Love,Written In Ruins-Chapter 30: Don’t Hide FromMe

Luciano lay in the dim, golden glow of the bedside lamp, the melody of Troye Sivan still playing softly, wrapped around them like a secret, seductive cocoon. Eloise’s head rested heavily on his chest, her dark-brown hair spilling across his body, like a veil, her breathing finally slow and even after the physical storm he’d unleashed on her body.

Her fingers traced idle, senseless patterns over his ribs, as if she were trying to map the man who had just unraveled her so completely.

​Luciano hadn’t planned this. Not yet.

​Luciano was a man who lived by the blade and the ledger. He prided himself on knowing every variable before he made a move. When he’d told her to come to the study, with the contract waiting like a loaded gun, his only intention had been to break her emotional resistance—just enough to make her sign without protest.

​But seeing her in his shirt... Christ. The sight had been a detonation of raw, territorial impulse. The way the oversized fabric had skimmed her thighs, the way it had hung loose on her shoulders, exposing the delicate line of her collarbone like a definitive claim... it had snapped something inside him. She looked like sin dressed in his colors. Like she had always belonged there, waiting for him.

​So he’d pushed. A little too much.

​Teased her with his fingers, his mouth, his words—until she was trembling, until her defiance melted into a desperate, beautiful need. Until she signed her name in that trembling scrawl, a small smear of her own blood beside it like an irreversible vow.

And then—

When he tasted her, he had expected the scars of a past trauma—the kind William had whined about like a pathetic, jilted bastard at the restaurant. He had prepared himself to be the man who conquered her fear, thinking she was a bird with broken wings.

Instead, he found a sanctuary that had never been entered.

The moment his tongue met that delicate barrier, the truth slammed into him like a bullet. His Paloma was untouched. A virgin.

He froze for half a heartbeat, buried between her thighs, her sweetness flooding his mouth, her body arching under him like she was made for this—for him.

All those years with William. All that waiting. And she had never given herself to anyone. Not because of some distant, crippling trauma. No. She had simply never wanted to.

William was a fool—a blind, arrogant sucker who hadn’t recognized the treasure he’d held. He had blamed "trauma" because his ego couldn’t handle the fact that Eloise simply hadn’t deemed him worthy of her soul.

She hadn’t been broken; she had been waiting.

Until now.

Until him.

The realization roared through him like wildfire—pride, possession, a fierce, territorial joy that made his chest ache with the force of it.

He devoured her after that—slow, reverent, relentless—until she shattered on his tongue, crying his name like a prayer she didn’t want to mean, a surrender she hadn’t known she possessed.

​Now, with her sleeping against his heart, he stared at the ceiling, fingers stroking slowly through her hair, savoring the feeling of her weight on him. She was his in every way that mattered now. Body soon. Soul... he was patient. He could wait for the rest.

​He pressed a kiss to the top of her head, breathing her in, the scent of arousal filling his lungs.

​"Tell me, mi corazón," he murmured, his voice a low vibration against her ear. "Will you keep pretending to sleep after what I just did for you? Cruel little thing."

​Her eyes fluttered open, shy and flustered, wide with the memory of a deliciously frightening thrill still burning in her chest. "I didn’t ask you for the... service," she whispered, mortified, her voice low and trembling.

She had hoped to avoid his gaze entirely—she should have known better than to expect mercy from a man who never offered it.

​Luciano chuckled, the sound low and warm, curling around her like smoke.

He truly believed she had no idea what she did to him, what she awakened in him. And he wasn’t about to let such a perfect opening to tease her slip through his fingers.

​"Oh? Is that so?" he murmured, leaning in as though confiding a deep secret. His teeth grazed the soft curve of her shoulder in a light, possessive bite, just enough to make her breath catch. "Then I must be mistaken, mi corazón."

​His lips brushed her ear, his voice deep with wicked amusement. "Because I could’ve sworn someone was yanking my hair like she wanted to tear it out." His hand rose, fingers sliding into his own hair in dramatized injury. "I think I’m going bald soon. All because my sweet little Paloma was chasing her release like she’d die without it."

​"Luciano—!" Eloise slapped a hand over her face, heat flooding her cheeks so fiercely it felt scalding. She couldn’t believe he would say that out loud—let alone with that infuriatingly smug tone of voice.

​He laughed again, softer this time, a rich, pleasing sound, and cupped her jaw, coaxing her hand away so he could see her expression, her delicious embarrassment.

