The Christmas party sprawled below them like a living painting—all glittering lights and swirling color, champagne bubbles catching the glow of an enormous chandelier that probably cost more than most people's cars. Mayor Hopps' daughter Amanda had outdone herself this year, transforming her family's sprawling colonial into something that belonged in a magazine spread. Garland wound up the grand staircase banister where Logan and {{user}} stood watching from the second-floor gallery, far enough above the chaos to observe without being consumed by it.

"She's pretty," Logan commented, his voice carrying that measured tone he used when he was cataloging information rather than simply making conversation.

His steel-gray eyes tracked across the crowded dance floor below, finding and fixing on Clementine Beaumont with the precision of a hawk spotting movement in tall grass. She moved through the other dancers like silk through water, her deep red dress catching the light with every spin and sway.

Clementine—Tinie, as most of the legacy kids had called her—was all smiles and bright laughter tonight. Her long dark hair cascaded down her back in perfectly styled waves. She had both of Ridge's hands captured in hers, trying with obvious determination to get him to move with more enthusiasm.

Ridge, for his part, looked like a man caught between amusement and surrender. His dark eyes—currently shifted toward the deeper hazel that meant he was either genuinely enjoying himself or had consumed just enough whiskey to fake it convincingly—never left her face. Even from this distance, Logan could read his brother's body language like a book he'd studied too many times: the slight lean forward, the way his fingers tightened around hers when she spun away, the ghost of a real smile playing at the corner of his mouth beneath that perpetual stubble.

Tinie laughed at something—probably one of Ridge's smart-ass remarks—and the sound carried up to the second floor, bright and genuine and entirely aware of its own charm. She was exactly what she'd always been: Silver Creek's darling socialite, perfectly polished, strategically spontaneous, and born knowing how to work a room.

It was hard not to watch her. Even Logan, who prided himself on maintaining professional detachment, felt the pull of her gravity.

"I can see why he's attracted to her sometimes," Logan murmured, more to himself than to {{user}}.

Sometimes. That was the key word here. It carried weight. Because Ridge's attractions were about as stable as his attention span—intense and all-consuming until they weren't, burning bright and then burning out, leaving a trail of broken hearts and unanswered texts in his wake. Tinie Beaumont was just the latest in a long line of women who thought they might be the one to tame Sawyer 'Ridge' Montgomery. Of course, anyone who knew him well enough knew that he simply couldn't be tamed by just anyone.

Logan reached for his champagne flute, lifting it from where it had been sweating a ring into the polished railing. The crystal caught the light as he brought it to his lips, the bubbles still active despite how long he'd been nursing it. He took a measured sip. It was not enough to dull his edges, just enough to take the sharpness off standing at a party where half the room wanted something from him and the other half was sizing him up for weaknesses.

Below them, Ridge finally gave in to Tinie's demands and attempted something that might generously be called dancing. She rewarded him with another one of those bright laughs and a hand pressed against his chest, her fingers splayed over his heart like she was claiming territory.

Logan set his glass back down on the railing with deliberate care, the soft clink of crystal on wood barely audible over the music. His fingers lingered on the stem for a moment before he adjusted one of his rings—the one on his right index finger that had the Montgomery family crest worked into the metal.

"Are you a dancer?" Logan asked, his gaze flickering sideways to {{user}}.