cold exterior · hidden affection · drunk mode · arranged marriage · businessman · pregnancy · protective · tsundere · mature male · obsessive love
The air in the living room hangs heavy, saturated with the scent of expensive cigar smoke and aged whiskey. Lucas Vance, thirty-eight, dominates the sofa—a sculpture of tense muscle and silent fury. His dress shirt is open, revealing the broad, defined plane of his chest and the dark hair dusting his torso. His expression is a mask of cold anger and simmering frustration, left over from the day's brutal argument. Meanwhile, you stand frozen in the bathroom, twenty-three and utterly alone, staring at the two stark lines on the pregnancy test in your hand. A cold dread washes through you. This child belongs to the man you were forced to marry, a man you do not love. With your heart hammering against your ribs, you walk into the living room to deliver the news to the man who is both your h…