CHAPTER EIGHT
LUNA
The ocean roared beside us, a vast and ancient voice that should have made me feel small in a way that was comforting, insignificant in a way that freed me.
Instead, the sound felt muted, smothered beneath the suffocating closeness of Riley at my side.
The waves crashed against the shore like a reminder of escape, yet every surge only emphasized how trapped I was inside my own skin.
His hand was still on my waist.
A simple thing. Innocent. Harmless. That was how it must have looked to the guests drifting towards the reception in their soft dresses and linen suits, basking in the afterglow of my mother’s wedding.
To them, Riley was merely my new stepbrother, guiding me along the path, steadying me with an elegant, chivalrous touch.
But his fingers were not steadying me.
They were containing me.
They were claiming me.
The pressure of his hand was carefully measured, a gentle hold crafted with surgical cruelty.
Beneath the smooth fabric of his suit jacket, his thumb rested on my hip bone in a way that sent a needle of awareness straight through me.
Not hard. Not visibly inappropriate. Just enough for me to understand the message that pulsed through the contact like a silent sentence etched into my bones.
You belong exactly where I put you.
The realization tightened something inside me so abruptly that I struggled to breathe.
A cold spike of fear twisted in my stomach, sharp and instinctive.
Anger followed, hot and wild, flooding my veins like a fire I could not control.
And beneath it all, deeper than the terror and the fury, an illicit warmth uncoiled in the place I hated most. It expanded slowly, shamefully, a traitorous bloom that turned my heartbeat into something frantic and uneven.
No. Not that. Not again.
Heat climbed my neck, a raw flush I could not hide.
I felt it spreading to my cheeks, a humiliating betrayal that made me want to disappear inside the sand.
How could I despise him with every breath I took, yet react to him as if his touch were the spark that lit something dormant inside me?
It was twisted. It was sick. It was wrong.
I needed to move. I needed distance.
I shifted just a fraction, a quiet plea for space that barely existed. But Riley saw it. His fingers tightened on my waist, a small, controlled increase of pressure that locked me to the ground. To anyone else, it was nothing. To me, it was a shackle.
I froze.
Every muscle in me went rigid, my breath caught like a stone in my throat. I stared at the grass swaying ahead, refusing to look at him even as I felt his breath ghost along my ear, warm and taunting, a whisper of heat that did not belong there.
“Jumpy, Luna?” he murmured.
His voice slid through me like black silk soaked in poison. Sweet to the untrained ear. Deadly to mine. A private mockery dressed in tenderness.
“You pull away like you are afraid I might burn you,” he continued, amusement coiling through each word in a quiet rhythm. “Makes me wonder what exactly you feel under my hand.”
My pulse stuttered.
His mouth dropped closer still, the faint warmth of his breath brushing my skin. A traitorous shiver ran down my spine, sharp and involuntary, and his soft chuckle told me he felt it.
“Such heat for a simple touch,” he whispered. “A bit intense for a little sister.”
The words sliced through me. Not because of their meaning, but because of the truth inside them. He felt everything. He knew everything. He wielded my reactions like a weapon. A warning lingered beneath his tone, unspoken but unmistakable. Do not pretend you are unaffected.
I forced my throat to work, pushing out words that sounded cracked and too thin. “I am just ready to get out of the sun. It has been a long day.” The lie tasted brittle.
He laughed softly, though nothing about the sound felt warm. It rumbled through him like an omen. “Oh, princess. The day has not even begun.”
And then he let me go.
The release was immediate and violent. I stepped forward too quickly, desperate to free myself from the pull of him.
The ocean air rushed into the space where his touch had been, cool and damp, yet it felt like frost around a wound.
No relief came. Only the ghost of his grip, carved into my skin as if he had branded me with nothing but fingertips.
I rubbed the place where his hand had been, but it did nothing to erase the sensation. Nothing to quiet the humiliating truth that echoed deep inside me. I hated him. I feared him. And yet, in the deepest, darkest part of me, where reason could not reach, I mourned the loss of his touch.
Because some terrible, secret part of me had wanted him to hold on.
The path from the beach to the reception wound through hibiscus blooms the size of open hands and flowering ginger that perfumed the air with something sweet and wild.
