Forbidden Pages

Prologue

The soft hum of voices echoed through the university library, broken only by the occasional shuffle of footsteps and the rustling of pages. Emma sat alone in a quiet corner, her eyes tracing the lines of text in front of her, though she barely registered the words. Her thoughts were elsewhere—on him.

She hadn't meant to get caught up in this, hadn't expected her heart to be so easily captured. It was a simple class, a semester of Literature 201, one among so many others. But when she'd first seen Professor Ryland Monroe standing at the front of the lecture hall, his eyes sharp and thoughtful as he spoke about passion and tragedy in literature, something had shifted within her. She'd felt it immediately—a magnetic pull that was impossible to ignore. And she hadn't.

In the beginning, it had been nothing more than an innocent admiration. She was captivated by his intelligence, his quiet strength, and the way he seemed to see past the superficial and straight to the heart of things. But admiration had grown into something deeper, something forbidden.

Now, she found herself living two lives: one that existed in the light, filled with classes, friends, and the familiar comfort of routine, and another that existed only in whispers and stolen glances.

Emma closed her book, her gaze drifting out the library's tall windows to where the early evening light was fading. She knew the risks, the consequences of what she was allowing herself to feel. Every part of her rational mind told her to walk away, to keep her distance, but her heart pulled her back to him, again and again.

She wondered, just for a moment, how this story would end.

Because every story has an ending.

Some are gentle, quiet as the closing of a book. Others end with a crash, a painful truth laid bare. Emma didn't know which ending awaited her and Ryland. But what she did know was that she was already too far gone, too deeply entangled in a love that had been as inevitable as it was impossible.

In this story, there was no going back.