He was my brother’s best friend. And the one man I was never allowed to want.

Part 2

(Lena)

I push the door a little wider—just a few inches—driven by that stupid reflex to look for the bathroom light switch.

But it isn’t a bathroom.

It’s an office.

Dark. Private. Heavy with silence.

A thick rug swallows my footsteps. A massive black-wood desk dominates the room.

And then I see it.

A photograph.

Framed with a care that hurts.

Noah.

And me.

Seventeen years old.

We’re wrapped around each other at an outdoor party, my hair loose and wind-tossed, his arm slung over my shoulders. My smile is wide—bright, naïve, so heartbreakingly happy it stings to look at.

No one else is cropped in.

No meaningful background.

Just… us.

The frame is expensive.

Kept.

Protected.

Not forgotten.

Treasured.

My chest tightens like someone slides a thin blade under my ribs.

What is this doing here?

In his office?

In the one room he told me not to touch?

My fingers lift toward the glass, trembling, like touching it might explain something.

It doesn’t.

It makes it worse.

The photo is placed at eye level.

Exactly where you’d look when you walk into the room.

As if… he looks at it often.

A shiver crawls up my neck. I don’t know if it’s the cold air from the hallway through the open door—

—or the idea that Aiden, the man built on control, lists, and schedules, keeps a picture of me like it’s… important.

“Lena.”

His voice comes from behind me—deep, restrained.

Cold.

Lethal.

I turn slowly.

Aiden stands in the doorway, leaning against the frame, looking at me like I crossed a boundary I didn’t even know existed.

His gaze flicks to the photo.

Then back to me.

Silence.

Deep.

Sharp.

“This,” he says, rough, “is one of the forbidden areas.”

“You shouldn’t be in here.”

I yank my hand back. The frame wobbles, almost tipping. I catch it with my fingertips, a small gasp escaping, and set it back carefully.

My heart launches into a reckless sprint.

I face him fully.

He’s still in the doorway. One hand in the pocket of his black slacks, the other holding a half-empty bottle of water. Dark suit jacket gone. White shirt open at the collar. No tie. The gray Toronto day spills behind him through the hall windows, but all I can see is his eyes.

Blue. Fixed on me.

Not the photo.

Me.

And I hate that I like that—because I like it far too much.

“The door was open,” I murmur, hearing how pathetic it sounds. “I thought it was… I don’t know.”

“Thought it was what?” His tone doesn’t rise. It hardens. The plastic bottle creaks slightly in his grip.

“A library.” I hate myself. I hate how badly I lie. I hate how I feel like a teenager caught doing something forbidden.

Aiden steps inside with slow, controlled movements. His expensive cologne—clean, woody, with something darker underneath—fills the narrow space between us.

He closes the door behind him.

Not all the way, but enough.

The soft, final click is loud in my ear.

“It’s not a library,” he says, his gaze sliding briefly to the frame now steady on the shelf. “And I told you this office is off-limits.”

My fingers tighten on the edge of the shelf. I can feel my pulse there, right where the wood presses into my skin.

“I know,” I admit, meeting his eyes. “I’m sorry.”

Silence.

I could move. I could step back and leave like nothing happened.

But my feet feel glued to the floor, like the polished wood has turned to adhesive.

“You didn’t care about this room the first time you came here,” he says, taking another step. He’s close enough now that I feel his heat, even with the careful distance he still keeps. “What changed, Lena?”

Me.

I changed.

I want to tell him I stopped seeing him as my brother’s best friend who smelled like campus and beer—

and started seeing him as this.

A man who fills an entire penthouse with his presence. A man who writes rules as easily as he closes million-dollar deals.

A man who looked at me in that hospital like I was a problem he was dying to solve.

“I wanted to understand your rules,” I improvise, because the truth is too dangerous. “To see who you are when you’re not… enforcing them.”

Something sparks in his eyes. His mouth—too perfectly shaped—curves slightly. Not a smile.

Something rarer. Something harder to earn.

“And what did you learn?” he asks softly.

I swallow.

My gaze flicks to the photo. To my own face—bright, unconscious, pressed against Noah.

“That you’re very good at pretending nothing matters to you.”

His eyes darken.

“I wasn’t pretending,” he says.

“Then why do you keep this like this?” I gesture toward the frame. I’m not yelling, but my words come soaked in something too close to accusation. “This isn’t the junk drawer of a man who doesn’t care. This—” my thumb brushes the glass without meaning to, “—this is…”

Too much. Too intimate. Too vulnerable for the man who just issued house rules like contract clauses.

