Luna Forsaken (Arya and James) novel Chapter 146

146 Don’t Hold Me Like That

Arya’s POVCO

I slapped his hand away. “Stop touching me like I’m a lesson.”

His gaze lifted to mine, dark and steady.

“You are a lesson,” he said quietly. “In what grief does when it’s fed lies.”

The words hit.

Hard.

My chest flashed with hurt so bright it came out as fury.

I shoved him with both hands and swung wild.

He caught both wrists this time.

Fast.

I barely saw it happen before my arms were pinned high between us, his grip firm, controlled, unbreakable without force I didn’t have in that angle.

“Let go.”

“No.”

I pulled harder. “Lev.”

“Look at me.”

“Let. Go.”

His jaw tightened, but his voice stayed level. “Look at me.”

I did. Because I was angry enough to bite him and because the bond dragged my eyes to his whether I wanted it or not.

Sweat darkened his shirt at the throat. A pulse beat steady in his neck. His eyes were not soft.

They were intent.

Too focused. Too certain. Too full of me.

I hated how that made my heart kick.

146 Don’t Hold Me Like That

“I am not James,” he said.

The name hit like a strike.

Something cracked inside me.

My breath broke.

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I twisted again, not even to get free now, just to get away from hearing that name in his mouth, from feeling the truth of it, from the way my body and grief and rage all collided at once until I couldn’t tell

which one was choking me.

Lev shifted, still holding my wrists, and walked me back two steps until my spine met the thick

wooden training post.

The impact thudded through me.

He braced one forearm above my head, still controlling my wrists with the other hand, caging me

without crushing me.

Safe.

Inescapable.

My pulse roared.

“Stop trying to fix me,” I spat, and my voice came out wrecked.

His eyes flashed.

He stepped closer, breath warm against my mouth, and said, low and rough enough to scrape bone,

“I’m not fixing you.”

My chest heaved.

He held my wrists higher, not enough to hurt, enough to keep me from clawing at him or at myself.

“I’m claiming what the world tried to destroy.”

The words gutted me.

Not because they were romantic.

Because they were brutal.

Because they named something I had refused to say out loud: that what was done to me was not just betrayal, it was an attempt to erase. To strip, to discredit, to discard, to make me small enough to step

146 Don’t Hold Me Like That

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over.

And this man, this impossible, infuriating man, kept looking at the ruin like he saw a throne buried

under ash.

My eyes burned.

No.

No, not now.

I jerked my head away, fighting the sting.

Lev saw it anyway.

Of course he did.

His grip shifted instantly, one hand releasing my wrists, his palm sliding down to my shoulder, grounding instead of pinning. The other stayed braced against the post beside my head. He gave me

room.

Not distance.

Room.

It was worse.

Because kindness from him never came wrapped in softness. It came in control. In adjustment. In knowing exactly how much pressure to take off without letting me run.

“I said don’t,” My voice broke.

And then the tears came.

Hot. Sudden. Furious.

I hated them.

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