Harper
I did not notice him at first. The music was too loud, the lights too bright, and the energy of the crowd too consuming for anything else to break through my focus.
I was laughing at something Kai had just said when Elise suddenly went still beside me.
She did not freeze completely, but her posture shifted in a subtle way that immediately caught my attentionand her eyes flicked toward the entrance of the club and then back to me, as if she were measuring my reaction before I even had one.
“What?” I asked, raising my voice slightly to be heard over the music.
Elise hesitated before leaning closer. “Do not react,” she said quietly.
Which, of course, immediately made me want to react. “What do you mean, do not react?” I asked.
Her lips twitched faintly, as though she knew exact
