tracking something.

Then he looked back at Chloe.

"Ready?" he said.

"Ready," she said.

They left.

I watched them go through the doors. Chloe's champagne dress catching the light. His hand moving to the small of her back the same way, not the way he had put his hand at mine in the dark. Different. Comfortable.

I looked at the door after it closed.

My coat was in my hands. The red dress was still on my body. The gold necklace was still at my throat.

I adjusted the dress at the waist. Smoothed the silk with both hands. Squared my shoulders.

Liam appeared at my side with our coats, his hand going automatically to the small of my back.

"Car's out front," he said.

"Perfect," I said.

The doors opened. Cold air rolled in from outside. All around us, Silver Ridge students spilled into the Valentine's night, loud, glowing, still in the good mood of a party that had gone well.

I walked out beside Liam with my chin up and my face easy and the folder on my phone sitting quiet and patient in my bag.

Nothing important.

The night was not over.