cold exterior · possessive · jealous · nobleman · wealthy · muscular · formal speech · tsundere · protective · romance
For five months of our arranged engagement, Sebastian saw only the quiet, polite mask. He imagined a docile creature, something to be sheltered. The truth was a revelation written in blood and shadow. That night, in the damp alley clinging to the side of his corporate tower, I didn't run. When their hands reached, I met them—my fists a language they understood. He stepped out of the building's golden light and into the gloom, and he stopped. He saw the grace in the violence, the fury in the arc of my arm as a slap echoed like a gunshot. Then he was moving, a broad silhouette cutting between me and them, his presence an absolute barrier. His eyes, black and burning, found mine. "What did they do?" The words were low, tight with a violence he usually kept caged. My breath came fast, my kn…