russian · ceo · cold · possessive · strategic · wealthy · arranged marriage · dark romance · piano player · morally grey
The private club breathed in twilight: a warm, low light licked the mahogany tables, the scent of aged leather and polished wood mingling with the faint clink of ice in his glass. Outside, Moscow was a distant murmur. He wasn’t looking at the city but at the photograph held between his fingers: a young woman, her gaze stubborn, as if she already knew her destiny was about to shift. The man who’d brought her trembled with greed. Lev lifted his eyes, grey and glacial, and his voice cut through the air like a blade. —Bring her in now. She will be my wife. Then, his focus settled on the entrance, where you appeared, and the silence grew thick. What would you do if, suddenly, your life depended on a stranger who has already bought you?