Page 57 of Gatsby's Starlet
“Relax,” he said, the word almost amused. “If I wanted to hurt you, I wouldn’t be sittin’ here talkin’.”
“You shouldn’t be here,” I said, forcing the words out even as my body shifted without thinking, just a step to the side like that would make a difference, like there was anywhere in this room I could move that wouldn’t still have him in it, watching, waiting, already too comfortable in a space that wasn’t his. “You need to leave.”
He didn’t answer right away, didn’t move, didn’t even blink, just sat there studying me like I’d said something worth considering instead of something we both knew didn’t matter, and the silence stretched long enough that I felt it start to press in, heavy and deliberate, like he was letting it do the work for him.
“You keep sayin’ that,” he said finally, his voice low, almost thoughtful, like he was turning the words over instead of pushing back against them, “like it changes anything.”
It didn’t.
We both knew it didn’t.
My throat tightened, but I forced myself to hold his gaze anyway, even though something deeper in me was already pulling back, already warning me that giving him that much of me, my attention, my reaction, was exactly what he wanted.
“I went tonight,” I said, trying to anchor myself in something solid, something I could control. “I did what I was supposed to do.”
“I know,” he said.
Too easy. Too certain. The words didn’t just land, they settled. And something in my chest dropped with them.
“You… know?” I asked, and I hated the way my voice shifted just enough to give him something to grab onto.
That faint hint of a smile touched his mouth again, slower this time, like he wasn’t reacting so much as confirming something he’d already decided.
“I know everything you do,” he said, his gaze never leaving mine. “I know what flavor you get at the coffee shop, how long it takes you to order, how many times you look over your shoulder before you stop thinkin’ about it.”
My pulse spiked, sharp and immediate.
“I know,” he went on, just as calm, just as steady, “that you don’t drink much, that you hold your cup like you’re givin’ yourself somethin’ to do, and that when you laugh, you look down first if you don’t mean it.”
My breath caught before I could stop it.
“And tonight out front,” he added, leaning forward just slightly, just enough to shift the weight of the room, “you forgot to look around at all.”
My stomach turned and I started feeling sick. “I didn’t—” I started, but the denial felt thin the second it left my mouth, like even I didn’t believe it.
He tilted his head just a fraction, watching me the way someone watches something they’ve already figured out. “You did,” he said quietly. “And that’s a problem.”
The room felt smaller now. Not physically, but in a way that pressed in.
“I’m doing what I’m supposed to do,” I said again, quieter now, more careful, trying to hold onto something that still felt like control.
He didn’t answer, just pushed to his feet in a slow, deliberate way that made it feel like time itself bent around him, like he owned every second of it.
I stepped back before I realized I was doing it, my shoulder brushing the wall as the space between us disappeared inch byinch, not rushed, not forced, just taken like it had always been his to close.
“You don’t get to get comfortable with him,” he said, his voice dropping, not louder but heavier, more threatening. “You don’t get to start believin’ any of that’s real.”
My heart slammed harder, my breath catching somewhere too high in my chest. “This isn’t—” I tried again, but the words didn’t hold.
He lifted his hand then, slow, controlled, and I went still without thinking, every muscle locking as his fingers hovered just at my jaw, not touching, not quite, but close enough that I felt it anyway, like the space between was thinner than it should’ve been.
“That’s how it starts,” he said, his voice quieter now, almost conversational, like he was explaining something simple. “You tell yourself it’s nothin’. Just a job. Just playin’ a part.”
His gaze dropped briefly, then came back to mine, harder this time. “And then you forget.”
My pulse stuttered.
“You forget why you’re there,” he went on, his voice still calm, still steady in a way that made it worse, “you forget who put you there, and you start lookin’ at him like he’s somethin’ else.”
