I wasn't about to glance dilliberately at the astonishing pair so I clarified, "The lady with the dark blue dress and the boy with reddish brown hair."

I caught Renee glancing at the subject in question out of the corner of her eye. "Oh, she's Dr. Cullen's wife and I assume the young man is their son." Renee threw in a giggle then. "Although, Dr. Carlisle Cullen and Esme look far too young to have an adolescent son!"

"He's adopted." came an unexpected reply from the woman sitting on the other side of Renee, one of her charity friends, I presumed. "I overheard Mrs. Cullen explaining to Mrs. Clarkson earlier." No doubt, a gossiper as well. Renee only nodded. She didn't particularly enjoy that kind of chatter.

I purposely diverted my eyes from the Cullens then and turned my head towards the head of the table. I would not let my interest give away any more than it already had.

But while the charity club president was chattering on about how proud she was of everyone's work and committment to the new children's hospital, my eyes drank in the temptation to wander in the direction of Esme Cullen's son. He seemed to be lost in thought, some place farway. His eye color pushed to a very dark hue, like ebony or black the exact color of coals. I was able to divert my eyes but too slowly. He looked up…at me. At first, I recognized confusion- perhaps surprise flickering in those black ocre eyes. Then they became utterly hard. Hardened like stones. Onyxes except there was no gleam, no shine to them. Just plain coldness. He locked me in his stony gaze and as much as I longed to break free (because I realized that I truly did), it became more difficult to do so as each second passed.

Perhaps it was because I wasn't accustomed to see anyone with that degree of beauty. He was a thousand times more handsome than any drawing I've ever seen of a fairy tale prince, yet by the way his stare was focused on me from across the table, he appeared to be more handsome than any prince charming I've ever read about but also a thousand times more sinister. That was when I discovered what his hard look enthralled. The emotion- if there was one because the hardness was so overpowering, covering up anything else, must have been hate.

Hate.

It didn't make sense.

He didn't even know my name nor I his. He never saw me before this evening so what reason could I possibly have given this stranger to abhor me? His arms were stiffly at his sides, his posture rigid. I started to get nervous and desired desperately to look away. Could it be that he did this to everyone he met? How utterly strange and confusing! I wondered if, on the day Jessica had seen this boy, he had had the same cruel look on his face? No. She would've mentioned if she'd found something unnatural about him and despite the observation that he was the most handsome boy she had ever seen in her life, Jessica hadn't said anything else.

At last, I willed my head to turn in the direction of Mrs. Clarkson as she began to thank some people who were present, but at that moment, he dropped his gaze from off of me. He stood, his gorgeous lips murmuring something so low I couldn't make out a single sound to the woman beside him who turned to look at him.

Mrs. Clarkson paused in mid sentence, glancing at his fleeing back as he exitted the dining room with perplexed eyes. I couldn't blame her.

He was more than inconvinient.

He was malicious.

When we arrived home that night I practically ran up the stairs to my bedroom.

"Was it that bad?" Mother called up to me. "I thought you had fun, you even made a little friend."

"Sure, Mother. I'm just tired."

I kept wondering as I lay down what in the world I could have possibly been thinking to go to that party, but was glad, in the least sense of the word, that there were high chances that I would never run into Dr. Cullen's son ever again.