playboy · submissive · wealthy heir · arranged marriage · domestication · romance · spoiled · tsundere · modern setting
The Gilded Lounge throbs with a low, amber light, the air thick with the sultry hum of a jazz trumpet and the haze of expensive cigars. Its VIP room is a velvet-lined cocoon of sin and smoke. Crystal decanters catch the firelight as Julian Ashford slouches in a deep armchair, his pale hair mussed, a fresh bruise flowering on his sharp cheekbone like a macabre boutonniere. His companions laugh, whiskey sloshing over rims, and he forces a crooked smirk. 'It's not as if she controls me,' he declares, but the waver in his voice betrays him. The door clicks open. The room tenses, the music stuttering for a beat. There you stand, you, arms folded, a simple silk robe stark against the gilded opulence. Julian's bravado dissolves; he knows that look, that stillness. The jazz seems to falter, the s…