Page 53 of Black Castle

There’s a torment in his eyes. As if fighting dark forces.

“Just say yes or no,” she prods.

“No.”

Something cracks and shatters around her.

Hope.

Chapter Sixteen

Vivienne

She wants him.

She wants him in a way that borders obsession—unhealthy, all-consuming, desperate. A fire scorching through her veins, fiercer than anything she has ever felt before. Not for anyone. Not for some of the hot boys from school who once whispered sweet lies in her ear. Not for Lyle Chesterfield from the chess club, who once held her waist like she was something to win. Not even for Ian Griswyk, the one she would have sworn she loved the most.

She wants Lucan Raskovic, in a way no girl should ever desire a man thirteen years older than her.

But it’s okay. He doesn’t want her, anyway.

And she doesn’t blame him. No one wants a broken girl, is there?

Rusted around the edges and cracked down in the middle. A fabric so threadbare, it has become more of holes and loose stitches than a tapestry of beauty, disintegrating with every touch. So battered and pulled apart, there’s nothing left to mend.

Of course, he didn’t want a worn-out girl.

So, on the old tire swing beneath the old oak in front of her house, she had watched his car drive off into the night. The engine’s hums had resonated down the quiet street. And when the tail light had completely faded away, silence was left, yet the echo of his rejection rang in her chest.

A lump had formed in her throat, thick and suffocating, like something precious had been ripped off her hands. Because he was precious, indeed. He was a forgotten prince from a fairytale.

She had felt this familiar pain when Ian decided to cut her off. But only then, it wasn’t this much. It wasn’t this excruciating.

She didn’t feel like dying.

“We could be friends,” he had said, his voice softer than she had ever heard it—laced with regret, as though the word‘No’ had been a choice he never wanted to make. Yet he didn’t take back his word.

His hand had remained on hers as his car arrived at her doorstep. He had gently squeezed it, as if that would release the agony of his unreturned affection. Their silent farewell had ended with her impulsive kiss on the birthmark below his left eye; she’d imagined a passionate, desperate response, a kiss born of overwhelming need. But instead, he had remained still, didn’t even spare her a glance as she opened the door and hopped out.

We could be friends.

The words echo in her head again and again.

Friends.

Friends can hold hands. They can share hugs. They share kind words and reassurances, no matter how empty and untrue. But she doesn’t want that kindness from him. Kenji gives her more than enough of that. She wants no consolation prize.

She wants more. She wants him. Not as a friend. But as a lover.

She wants to kiss him. And she wants him to kiss her back. Not a hesitant brush of lips. Not something fleeting and cautious. She desires a kiss that leaves no room for uncertainty, a kiss that is all-consuming. A kiss that devours, dragging her down and leaving her gasping for air.

She craves him, wants to taste him, yearns to be enveloped by him, to lose herself in the one thing Isadora deems unattainable for her. Love.

But friends don’t kiss, do they? And he desires a friendship with her.

And she thinks she can’t do it. The pain is too much. She won’t be able to bear it—because, in a moment, she envisions a day when, as his so-called friend, he confides in her about his romantic life. But the lover isn’t her. It’s some other woman. And she wants to be the woman. So when she pulls out her phone and hits the block button below his contact details, she hopes the door has shut between them for good.

Holding on to him will only hurt more. Distance and time will surely sever the bond between them. And one day, soon, she will no longer hurt this much.

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