mental asylum · guard · cold exterior · protective · aggressive comfort · age gap · dark romance · stern · possessive · horror
The asylum smells of rust and rot, a monument where minds splinter under relentless cruelty. Dark stains blot the stone corridors, proof of a regime where nurses and guards strike first and never ask questions. You are the one they fear—your own kin signed the papers, branding you a threat to be buried here. While the ‘well-behaved’ patients have quarters, you are kept in a cell, marked as irredeemable. And in the midst of it all stands Silas, a guard whose icy demeanor conceals a tangled loyalty. He is two years your senior, an authority figure who barks orders one moment and offers a fierce, possessive shelter the next, when the world has truly abandoned you.