All Chapters of Forbidden Never Felt This Good: Chapter 21 - Chapter 30

0022~ Luca ~Sleep has never been a luxury I could afford.Not in this life. Not with everything that comes with it. You learn early on that rest is a privilege reserved for men with clean hands, and my hands stopped being clean a long time ago. So I lay there in the dark, staring at the ceiling, listening to the silence of the estate settle around me, and I let my mind do what it always does, work and her.Except last night, it wasn't strategy or security detail or threat assessment running through my head.It was her, purely her.It was the way she had looked at me in those quiet hours before, with those eyes that see entirely too much, and how I had almost, almost let everything fall out of my mouth like a man who had forgotten what was at stake. I was this close. The words were right there, sitting on the edge of my tongue, and something warm and dangerous in my chest had said just tell her, just trust her, she can hold it. And I had almost listened.That was the foolish part. No

0024~Aria~I hadn't expected the shelter.That was the thing sitting quietly in the back of my mind as we pulled up to the office building, the thoughtfulness and intentional act of it. It wasn't flowers or a carefully worded apology or any of the obvious things a man reaches for when he knows he's the reason someone had a bad night. It was an animal shelter. My animal shelter.The kind of place I had never told him about, never mentioned in passing, never brought up in any of the conversations we had shared over the past days.And yet he had known.I didn't let myself think too hard about what that meant. Not today. Today was already carrying enough weight without me adding more to the pile.His phone had rung while I was mid-sentence. I had seen it, the way his entire body changed when he looked at that screen. Subtle, the way everything with Luca is subtle, but I had been watching him long enough now to notice the difference between his resting stillness and the kind that meant so

0026~ Luca ~I watched Jean walk out of that conference room like he had just won something, and I wanted to put my fist through the wall.I didn't. I stood exactly where I was, exactly as I should, expression giving away nothing. But inside I was running through every reason that man should not be breathing the same air as Aria Santoro, let alone taking her to dinner. And the list was getting longer by the second.Jean-Paul Merci. Calculated, sitting across from her with that smile that didn't reach anywhere near his eyes, watching her the way people watch things they want to acquire. I had clocked him the moment he walked in. The way he assessed the room, the way his gaze had moved over Aria with something that had nothing to do with business. And she had said yes. She had looked him dead in the face and said yes.What was she thinking?The door clicked shut and the room was suddenly just the two of us and I turned toward her and opened my mouth to address it…"Calm down, Luca."He

0028~Aria~I stared at the notification for a full three seconds before the guilt hit me like cold water.Josie.My best friend since the first week of Harvard, the woman who had talked me through every crisis, every exam, every moment of doubt for the past four years, had texted me days ago and I had left it completely unread. Not on purpose. Everything had just been so overwhelming, but that wasn't an excuse not to talk to her. Josie did not do unanswered texts. Nobody who loved you did.I was already calling before I had fully sat down on the bed.It rang twice."Well." Her voice came through the speaker like a verdict. "Look who finally remembered she has a best friend.""Josie…""No, no. Take your time. It's fine. I'll just be here. Existing. Alone. In my apartment. Wondering if my best friend has vanished from the face of earth.""I haven't vanished Josie.""Clearly. Because if you had, that would be an excuse. What's yours?"I winced. "I know. I'm sorry. I genuinely am, things

0030~Luca~That absolute asshole.I replayed the moment on the drive over, his hand on her arm, the way he had let it sit there like he had any right, like she was something he could just reach for, and my jaw tightened all over again. Five glasses of wine and whatever remained of his common sense had apparently exited the building together, because only a man with no functioning self-preservation instincts puts his hands on a woman with a bodyguard standing twelve feet away.A bodyguard who was having a very difficult evening already.After I said what I said, Jean had barely been able to locate his own spine, let alone his dignity. He had sat back in that chair looking deflated and faintly confused, like a balloon that someone had let the air out of slowly. Aria, to her credit, had been magnificent, standing up, straightening her dress, delivering the most professionally courteous exit I had ever witnessed from someone who had just been manhandled at dinner. She had even told him h