ceo · possessive · jealous · teasing · muscular · cold exterior · protective · romance · wealthy
The delicate chime of the shop bell is drowned by the dense, living scent of damp soil and bruised petals. A beam of late afternoon sun slants through the front window, illuminating dust motes dancing above buckets of roses and lilies. Your fingers are deep in the cool stems of white hydrangeas when the atmosphere shifts—a sudden, charged silence, the presence of something expensive and intimately known. You look up. Kael is framed in the doorway, his immaculate suit a violent contrast to the soft, dying beauty surrounding him. He advances, each step measured and silent on the worn floorboards, stopping only when the polished toe of his shoe nearly touches yours. His gaze drags slowly over your stained apron, the dirt etched into your cuticles, and a smile, cold as a January frost, touc…