Aiden is quiet for a few seconds. My breathing fills the space, fast and traitorous.

When he finally speaks, it’s barely above a whisper.

“Because you two are the closest thing to a family I’ve ever had.”

The confession hits hard enough that I have to grip the shelf to keep from swaying.

“Aiden…”

“Don’t misunderstand me.” His gaze shifts again—he lifts a wall between us with a practiced ease that hurts. “The rules exist so this—” his chin tips toward the frame, “—doesn’t become a problem.”

This.

Me.

Noah.

Us.

Slowly, I pull my hand away, like the movement weighs more than it should. I lower my arms, forcing myself not to touch anything else.

“Understood,” I whisper. “I won’t come in here again.”

He nods, but he doesn’t move. The air between us thickens with electricity—dense, almost tangible.

“It’s not just the office, Lena.” His pupils widen slightly. “It’s the whole penthouse. It’s… this arrangement. If you’re going to live here, I need you to follow my rules. Without testing how far you can bend them.”

My pride twists, irritated.

“I’m not a teenager rebelling against her guardian,” I say, holding his gaze. “I agreed because I don’t have many options. That doesn’t mean you get to talk to me like I’m a child.”

His face tightens. For a second I see the Aiden everyone in Toronto knows: the man who never loses control, who makes boardrooms tremble—

and yet here, in front of me, he looks like he’s about to break a rule he wrote himself.

“I’ve never seen you as a child,” he says.

The sentence lands between us—heavy, loaded with things no one should say out loud.

My pulse detonates.

“Then stop treating me like one,” I whisper.

Something fractures in his eyes—just a hairline crack, a flash of raw emotion.

Instead of answering, he yanks the office door open. Light from the hallway pours in.

“Dinner is at seven,” he says, voice iced over again. “Don’t be late, Lena.”

And he leaves before I can say another word.

The guest bathroom becomes my only safe zone.

I shut the door, crank the hot water all the way, and let steam swallow the room as I lean against the cold wall. My hands are still trembling.

Because you two are the closest thing to a family I’ve ever had.

It shouldn’t matter so much.

I shouldn’t picture Aiden at eighteen, twenty, looking at my brother like the brother he never had.

I shouldn’t imagine him keeping a photo of us like a talisman.

I also shouldn’t remember the way he looked at me when he said he’s never seen me as a child.

I pull off my shirt and toss it to the floor. Then my jeans. The mirror fogs quickly, but I still catch my blurred reflection—flushed cheeks, swollen lips from biting them, eyes too bright.

Repressed desire.

That’s what I am right now. A fistful of want with nowhere to go.

I step into the shower and let the water run over my hair, my neck, my shoulders. I close my eyes, pressing my forehead to the tile. The heat strokes my skin, but it can’t put out the fire burning under it.

I think about his hands. The way he gripped the water bottle. The way those long, strong fingers could—

No.

No.

No.

“Calm down,” I order myself, barely audible beneath the water.

I keep thinking about him anyway. About how close he stood in that office. About his voice when he said the rules exist so “this” doesn’t become a problem.

What if the problem is already here?

What if I’m already the problem?

I squeeze my eyes shut, but my mind betrays me—imagines him here, in this shower, stepping in behind me, bracing one hand against the wall next to my head while water runs down his arms, his chest—

My skin pebbles from head to toe.

I slide my hands over my body, trying to make the motion innocent, practical—

but every touch is a reminder of how much I’m missing something I shouldn’t want.

That something has a name.

And it’s across the hall.

When I finally turn off the water, my legs feel like jelly. I wrap a thick towel high around my body, covering my chest, and step out into a cloud of steam.

The penthouse is silent. No footsteps. No voices. No mechanical keyboard tapping. Just the faint hum of the city behind the glass.

I inhale, determined to cross the hall back to my guest room.

And then I see him.

Aiden is in the open kitchen, his back to me, sleeves rolled to his forearms as he slices something on the island. Warm light gilds the line of his shoulders, the perfect fall of his shirt across his back, his narrow waist, the cut of his hips under his belt.

Too late to retreat.

My feet have already carried me a few steps out of the bathroom.

He lifts his gaze to the reflection in the black glass panel over the counter. He doesn’t look at me directly—he looks at my shape.

I know because his hands stop mid-motion, the knife hovering over the cutting board.

I freeze in the hallway.

I’m wearing only a towel. Nothing underneath. The thick cotton clings to my damp skin, revealing more than it hides.

“Dinner’s going to take a while,” he says without turning. “If you’re hungry, there’s fruit in the fridge.”

