Page 72 of Luka

She smiles softly as she wipes her lips.

I care about you too. I want to say it but can’t figure out how. It’s five words, but they feel so empty. So meaningless after everything I’ve done.

I want to fix it. I do. I just don’t know how.

“Do you like baseball yet?” I ask with a humored smile.

She shrugs as she stares out at the field. “To be honest, I think I’d like just about anything outside my father’s estate. It’s…” She waves a hand at the game, unsure how to phrase whatever she’s thinking. “Life.” She shakes her head as she blushes. “That sounds stupid.”

“It doesn’t sound stupid.”

She tucks hair behind her ear shyly and goes back to the game. I was wrong before, when I thought she was pretending to be engrossed by this. She really is into it.

There’s a whole world she hasn’t seen, and the best I could do was take her to a baseball game.

I’m consumed with the sudden urge to give her the world, or as much of it as I’m capable. I don’t know how long our time together will last, but it feels vital that we spend it on her. Spend it slashing as many firsts as possible.

I wait until the last inning before taking Lucia’s hand. “Come on.” I stand and help her out of her seat.

Wrinkles form on her forehead as I start to shuffle us past people. “Where are we going?”

“You’ll see,” I say, but the truth is, I don’t know yet. Anywhere. Everywhere.Somewhere.

21

LUCIA

People.

So many people.

Luka holds my hand as he leads me through a winding path of the amusement park, cheerful music booming through speakers above our heads. All around us people laugh, some kids cry, others scream with excitement.

The sound of a roller coaster roaring pulls my eyes to my right, and I watch as carts of people wind upside down on a loop at a nauseating speed. I’m in awe of it. Of all of it. I can’t quite tell if it’s overwhelming or invigorating, and I think that’s why Luka holds my hand. I think he knows what’s happening inside my head, even though I’m trying to hide it.

It’s embarrassing to feel so out of place in a scene that must be ordinary for him. Crowds are something he’s experienced his entire life. Cheap thrills are something I can see him constantly chasing. I’ve never gone faster than what my horses could carry me.

“Well?” Luka asks as we pass a man wearing thick eyeliner and black baggy pants with fishhooks dawning them like they’re jewels. I turn my head in wonder as we pass.

“Well what?” I ask.

“What should we ride first?”

I scoff and face forward. “If you think I’m ridinganythingwith you, you’re naiver than you’ve ever pegged me as.”

He laughs. “You know I can’t control the rides, Peach.”

You’d find a way. You could push me out. Blah blah blah. An endless list of excuses fills my head, but I don’t voice them because they aren’t true, and it’d be pathetic to try and use them.

The truth is, I trust Luka more than I trust anyone in the world right now. If I didn’t, I never would’ve left the hotel. I wouldn’t have let him bring me here. I wouldn’t be holding his hand, my heart beating fast with both the nerves of trying something new and the excitement of finally getting what I wanted.

This is the world. Luka is willing to show it to me.

Once again, the dynamics between us have shifted. This isn’t about making a deal with me anymore. This isn’t about him sparing Arseni from my father’s wrath. This is aboutme. My happiness. My fulfillment.

And I’m trying, with everything inside me, not to feel something because of it. Not to feel special because the man who loves no one, who shows the whole world his icy demeanor, gives me his warmth. But damn it, I do. And damn it, I want more of it.

When I glance at him, he smiles at me, showing me dimples I hated him for having the first time I saw them. Now, they make his handsome face, so hard, so rugged, soften and glow.

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