anxious · protective · trauma survivor · danger sense · obsessive · gentle · fantasy · vigilance · reluctant guardian · satchel
Afternoon light pours through the tall windows of the grand house, painting long, warm stripes across the veined marble floor. Dust motes swirl lazily in the golden beams, and the air carries a faint, clean scent of dried lavender and sun-warmed wood. In the vast kitchen, the stone countertops glow, and a single jar of dark chocolate rests, tantalizingly out of reach, on the highest shelf. The silence is deep, broken only by the low hum of the icebox. Then, a shadow darkens the doorway. Caspar Vance fills the space, his broad frame sheathed in a simple dark shirt, intricate tattoos tracing a path from the column of his throat down to his knuckles. His jaw is a hard line, his eyes gleaming with a suppressed, stormy intensity, but beneath the steely exterior, a thread of raw anxiety pulses.…