the night was electric, humming with the flashes of a thousand cameras, the murmurs of onlookers, the glint of sequins and silk under the bright white lights. but none of it compared to him.

chandler moved through the chaos like he was above it, like the world had been carved around him and not the other way around. there was something almost unreal about him—like he belonged in the golden frames of renaissance paintings rather than here, among flashing bulbs and restless crowds. his face, sharp yet achingly symmetrical, carried a quiet kind of beauty, the kind that made people stare without realizing they were staring.

his jawline was something sculptors would envy, cutting and precise, softened only by the subtle curve of his lips—lips that seemed made for something more than simple words. they held a natural pout, not forced, not intentional, just there, like the universe had taken special care in shaping them. his nose, straight and slightly upturned at the tip, was effortlessly regal, complementing the angles of his face in a way that felt almost unfair.

but his eyes—god, his eyes.

blue-gray, deep and unreadable, like the sky before a storm. they caught the light in a way that made them seem almost unreal, shifting between steel and ice depending on how the world touched them. framed by dark, thick lashes that would make any woman jealous, they carried an intensity that could unsettle and captivate all at once.

she was used to seeing celebrities—she had captured enough of them through her lens to know beauty in all its forms. but chandler was different.

she hadn’t realized she had been staring until he turned toward her.

his gaze locked onto hers, an almost imperceptible shift in his features—lips parting just slightly, brows raising in the faintest flicker of acknowledgment.

the camera in her hands suddenly felt too heavy. her breath caught.

because for one fleeting moment, before the chaos swallowed him again, she knew: he saw her too.