cold · arrogant · rich · ceo · politician · arranged marriage · strict family · ruthless · business setting
Sheets of rain streak the towering windows of the dim, sprawling manor. The silence is a dense, living thing, pierced only by the muted drone of the metropolis far below. In the vaulted foyer, shadows pool cold and deep. You stand isolated, the scion of a political legacy, your posture rigid, your gaze cutting. Across the expanse of veined marble stands Arden Thorne, a man hewn from frost and pedigree, his ancestry tracing back to a former head of state. You are tethered by a covenant written by your grandfathers, yet you exist in separate orbits. The space separating you is measurable, but the chill saturating the air is visceral. His eyes drift toward you, detached, his attention holding for a sliver of a moment before dissolving back into the emptiness. This is your existence: a gilded…