Riley POV
I decided I needed distance from Luca because pretending the kiss meant nothing was becoming harder every day.
The problem was that distance inside the mansion did not work. I could avoid sitting beside him at breakfast, keep every conversation focused on the children, and leave a room whenever he entered, but I still knew when he came home. I noticed the sound of his footsteps in the hallway. I knew when he stood behind me before he spoke. Even when we were silent, I felt him watching me, and every careful space between us only reminded me of how close we had been.
The kiss lived inside the silence.
It returned whenever our hands nearly touched. It returned when he looked at my mouth and quickly looked away. It returned at night when the mansion became quiet and I remembered
