บททั้งหมดของ The Bride Looked at Me First: บทที่ 1 - บทที่ 10

The morning after the first time Celine Hartman looked at me, I had coffee in one hand and my phone in the other, staring at a blank text message I didn’t want to send. My fingers hovered over the keyboard like I was about to disarm a bomb.Don’t text her. Don’t start this. It’s wrong.I’d been home for less than twelve hours, and the wedding chaos was already suffocating me. My sister, Aaliyah, floated through the apartment like she owned every square inch, perfectly coiffed and radiating ambition. Her fiancé, Celine, moved with a calm precision that made my hoodie-and-sneakers self feel like a torn-up scrap of nothing.But it wasn’t that I was intimidated. Not exactly. It was… something worse.Her eyes.The way she’d looked at me in the living room last night. Like she’d been waiting for me to show up. Like she already knew me in ways no one else ever had. I could still feel it, a heat crawling up my spine and settling deep in my chest, somewhere between thrill and danger.I shoved

The garden was silent except for the soft hum of the night air and the faint rustle of leaves under my shoes. I could feel Celine’s presence behind me before I even realized she had followed. Every step she took made the space between us shrink, my chest tightening with each one.“You shouldn’t sneak around at night,” I said, though my voice betrayed me with a tremor I couldn’t hide.She didn’t answer immediately. Instead, she leaned against the fountain, crossing one leg over the other, her eyes catching mine in the dim golden light. “Why shouldn’t I?” she asked softly, her tone teasing, almost velvet. “Is it because it’s dangerous? Or because you can’t stop thinking about me?”I froze. The words, casual though they seemed, hit me like a hammer. My heart lurched, and I felt the heat rise in my cheeks. I wanted to deny it, to turn and run, to pretend that none of this, this impossible, forbidden, electric pull, existed. But I couldn’t. Not when she was there, looking at me the way no

The rehearsal dinner had ended hours ago, and the house was quiet, except for the faint hum of the city outside and the soft tick of the kitchen clock. I should have been in my room, scrolling through my phone to escape the ache in my chest, the constant pull of her in my thoughts. But somehow, I found myself wandering the hallways, drawn toward the living room.She was there. Of course she was.Celine leaned casually against the doorway, a glass of wine in hand, her eyes catching the dim light and turning it molten. She didn’t speak at first—just watched me, quiet and deliberate, and my stomach twisted with the ache of desire. Every step I took closer made my pulse hammer, every inch a gamble with fire I didn’t want to escape.“You’re here again,” she said softly, almost teasing, though her voice carried a weight that made me shiver. “I was wondering when you’d sneak out.”I swallowed hard, my throat dry. “I… I couldn’t sleep,” I muttered, trying to sound casual, though my heart betr

I woke before sunrise, not because I'd slept well, but because sleep had refused to claim me at all. Every time exhaustion finally dragged my eyelids shut, I found myself back in her room, standing in that fragile silence with my forehead resting against Celine's. I could still feel the warmth of her breath mingling with mine, still hear the softness in her voice when she'd whispered my name as though it were something precious she wasn't supposed to say aloud. There had been uncertainty in her eyes, but something else too—something that mirrored the chaos raging inside me. Relief. Fear. Longing. They had all existed together in that single look, and now they haunted me more than the kiss itself. My fingers drifted unconsciously to my lips, tracing them as if they could somehow hold on to the memory before it slipped away. They still tingled, still remembered the impossible tenderness of that moment, and instead of fading with the night, the memory had rooted itself deeper inside me.

The next morning arrived too quickly. Nora had barely slept, her dreams dissolving into fragments of camera shutters, white roses, and Celine's eyes. By the time she climbed out of bed, the house was already alive with movement. Someone was laughing downstairs. Someone else was arguing over ribbons. The scent of fresh coffee drifted through the hallway, mixing with the perfume of flowers that had arrived before sunrise. She dressed mechanically, choosing faded jeans and an oversized black shirt—the uniform she always wore when she photographed events. The camera around her neck felt familiar, grounding. It was the one thing in her life that still made sense. Cameras didn't ask impossible questions. They didn't fall in love with people they shouldn't. They simply captured what stood in front of them. Nora wished her heart worked the same way.By eight o'clock, everyone had piled into three different cars for the venue walkthrough. Nora volunteered to drive separately, claiming she need