The morning after was thick with silence.
Not the heavy kind that screamed regret, but the sort that hovered—watchful, charged, waiting to see what came next. Like the world had witnessed what happened behind closed doors and was holding its breath.
Aria sat up in bed long before the sun touched the windows. The sheets smelled like him. Like cedarwood and danger. Like heat.
Luciano wasn’t beside her.
Of course he wasn’t.
He left sometime before dawn, the way he always did when he gave too much of himself. He disappeared before the morning light could make things real.
She stared at the pillow where his head had rested, and for a moment, she let herself remember.
Not the kiss. Not the fire.
But the look in his eyes after—quiet, almost wrecked.
Like touching her hadn’t satisfied any
