All Chapters of His Forbidden Muse: Chapter 31 - Chapter 36

The say children owe their parents everything. Gratitude for life, obedience for love. And if we dare defy them, there’s guilt. Curling in the pit of the stomach like smoke that chokes you. You displease them, and it stays with you, like a soft scar only you can feel but not see.So we nod.Smile.Show up.Pretend.Because to say no feels like betrayal, and I’ve never been brave enough for that.So here I am. Getting ready.Since I’ve changed my wardrobe, purged the nun-like dresses Anya always mocked, I’m left with scraps of impulse. Dresses bought on a whim, coaxed into my hands by Veronica’s persuasive charm and a need to feel something other than invisible.My eyes land on the emerald one and the memory is instant. The way it clung to me and how the night unravelled. The look in Massimo’s eyes and the feeling of losing and wanting all at once.A spark runs through me, tingling where I shouldn’t still feel him.I shake it off like a guilty pleasure.Sighing, I reach for something safe

I am rendered motionless and speechless as I momentarily forget about the tie in his hand.His fingers brush lightly over the pulse at my wrist, like a ghost of a touch, almost too tender. I freeze. He doesn’t seize me yet. He waits and I do too. Let me feel the inevitable and the inescapable.I can feel the heat of his body, the possessive weight of his stare. My breath stutters. Only then, only when the fear blooms in my chest like a flower, does he move. He grabs my wrist and yanks it behind my back.I gasp, and before the second gasp leaves me, he loops it around my wrists and pulls it taut. His eyes flicker with hunger I can’t deny as his grip is unrelenting before he brings me with his own brand of command.I jerk back instinctively. “Massimo, don’t!”I struggle. If only for show, my heart thrumming wildly in my chest, but my body betrays me, inching closer to him, instinctively leaning into the heat of his presence.There’s no escape. He knows it. I know it.He chuckles and sna

My brother is ruthless when it comes to his family. Or anything in general. No one has read his heart yet. And I wonder if anyone ever will. He’s worse than a puzzle, deeper than oceans and darker than space’s dark matter.So, when I say every face in the crowd tenses, I mean it. Everyone does. Including my parents. Mama seem to just look at him with this strange emotions in her eyes. Judas doesn’t talk to Mama, no one knows the reason. Anya guess it’s something that happens in childhood, but I believe it must be the day he killed that beautiful canary she gifted him. Papochka says that was normal, but we all know nothing about skinning a little bird alive is normal.Maybe he said that because he believed my brother was redeemable, he still believes that, the difference is, he believes Judas can still be saved by love, while the rest of us have learned to fear him instead.Not fear him, but his unpredictability.Papochka holds onto this fragile hope like it’s a prayer stitched into hi