His voice sounds… wrong.

Lower.

Slower.

I swallow.

“I’m fine,” I say, stepping forward because standing still like a statue would be even stranger. “I was just—going to my room.”

Aiden turns.

And I wish he hadn’t.

His eyes travel over my body in a way he can’t fully disguise. Starting at my face, sliding down my throat, pausing at the damp edges of the towel, continuing along the bare line of my thighs to my naked feet.

The silence turns into something else.

Not just tension.

Something heavier. Hotter.

“You’re going to catch a cold,” he murmurs, setting the knife down. “These windows make the place drafty.”

“I just got out of the shower,” I reply, voice pitching higher than I want. “I’m… fine.”

Another lie.

I’m not fine.

I’m on the edge of something I shouldn’t be.

He comes around the island slowly, like he’s testing my reaction. I can’t stop watching the way he moves—everything in him is controlled, but there’s violence beneath the surface that could devastate a room if he let it.

He stops a couple of steps away.

“Lena.” He says my name like a warning. Or a promise.

I force my chin up.

“What—another rule? No leaving the bathroom unless I’m fully dressed?”

His gaze darkens.

“I don’t need a rule for that,” he says, a thread of irony barely softening it. “Just a little common sense.”

“Common sense says it’s not a big deal.” I shrug. “It’s a towel. You’ve seen women in less. I’m sure.”

Mistake.

Something that looks too much like jealousy—or anger—crosses his face.

“I don’t want to think about what I’ve seen or haven’t seen,” he says, stepping closer. “We’re talking about you. And the fact that this is not a place where you can walk around… like that.”

His finger points—without touching—at the line where the towel ends and my bare thigh begins.

That small gesture is enough to set my skin on fire.

“Why?” I whisper. “Does it make you uncomfortable?”

His eyes lock on mine. Blue. Sharp. Dangerous.

“Yes.”

The brutal honesty steals my breath.

“Then…” I wet my lips, throat tight, “maybe the problem isn’t the towel.”

A muscle ticks in his jaw.

For a full second, I think he’ll step closer. That he’ll corner me against the wall, brace a hand beside my head exactly like I imagined in the shower, put his mouth near my ear and—

He doesn’t.

He stays where he is—one step away—with his hands tense at his sides.

“Go get dressed, Lena,” he says finally, every word delivered with surgical precision, “before I do something I shouldn’t.”

The world stops holding itself back.

My heart pounds so hard I’m sure he can hear it.

“Like what?” I ask, because I never learn when to shut up.

His pupils flare. His gaze drops to my mouth for a fraction of a second. His fingers flex like he’s fighting himself.

“Don’t provoke me,” he whispers.

His phone rings—sharp as a gunshot through the room.

We both flinch.

Aiden drags a hand over the back of his neck, regaining control in a second—like he’d been trained for it. He checks the screen.

“Go,” he says, softer now, more dangerous. “Get dressed. Please.”

I obey.

Not because he ordered me—

but because he couldn’t hide the raw want in his voice when he said please.

I walk down the hall, gripping the towel, trying to breathe.

And then I hear him on the call—low, tight, too intimate to be casual.

“No. Don’t worry. I’d never cross that line.”

I stop dead.

My heart clenches into a fist.

The sentence cuts like a blade—loaded with something I can’t tell is prohibition…

or desire he’s trying to kill.

My mind makes the wrong connection.

I assume he’s talking about me.

About us.

That he’s fighting the same thing I am.

And maybe I assume it because minutes ago—

he almost did it.

He almost touched me.

He almost crossed the very line he’s now promising not to cross.

I close my bedroom door and press my forehead to the cold wood.

Line.

Never.

And yet his gaze under the warm kitchen light had said the opposite.

I hear him moving on the other side—slow steps, controlled breathing—like he’s putting himself back together before becoming himself again.

My pulse beats in my throat, wild, unbearable.

Then his voice slides through the wall again.

Lower.

More dangerous.

More honest.

“No. It’s not a problem… as long as I keep control.”

Control.

The word hums in the air like a warning—

or a broken promise.

I don’t know who he’s talking to.

I don’t know what he’s explaining.

I don’t know what he’s trying to deny.

But I know one thing with absolute certainty:

He’s not talking about business.

And he’s not talking about the world.

He’s talking about me.

About what almost happened.

About what could happen.

And for the first time, the truth lodges in my chest with dizzying force:

The real forbidden line isn’t the one he swears he won’t cross—

It’s the one we’re already erasing without realizing it.