Chapter 23

• Chapter 23: Avoiding Her
• Luca wakes with a dull, persistent ache behind his eyes, the kind that burrows deep into his skull and refuses to leave.
• He drags a hand across his face, calloused fingers pressing against his throbbing temples, trying desperately to shake off the leaden heaviness lingering from his sleepless night. The Egyptian cotton sheets are thoroughly tangled around his legs, twisted into a complex labyrinth from hours of restless tossing. His pillow lies discarded on the floor, as if he fought with the bed itself during the dark hours. Maybe he did. The evidence of his internal battle is scattered across the room—a lamp slightly askew, a glass of water half-empty, his phone face down on the nightstand where he'd thrown it after checking the time for the fifth time at 3:47 a.m.