CHAPTER 46: The Distance After Wanting

CHAPTER 46: The Distance After Wanting

The moment their lips made contact, something in Isabella immediately seemed to snap back into place.
She stepped away abruptly, eyes wide as if she had just surfaced from deep water. The music still played around them, the applause had long faded, but she couldn't register any of it. All she could feel was the echo of his mouth on hers…warm, sure, and devastating.
“I…” She stopped, pressing her palm lightly to her lips as if she could physically push the sensation away. “We should go home, Luca.”
Luca didn’t reach for her, and that alone surprised her even more.
He simply searched her face. There was obvious disappointment in his eyes, but he didn’t argue or tease her. Neither did he demand an explanation. He simply nodded slowly, as if he already understood something she didn't know.
“Alright,” he said quietly.
The gentleness of that agreement unsettled her more than resistance ever could have, and she suddenly found herself wishing for the ground to open up and swallow her.
They left the dance floor without another word, moving through the crowd in silence. Outside, the night air was cool against her overheated skin, sobering her up in a way she desperately needed. The car ride home felt longer than it should have, and Luca drove in silence without taking his eyes off the road.
He didn’t steal glances at her like he did when they were coming, and he made no attempt to try to fill the silence.
Isabella stared out the window, watching the city blur past, while her thoughts warped themselves into a tangled mess.
She didn’t understand what had just happened.
She was supposed to hate him.
He was the enemy. The man that was tied to everything she had lost, and everything she had been forced to become. And yet every time she tried to sharpen that hatred, it dulled in his presence. He absorbed her edges, her anger, and her cruelty. And he always returned it with patience and understanding. With a kindness that felt undeserved and dangerous.
She wanted distance from him because proximity was beginning to confuse her.
When they finally arrived home, the entire mansion had gone completely quiet. Luca parked, turned off the engine, and stepped out first. He opened her door out of habit, then hesitated, as if reconsidering, before offering his hand anyway.
She took it, making no attempt to hesitate before she changed his mind.
Inside, the house felt too large and too still.
“I’ll take the guest room tonight,” Luca said as she opened the door and went into their shared bedroom. His voice was calm and carefully composed. “It seems like you need some time to yourself.”
She looked up at him, startled by the accuracy of it.
“Yes,” she said softly. “I think… I think I do.”
He nodded. “I understand.”
The words tightened something in her chest.
“Thank you,” she added, forcing herself to meet his eyes. “For tonight. I really did enjoy myself.”
He gave her a small smile…warm, yet restrained. “I’m glad, Bella.”
As he turned to leave however, Isabella's body reacted and moved instantly.
Her hand shot out, and her fingers wrapped around his wrist, pulling him back with a strength that seemed to be born of impulse rather than thought. He turned, his face lighting up with surprise for a moment before she surged forward and kissed him.
This time, there was no hesitation…and Luca responded instantly.
All the restraint he had shown all night shattered completely as his arms came around her, strong and sure, pulling her against him as his mouth claimed hers with a hunger that sent heat racing through her veins. The kiss was hot, urgent and consuming, erasing every careful boundary they had been pretending still existed between them.
She gasped into his mouth, threading her fingers into his hair as he backed her toward the nearest wall. Her body responded without permission, without logic, arching into his touch as if it had been waiting for this exact moment.
He kissed her like a man that had been starved…that had been holding himself back for too long.
Her breath froze in a ragged gasp the second his mouth pulled away from hers, dragging hot and wet down her jaw, nipping at her throat, and sucking hard enough on her collarbone to leave marks.
His hands were everywhere…rough, greedy palms shoving under her clothes, gripping her tits, pinching her nipples until they ached, and mapping every fucking inch of her like he owned it.
The room faded into nothing but raw need…sweat slick skin, panting breaths, and the obscene slap of bodies grinding together.
Clothes were in the goddamn way.
She didn’t even notice how fast they came off…her shirt yanked over her head, bra torn aside, his belt clinking open as she clawed at his pants like a desperate slut. Bare skin finally met bare skin, with his hard cock pressing thick and throbbing against her thigh. Her completely soaked silk panties were the only barrier left between them.
Isabella moaned like a bitch in heat, arching her back as his mouth attacked her tits again, sucking one stiff nipple deep into his hot mouth while his curious fingers twisted the other. Her pussy clenched, dripping wet, while every forbidden fantasy she had buried exploded to the surface. The careful walls she had spent the past years building shattered in one brutal surge, leaving her naked, shaking, and begging for whatever he was willing to give her.
Luca scooped her up easily like she had no weight, her legs wrapping around his waist on instinct, her slick cunt grinding against the ridge of his cock through the last scrap of fabric. He threw her down on the bed, and then loomed over her…tense muscles, heaving chest, and eyes that were black with pure animal as he stared down at her spread thighs and the wet spot darkening her panties.
He looked like he was just seconds away from fucking her raw.
Then he stopped.
He pulled back slowly, visibly forcing himself to regain control. For a moment, she thought she had done something wrong, and panic flickered in her chest.
“Luca?” she whispered.
He closed his eyes briefly, then opened them, meeting her gaze with an intensity that stole her breath all over again.
“We can’t,” he said quietly.
Confusion flooded her. “Why?”
His hand came to rest gently over her abdomen in a protective manner.
“Because I won’t let this happen if there’s even a chance that you’ll regret it tomorrow,” he said. “Not like this. Not when emotions are this high.”
Her throat tightened.
“And because,” he continued, keeping his voice low and steady despite the strain evident in it, “you deserve to choose me with a clear mind. Not because the night carried you here.”
Silence settled between them, heavy and charged.
Slowly, carefully, he straightened, putting distance between them even though every inch of his body clearly resisted it. He offered her a hand…not to pull her back into him, but to help her sit up.
Isabella stared at him, for the very first time, she saw the cost of his restraint.
And it undid her.