Chapter 10

Asher pushed Luca against the wall, lifting his chin with a rough thumb. “Are you sure?”

Luca nodded, eyes dark, voice low. “Yes.”

Asher didn’t ask again.

He kissed him like he meant it, like the truth had weight, and he’d been carrying it too long.

Clothes came off slowly at first, shirts pulled over heads, buttons undone one handed, fingers brushing skin like they couldn’t quite believe it was real. Then faster. Frenzied.

Luca's back hit the bed with a soft thud, and Asher hovered over him, looking down like he was memorizing the moment.

“You’re not just some fantasy,” Luca whispered. “You feel like the first thing that’s ever been real.”

Asher bent down, lips brushing the side of his mouth. “Then don’t run from it.”

Asher guided every touch, every movement, like he wasn’t just claiming Luca’s body but asking for something deeper. And Luca gave it, every breath, every sound, every shudder.

Afterward, tangled in sweat and sheets and the kind of silence that didn’t need filling, Asher lay back, chest rising slowly.

Luca curled beside him, cheek pressed against his shoulder, heartbeat still racing.

“This doesn’t change things,” he murmured.

Asher’s hand ran through his hair, slow. “No. But it changes us.”

A pause.

"I don’t know how to protect this,” Luca whispered, his voice barely audible against Asher’s chest.

Asher was about to respond when...

Bang. Bang. Bang.

A sharp knock hit the door like a warning shot.

Both of them froze.

Asher’s jaw clenched.

Then came the voice.

“Ashy, you in there? I have questions. And zero patience.”

Hannah.

Luca bolted upright, panic flooding his veins like ice. “Shit.”

Asher groaned and threw his arm over his face. “Give me one reason not to fake my own death.”

Another knock. Harder. “You alive or just finally choking on your ego?”

“I’m naked!” Asher shouted. “Go away!”

There was a beat of silence.

Then her voice, full of smug amusement. “Oh please. You think anyone in this family wants to see you naked? You’re the undeserved chromosome in the Hartwell DNA. Relax, I’m not that desperate.”

Luca looked like he was going to pass out.

He scrambled out of bed, dragging the sheet with him, and bolted for the bathroom, barely remembering to grab his shirt on the way.

The door clicked shut just as Hannah’s voice rang again, louder now.

“Also, newsflash, the whole house is talking. You might want to put on pants before the narrative shifts from ‘black sheep’ to ‘full blown wolf in heat.’”

Asher sighed, ran a hand through his hair, and sat up.

“Coming in anyway,” she chirped.

Click.

The door swung open before he could even protest, and Hannah stepped inside like she owned the room, all long limbs, high end loungewear, and a phone already in hand.

She stopped mid step.

Then smirked.

“Well, damn. You really were naked.”

Asher sat there, sheet bunched loosely at his hips, entirely unbothered. “Can I help you, Satan’s intern?”

She strolled farther in, casually glancing around. “Oh, I don’t know. Thought I’d drop by, say hi, collect a few incriminating details about your sudden reappearance in our family photos.”

She sniffed. Then looked pointedly at the rumpled bed, the faint smell of sex still hanging in the air, the misplaced articles of clothing...

And grinned. “Well, well. This room looks like a metaphor.”

“Go away, Hannah.”

She made a show of walking over to the nightstand, picking up a silver cufflink that definitely wasn’t Asher’s and turning it over between her fingers. Her voice turned singsong. “Should I guess whose this is? Or are we keeping things delightfully ambiguous for maximum drama?”

Asher didn’t flinch. “Go. Away.”

“You know, for someone so good at hiding in shadows, you sure do a terrible job cleaning up after yourself.”

She turned her gaze back to him, and for a second, something in her expression shifted. Less teasing. More curious.

“Is this real, Ash?” she asked, almost quiet.

He looked her dead in the eyes. “Does it matter?”

She blinked once, like the honesty caught her off guard.

Then she tossed the cufflink back onto the bed, shrugged, and turned toward the door.

“Well, if you get disowned again, dibs on your apartment. I always liked the lighting.”

“Leave,” he muttered.

She opened the door but paused, throwing one last glance over her shoulder.

“Whatever this is? You better hope no one else figures it out before you do.”

Click.

She was gone.

The silence she left behind was heavier than anything she said.

From the bathroom, Asher heard the faint sound of running water, but he knew it wasn’t about the faucet. It was about control. About Luca trying to breathe again. About pretending this wasn’t already spinning too fast.

Asher leaned back on the bed and stared at the ceiling.

He didn’t believe in fate.

But this?

This felt a lot like being hunted.

Luca leaned over the sink in Asher’s bathroom, hands braced against the marble, chest heaving like he’d just run ten miles.

He turned on the cold tap and splashed water over his face, hoping the shock would bring him back to reality. But nothing could erase the sound of Hannah’s voice, or the way her sharp smile curled as she surveyed the room, as if she already knew.

He didn’t have time for this. Not now. Not with his engagement looming like a guillotine and whispers already crawling through the estate like rot.

I don’t know how to protect this.

He hadn’t realized how true those words were until he was hiding in a bathroom, his pulse betraying every lie he’d carefully built.

Luca stared at himself in the mirror.

Jaw tight. Eyes too wide.

This is what fear looks like on you.