"Oh no," he breathed, savoring her embarrassment like a fine wine. "Don’t hide from me. I love when you blush like this. It is truly adorable."

​"I wasn’t— I didn’t— that’s not—" she stammered helplessly, searching for a defense that didn’t exist.

​Luciano tilted her chin up with two fingers, forcing her eyes to meet his. The hunger there, dark and untamed, made her breath shake.

​"You did," he said gently, almost reverently, acknowledging her reaction. "And it was beautiful."

​Her heart tripped over itself.

​"But if my hair truly suffers," he continued with mock seriousness, brushing her lower lip with his thumb, "then you will owe me. Terribly. You have incurred a debt."

​"Owe you?" Eloise echoed, barely able to think, the simple word feeling loaded with unknown consequence.

​He leaned closer, lips nearly touching hers, eyes dark with a promise she felt deep in her bones. "Oh, yes," he whispered. "And I always collect what I’m owed, cariño."

​Her pulse throbbed wildly, her breath shallow, her body betraying her in a thousand ways she couldn’t hide, already responding to the dark promise.

​Luciano saw every one of them—and smiled like a man who intended to take his time enjoying all of it.

​But she sensed something was wrong immediately with his voice, a tightness that wasn’t purely teasing. She lifted her head from his chest, turning fully to face him. Then she saw it—the tension coiled beneath Luciano’s skin, the way his breaths dragged slow and uneven, as if he was fighting off the last edge of something he hadn’t meant her to witness.

​His shirt clung to him, open just enough for her to see the hard rise and fall of his chest. He looked controlled... but only barely, like a tightly wound spring.

​Her hand lifted before she could stop herself, moving on pure instinct, soft to his belt—a quiet, concerned attempt to ease the physical tension that still tightened in him, a lingering effect of their intense encounter.

​But his fingers wrapped around her wrist in an instant, stopping her with a gentleness that didn’t match the storm simmering in his eyes.

​"I’m fine," he murmured, though his voice was a shade too low, too rough to be convincing. His eyes lifted to hers, darkened with something that wasn’t entirely tamed—something purely physical and dominating.

​"Luciano..." she whispered, recognizing the dangerous shift.

​He leaned in, his breath brushing her jaw, his grip still warm around her wrist.

​"But I need you to understand something before you try to soothe me like that," he said, each word a slow slide of warning wrapped in heat. "I’m not built for soft lines and gentle edges, Paloma. Not in bed."

​His thumb pressed once along her waist—before his hand slid lower, squeezing her ass, slow, claiming, making her gasp and instinctively press against him.

​"I like it rough, cariño," he finished, his voice a dark promise that sent a shiver of terror and excitement through her. "I like control, and I take what I want. And I don’t want to catch you off guard."

​Heat flooded her cheeks so quickly she swore it reached the tips of her ears. Eloise’s breath caught, tangled somewhere between a gasp and a sound she refused to let escape. Luciano saw every flicker of it—her shock, her fluster, the way her thighs pressed together on instinct—and his lips curved, slow and sinful.

​"Ah," he murmured, tilting her chin up with one knuckle. "There she is. My shy little fire who pretends she doesn’t know exactly what she does to burn me, and exactly what she secretly craves."

​"I wasn’t—" Her voice cracked, betraying her. "I was just... worried."

​His expression softened for a fleeting second, enough to make her chest tighten—before that softness sharpened into something hungrier, deeper, a truth he couldn’t hide no matter how hard he tried.

​"Worried," he echoed, brushing his nose along her cheek. "You don’t need to worry about me, Eloise. You just need to listen."

​Her pulse stumbled. His grip slid from her ass to her waist, pulling her effortlessly onto his lap. Her palms braced on his shoulders, but his nearness made her limbs feel unreliable, liquid. Luciano’s voice was a low hum against her skin.

​"When I want you," he said, each word deliberate, each syllable a clear boundary. "I don’t take my time. I don’t move gently. I don’t restrain myself unless you ask me to stop, specifically." His hand splayed across her lower back, holding her exactly where he wanted her. "But I will never hurt you, Eloise. Never. Do you understand?"

​Eloise swallowed hard, nodding—because speaking was impossible, because his eyes were too much, because her body was already agreeing with every word he spoke.

​Luciano’s mouth brushed the corner of hers, not quite a kiss, just enough to make her tremble and crave the rest.

​"Good," he whispered. "Then don’t look away from me again. You look only at me when I speak."