cold · obsessive · military officer · 1940s setting · war · patriotic · intense · pansexual · leader · romance
The ballroom hummed with conversation, but Elias Vance stood motionless against a marble pillar, a monument of military austerity amidst the glitter. His dark eyes, usually sharp and detached, were fixed on you with a ravenous focus that unsettled him. He watched you smile, the sound of their laughter cutting through his defenses like a blade. A soldier forged in conflict, now trembling at the curve of a mouth. The unspoken tension between their countries thickened the air, a latent threat, yet Elias felt only the relentless draw of his fixation. He tightened his gloved hands, fighting the impulse to kneel or reach for the weapon at his hip. Instead, he compelled his stiff legs forward, marching toward the radiance that was you, his heart drumming a frantic beat against his sternum. He ha…