Forgotten Luca (The Four 1)

Not a man who’d made me hold on to that little scrap of possibility with everything I was.

The sound of a sliding door jarred me from my thoughts. I turned to see a figure on the balcony. We were too high up for it to be an intruder, and the sight of the individual flicking a cigarette butt over the railing was proof that it wasn’t someone with nefarious intent. I’d noticed the faint smell of cigarettes on Luca when we’d been in the den at Ronan’s house, but I hadn’t actually seen him smoking. But the tall outline of the figure and the way he moved left no doubt as to who it was.

Surprisingly, Luca didn’t notice me at first when he came back into the suite. I remained silent as he moved to the small bar on the opposite side of the room. A little light above the bar came on when he opened one of the cabinet doors to retrieve a glass. He poured himself a shot of something and downed it, then filled the thick crystal glass with the same liquid, only more this time. He added a few ice cubes, but instead of taking another drink of it, he leaned against the bar. His shoulders rolled forward as he hung his head. His hands gripped the side of the bar. There was no mistaking the way his long fingers curled around the burnished wood.

I felt like an intruder on his private moment. But I couldn’t make my feet move silently across the carpet to go back to my room. I should have cleared my throat or something, but truthfully, I was too caught up in the things I was feeling to even consider alerting him to my presence.

He made no sense to me.

No, scratch that.

I didn’t want him to make sense to me. Whether I wanted to admit it or not, Luca had been playing a role in my life for much longer than I’d realized. There was still this part of me trying to hang on to the hate I’d felt for so long, but every time I tried to let it rise up so I could make decisions that made more sense, like choosing to stay with Ronan over Luca, I remembered the cracks in his voice as he spoke, the tremor in his hands when he touched me, the exquisite sensation of his lips briefly skimming the spot where my neck met my shoulder as he’d rested his head against me.

And then there were moments like this where his body spoke in ways that belied his wealth, power, and strength.

He frightened me.

But for the wrong reasons… or maybe the right ones. I didn’t really know.

Luca hung in the same position for a moment, then grabbed his drink off the bar. He turned in my direction and instantly stopped. The only light in the room was coming from the bar.

We both just stood there for several beats. It should have been awkward enough to have me moving, but I stayed where I was.

“Do you want me to go somewhere else?” Luca asked quietly.

It was the last thing I expected him to say. This was his place, after all.

I shook my head but realized he might not be able to see me. “No,” I managed to say. “I should… I should go back to bed.”

He didn’t respond. There was no confirmation that I should go, no argument that I should stay. He merely went to one of the leather chairs in the spacious living room and sat down. He held the glass in his hand and took a long sip before settling his hand on the armrest and just rolling the glass so the ice clinked against the crystal.

He was still wearing the same clothes he’d changed into when we’d gotten to the hotel room. His outfit had been a replica of what he’d been wearing earlier in the day. He’d even kept the gun on his person, though he’d untucked his shirt so it would cover the weapon when he was around Violet. But it looked like since we’d gone to bed, he’d tucked the shirt back into place. It made me wonder where his gun was.

It also made me wonder what kind of life he led that he needed so many men to watch his back and had to be armed at all times.

I remembered the way he’d put the gun to Taz’s head that morning and demanded information on where Carla was. The move had been second nature to him. I’d fully believed he’d shoot the pimp to get what he wanted from him.

Luca took another sip of his drink. He never looked my way or acknowledged my presence. I moved to the couch and gingerly sat down on it, fully expecting him to tell me to leave the room.