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One hand rests against my lower back, a quiet but unmistakable claim, while his other swirls his untouched drink in slow, deliberate movements.
I still feel like an imposter in sneakers.
“Try not to look so tense, printsessa,” Damien murmurs, his lips barely moving, but I hear the amusement in his tone.
I scowl. “I am not tense.”
“You’re gripping your champagne flute like you plan to use it as a weapon.”
I glance down at my fingers, knuckles white from clutching the stem.
Okay, maybe I’m a little tense.
Before I can fire back, a woman in a midnight-blue gown with a dangerously high slit approaches us. I don’t know who she is, but the moment I see Damien’s expression shift, I know.
There’s history here.
I feel it in the way his shoulders go rigid, the way his hand on my back stills slightly but doesn’t pull away.
The woman stops in front of us, a champagne flute in one hand, the other delicately brushing back a loose strand of blonde hair.
She is stunning.
That effortless, glossy, too-put-together kind of stunning that makes me acutely aware that I’m standing here without an ounce of makeup, in sneakers, in a room where I am very much out of my depth.
She tilts her head, studying me before shifting her gaze to Damien.
“Damien,” she says smoothly, like the name tastes good on her tongue.
“Nina.” His voice is cool.
Her hair is styled in soft, glamorous waves that frame her high cheekbones, her skin smooth and perfectly luminous. She wears diamond earrings, subtle but lethal, and a matching bracelet that probably costs more than my rent for a year.
And her face?—
God, her face.
It’s the kind of beauty that doesn’t require effort. The kind that turns heads in every room she walks into, the kind that forces people to pay attention.
Her deep hazel eyes flick over me first, not in a way that’s overtly rude, but in a way that tells me she’s taking inventory.
Assessing.
Measuring.
I have no idea who she is to Damien, no clue what their history entails. But I don’t have to be a genius to recognize the familiarity in the way she says his name, the way she carries herself around him.
And more than that?—
I don’t miss the way she touches him.
It’s subtle.
A light press of her perfectly manicured hand against his forearm when she speaks. A brief, casual touch to the lapel of his jacket, like she has every right to.
She leans in slightly when she talks to him, her voice low, intimate, like they have secrets only the two of them understand.
I shouldn’t care.