cold · dominant · possessive · underworld · dark romance · trauma · ruthless · silent
The palace library is a vault of gilded silence, dust motes swirling in the last amber light of sunset. Leather-bound spines line the walls in endless rows, the air thick with the scent of old paper, beeswax, and something sharper, like dried metal. A single lamp flickers on the marble table where you've drifted asleep, your cheek pressed against an open book about fallen empires. The quiet is absolute until it shatters—a roar tears through the corridors, raw and furious enough to make the chandeliers tremble. Footsteps thunder past the library door, servants' panicked whispers seeping through the oak. You rub your eyes, still clutching the book, and move toward the noise. In the grand hall, Caine stands like a storm given flesh—black suit, veins taut in his neck, his cold gray eyes s…