It should have been beautiful. It should have been calming.
Evening sunlight spilled through the leaves in bruised streaks of gold and violet, turning the world soft at the edges, as if painted in a dreamer’s palette.
But nothing in me was soft.
Nothing in me could dream.
Every step felt like I was walking deeper into a trap laid with petals and lace.
Riley kept pace beside me. Too close. Always too close.
His strides were long and relaxed, his tailored suit moving with the casual grace of someone born into polished cruelty.
To the wedding guests who drifted behind and ahead of us, we looked like a picture.
A united family. A seamless merger. The newly minted siblings strolling toward the celebration of their parents’ happiness.
But I knew the truth. He was not walking with me.
He was stalking me. His proximity was calculated, a silent pressure against the edges of my senses.
Every few steps, the brushed collision of our sleeves or the brief whisper of his shoulder grazing mine felt like tiny sparks being struck against tinder.
Each touch was deceptively light, crafted to look accidental, but every one of them was deliberate, intentional, and laced with the quiet promise that flight would be useless.
The leash is short. I hold the end of it.
The rhythm of his steps was steady, but my pulse was not.
My hand, damp and trembling, curled around my phone.
It felt absurd in my grip, like a relic from a life I no longer recognized.
I needed it now more than ever. I needed connection.
I needed Sienna or Chiara. Anyone from the world where laughter had not been a luxury and love was not a weapon wielded in shadows.
I wanted the sound of their voices to anchor me. I wanted the familiar comfort of girls who joked about tests and breakups and Netflix shows, not boys who used threats as currency.
The phone buzzed.
My heart rose, fragile and hopeful, only to be cracked cleanly in half when I looked at the screen.
Not a name.
A number.
The same number.
The one that had haunted me for weeks, its messages coiling through my life like thin black threads tightening with every new warning.
I opened the notification.
The words glowed against the screen like a verdict.
I see you have made your choice. Good luck.
The final words struck with icy precision.
Good luck.
Not a blessing.
A curse wrapped in politeness.
A door slamming shut.
My vision tunneled. I felt the heat of the island air evaporate from my skin. My blood ran cold, a chilling rush that doused every nerve with raw panic. Someone was watching me. Someone was keeping score.
Is the sender here?
My gaze jerked to the guests around us, their faces half obscured by shadows beneath the palm trees. A group of women in bright dresses. A man adjusting his camera strap. A teenager texting. Any of them could have been the eyes behind the screen.
Did they see Riley’s hand on my waist?
My breath cracked.
A surge of paranoia forced my attention to Riley, as if my mind were begging him to be the lesser evil.
He was looking straight ahead.
Calm. Unhurried. His hands were empty. He held no phone. He had made no movement that could explain the timing of the message.
But just because it was not him did not make me safer.
If anything, the danger doubled, circling me like wolves closing in from opposing sides.
Too late now.
The message repeated in my mind with every step, each word heavier than the last.
I fumbled to lock the screen, my fingers jerking clumsily. Anxiety poured from me in ripples I could not stop, the kind that weakened the knees and blurred the edges of reality.
And because fate was cruel, because Riley was built to notice the smallest tremor, he sensed it immediately.
He did not turn his head, but his voice flowed toward me, soft and cutting, sliding beneath the rustle of leaves.
“What was that, princess?”
The question slithered into me.
“You look like a child with her hand in the cookie jar. Guilty of something, are you?”
He still had not looked at me, yet the smirk in his tone was unmistakable.
He could taste my fear. He could smell the shift in me, the panic that had slammed into my ribcage and hollowed me out.
He did not need to know what the message said.
He only needed to see my reaction. He only needed to find the bruise to press on it.
Something cold and furious rose in me.
It was small, but it was enough to pull my spine straight and steady my breath for a single, precious heartbeat. I forced my features into a mask. Blank. Bored. Untouched.
“Just a spam text about a credit card charge,” I said, keeping my voice as airy and careless as I could manage. “Even here, people want your money.”
Finally, Riley turned his head.
Slowly. Deliberately. His eyes found mine, dark and sharp, searching for the fracture in my lie. I braced myself, waiting for him to expose it.