POV: Luca Volkov

The day starts with chaos.

A data breach in Volkov Tower — confidential accounts accessed from an unknown IP in Milan. Every senior executive is panicking. The board fears exposure. Investors threaten to withdraw.

But Luca hears nothing except the echo of Elena’s voice from the night before:

“You don’t get to look at me like that anymore.”

He should be focused on the crisis. Instead, all he can think about is her.

When Elena arrives in the boardroom with a case file and her lawyer badge clipped to her blazer, Luca’s entire world snaps into place — not calmer, not easier — just aligned.

She speaks sharply, effortlessly, tearing through legal loopholes and crisis strategies with the precision of someone who’s worked for this moment her whole life.

Luca watches her.

Not because she’s beautiful. Not because he wants her.

But because she is the only person who has ever matched him — intellectually and emotionally.

Half the room underestimates her until she proves them idiots. Half of them stare too long — and Luca has to grip the table until his knuckles go white to stop himself from snapping.

Every time someone speaks over her, he cuts them down with ice-knife precision:

“Let her finish. She’s the only one here who understands the consequences.”

Elena doesn’t thank him. She doesn’t even look his way.

That hurts more than bullets.

Later, when Luca is certain the hacker’s next move will involve a physical threat, he corners Elena in his private office. He’s not gentle, but he isn’t rough either — just desperate to make her listen.

She tries to walk past him.

He blocks the exit.

Elena: “You don’t get to close doors on me anymore.”

Luca: “Someone is targeting the family. Which means you. I’m not letting you walk home alone tonight.”

Elena folds her arms — daring him.

“I don’t need you to protect me.”

Luca doesn’t raise his voice. He lowers it — the tone that always undoes her.

“You do. Just not from me.”

Silence. Heavy. Unsafe.

He steps back, giving her space — for once not taking, not demanding.

“I know I’m the reason you don’t feel safe trusting anyone. But as long as I’m alive, nothing touches you. Not in this building, not in this city, not anywhere.”

Elena swallows — not because she believes him, but because she remembers when he said the same thing years ago and meant it.

Just when the tension becomes unbearable, alarms sound in the building — security breach on the lower floors.

Instinct takes over.

Luca grabs her hand, not possessively, not claiming — protecting.

“Elena. Look at me.”

She does.

And for the first time since the reunion — they aren’t enemies. They aren’t ex-lovers. They aren’t pretending.

They are the boy who would’ve burned the world for her, and the girl who once trusted him to.

He whispers, raw:

“You’re safe with me. Always.”

And for one breath, she believes him.