Lila's parents stared her down, their expressions unreadable but heavy with expectation.
She swallowed, taking a breath before speaking. "Why are you here? Were you invited?"
Neither of them answered her. Instead, their sharp, discerning gazes shifted toward Noah, sizing him up with barely concealed disapproval. The scrutiny was suffocating, as if his very presence was offensive to them.
Then, her mother—tall, poised, and every bit the aristocrat—lifted a manicured hand and gestured toward him.
"Does your… friend not know the proper way to greet?" she asked, her tone drenched in condescension.
It was then that Noah finally snapped back to reality.
For a moment, he had been too shocked to process what was happening. Lila's parents were here. Not that he ever looked down on Lila—no, that wasn't it—but he just never thought of her like that. For her parents to be invited to an event like this, it meant they had to be highly ranked figures in society.
