Luna Forsaken (Arya and James) novel Chapter 181

181 His for the Evening 3

Arya’s POV

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I rose halfway before I realised I was doing it, my body answering him before my pride

could instruct it otherwise. Heat climbed my throat at the memory of the corridor, and

from the look in his eyes, he noticed.

Of course he noticed.

He stopped in front of me and looked me over once, careful, assessing, not crude. His

gaze lingered a fraction at my mouth and then returned to my eyes, satisfaction flashing

so briefly no one else would have caught it.

“Why do you keep trying to get away from me?” he asked.

The room went still.

I could have lied.

Could have laughed.

Could have made this easy.

Instead my pulse jumped and I said, because apparently my dignity had left my body

entirely tonight, “I was invited.”

The corner of his mouth moved.

“Mm.”

Then he looked at the women around us with easy politeness and enough authority to

make the politeness feel like command.

“I need to borrow her.”

Borrow.

As if I was a book he had already checked out.

As if the answer had been decided.

I opened my mouth to respond, mostly so it did not look as though I had no say, but!

didn’t get the chance.

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Lev bent, slid one arm behind my knees and the other around my back, and lifted me

clean off the ground.

A startled laugh tore out of me before I could stop it.

The room gasped, then, absurdly, some of the women laughed too.

Not all of them.

Rebecca looked like she might choke on her own fury.

Mary froze, shock and humiliation flashing across her face in equal measure.

Diana’s expression went unreadable, which meant she was paying very close attention.

I instinctively grabbed Lev’s shoulder, the other hand flying to his chest as he settled me

against him like I weighed nothing. Heat rushed through me so hard it made my ears

ring.

“Lev!” I hissed under my breath, half scandalised, half breathless. “Put me down.”

“No.”

The answer was calm. Immediate. Infuriating.

My cheeks burned. “Everyone is watching.”

“I know.”

“That is not helping.”

His eyes dropped to mine, and the look in them turned darkly amused. “It wasn’t meant

to.”

My heart kicked traitorously against my ribs.

Ria was practically singing. He chose us in front of them.

I tried to glare and failed because I was too busy trying not to smile like a fool while

being carried through a room full of women who had just finished discussing my place.

Lev adjusted me slightly in his arms, one hand firm at my back, the other secure beneath

my knees. The move was effortless. Possessive without roughness. A statement in flesh

and bone.

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He looked back at the room once and said, for all of them to hear, “She’s with me for the

rest of the evening.”

Butterflies exploded in my stomach.

I hated the butterflies.

I loved the butterflies.

I wanted to bury my face in his neck and disappear.

I wanted every woman in that room to choke on the image.

So I did neither.

I lifted my chin and let him carry me.

The laughter behind us thinned into murmurs as he strode out of the tea section, through

the adjoining corridor toward the larger hall. I could feel stares following us like sparks

across dry grass.

The moment we were beyond immediate earshot, I turned my face toward him and said

through clenched teeth, “You are impossible.”

He didn’t look down. “You looked like you were handling them.”

“I was.”

“I know.”

“Then why did you do that?”

This time he glanced at me, and the heat in his gaze nearly stole my breath.

“Because I wanted to.”

The simple honesty of it hit me harder than any clever answer would have.

I swallowed and looked away first, suddenly too aware of how close we were, how

steady his heartbeat felt through his jacket, how easily I fit in his hold.

Voices from the main hall grew louder as we approached. Music drifted in from the

ballroom beyond, low and elegant and dangerous in the way all beautiful things in

Blackbirth seemed dangerous tonight.

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I lowered my voice. “You’re making enemies.”

“I had those already.”

“Lev.”

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He stopped walking just before the hall opened fully into the crowd and set me down at last, slowly, his hands lingering at my waist until he was sure my feet were steady.

My knees almost weren’t.

He noticed. His thumb pressed lightly into my side in a silent warning-not-warning.

When he spoke, his voice was low enough for only me. “Let them talk, Arya.”

I looked up at him.

He was no longer amused. No longer performing for the room. The possessive edge was still there, but beneath it was something steadier. Intention. Choice.

“They will talk whether you breathe too hard or stay silent for a year,” he said. “So let them talk while they watch me choose you.”

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