The Banished Shy Luna Chapter 37

Elder Thora lingered for a moment after Maverick stormed out, her silver eyes sweeping over me, over Toren, over the smoldering tension that hadn’t dissipated. Then she exhaled softly, adjusting the fall of her gown.

“I’ll speak with the other Elders about this new development,” she said, her voice calm but threaded with steel. “Stay here. Breathe. Do not let his poison linger longer than it already has.”

Her eyes locked with mine, warm and steady. Then she turned and swept from the room, the door shutting with a soft click that left me alone with Toren.

The silence pressed in, heavy and suffocating. My hands shook at my sides, my chest tight with all the words I hadn’t said when my father stood here tearing me apart.

“I hate that he called me that,” I whispered, the word itself catching in my throat like glass. “A… whore. It feels like… maybe he’s right. Maybe all I’ll ever be is—”

“Stop.”

Toren’s voice was sharp enough to cut air. His eyes burned into mine, furious, unyielding. He surged to his feet, the sheer force of his presence making the walls feel too close.

“You are everything but that.” His growl rumbled low, dangerous and raw. “Do you hear me? Everything. I saw it the first time in that elevator. The way you carry yourself even when you think you’re invisible. The way you defy them, even if it’s only with your silence. The strength it takes to endure what you’ve endured and still stand here before me—Kira, that is not weakness. That is fire.”

My lips parted, trembling, but no words came.

He began to pace, energy rolling off him like a storm too big for the walls to hold. “You are resilient. You are kind, even when they don’t deserve it. You care, even for those who tried to break you. And still—” he stopped suddenly, turning to face me, his chest heaving, “still you think you’ll never be enough?”

My throat ached, shame hot on my tongue. “I… I just feel like no matter what I do, no one will ever truly love me for who I am.”

The room snapped with the sound of his movement. In an instant, I was against the wall, his body caging mine, his hands braced on either side of me. My heart slammed so hard it hurt.

His face was so close I could feel his breath when he spoke, low and dangerous, but filled with something that made me ache.

“You are more than enough, Starlight.”

The name burned through me, searing deep. My chest tightened, my stomach flipped, and my knees nearly buckled. Starlight. He said it like I was precious. Like I was untouchable. Like I wasn’t dirt under anyone’s boot but something worth looking up to.

“You are mine,” he continued, voice rougher now. “My everything. And I will not—ever—hear you speak of yourself like that again.”

Then he kissed me.

It wasn’t careful. It wasn’t gentle. It was the kind of kiss that said I am here and I am not leaving. His mouth caught mine with heat that stole the ground from under me. The wall held my spine; his body held the rest. When I parted for him, he deepened it—slow, then surer—like he was memorizing me, carving the shape of us into something that would not fade.

His hand slid from my hip to my waist, to the small of my back, pulling me closer until there was no space left to get lost in. The arm braced above me bent; his palm pressed to the wall near my head as if he needed the anchor. The scent of him—pine and smoke and something distinctly him—wrapped around my lungs. Heat pulsed through me in dizzying waves.

I lifted my hands and froze.

I didn’t know where to put them.

My uncertainty skittered through the kiss. He felt it immediately. Toren went still—not pulling away, but pausing, breaking the rush into breath-sized pieces. He leaned his forehead to mine, and for a moment all I heard was our breathing, ragged and uneven.

“What’s wrong?” His voice was hoarse, scraped thin by restraint. “Tell me.”

Embarrassment burned my skin. “I…” I swallowed. “I don’t know what to do with my hands.” The confession tore itself out of me. “I don’t know how to… be in this. The only other person who kissed me was—”

A sound rumbled out of him—warning, possessive.

“Don’t,” he said, very quietly. “Do not say his name when I’m touching you.”

I nodded quickly. “Okay. I’m sorry. I just meant—I don’t know anything, Toren. He… did everything. I just stood there. I don’t want to ruin this by not knowing how.”

He exhaled, a rough shiver of a breath, then gentled. His hand lifted to my cheek; his thumb brushed the fading sting there as if to erase it. “You won’t ruin anything.” The words were a vow. “You’re new to this. I know.” His mouth ghosted over mine without taking, a promise held on a string. “I will try to go slow for you.”

He stiffened, eyes flashing with truth he couldn’t smother. “But, Kira… I am not built for ‘slow’ for long.”

Something fluttered wild in my chest. “Show me,” I whispered. “Please.”

His eyes darkened in a way that made heat pool low in my belly. “Give me your hands.”

I lifted them, palms uncertain. He took them both, big hands swallowing mine, and placed them gently where he wanted: one flattened against his chest, over the thunder of his heart; the other guided up into the hair at the nape of his neck. My fingers tangled there on instinct. He sucked in a breath like the touch did something to him he hadn’t braced for.

“Good,” he murmured, pride in the word. “Just like that.”

Then he lowered his mouth to mine again—slower, shaping the kiss so I could learn the rhythm with him. When he tilted my chin with two fingers, I followed. When he nipped softly at my lower lip, I answered with a shy, braver press. He rewarded me with a sound that vibrated through my bones.

“You’re a fast study,” he said against my mouth, and the praise kindled something fierce and glowing in me.

He explored the line of my jaw with his lips, a brush here, a warmer press there, and heat blurred the edges of the room. The hand at my waist slid higher, then lower, mapping the curve of me like he was committing a coastline to memory. Every place he touched became a compass point.

“Tell me if you need me to stop,” he said, voice rough silk. “I mean it. I will stop.”

“I don’t want you to,” I breathed, surprised at my own boldness. “I just—” My laugh broke soft and breathless. “I want to do it right.”

His smile was dangerous and tender all at once. “There is no wrong with you.”

He guided my hand at his chest down, letting me feel the steel of him through fine fabric, the breadth, the heat. “Touch me where you want,” he said, eyes never leaving my face as if the map he followed was written there. “And I’ll teach you the rest.”

Courage unfurled inside me like a new wing. I smoothed my palm up, then down, feeling the play of muscle shift beneath my touch. His eyes fluttered half-shut, the line of his throat tightening, and that small reaction—my doing—sent a triumphant thrill through me.

I tugged faintly at the hair at his nape. He groaned, head bowing, mouth catching mine with a hunger that told me exactly what that did to him. Heat streaked through me, bright and dizzying.

“Careful,” he warned, breath skimming my lips, a smile in the threat. “You’ll teach me ‘not slow’ by accident.”

“Maybe I want to,” I said before I could think, then clapped my lips together, mortified.

He laughed—low, delighted, undone—and kissed me, softer this time, the kind of kiss that felt like relief after a storm. “There she is,” he murmured. “My brave girl.”

My chest swelled. No one had ever called me that and made me believe it.

He pressed his brow to mine again, breathing me in. The world narrowed to the circle of his arms and the steady drum under my hand. The cracked door, the threats, the Elders—everything fell to the far edges.

“Toren?” I whispered.

“Yes.”

“I’m still scared.”

“I know.” He lifted my hand from his chest and kissed the center of my palm, tender and reverent. “Be scared. I’ll be brave for both of us until you don’t need me to be.”

My eyes burned. “What if I always need you to be?”

“Then I’ll never stop.” A beat. “And when you are brave for me—which you already are—I’ll be smart enough to let you.”

A knock sounded, distant and polite—a staff knock, not a threat. He didn’t move. Neither did I. We just breathed, foreheads touching, learning the shape of quiet together.

“Breakfast,” he said at last, voice still frayed with heat. “Eat with me. Then we face the rest.”