I never asked for a crown.
Or the man who came with it.
This marriage was a ledger entry, a duke's duty to secure his line through me. Cold. Calculated. The candle flames danced on his sharp features as we faced each other in that vast bedchamber, inches apart, our breaths tangling like secrets we dared not name. I told myself it was just nights of necessity, bodies joined for legacy alone.
But his hands. God, his hands found places duty never mapped. Practical woman that I am, I masked my loneliness behind Duchess-perfect poise, years of isolation sharpening me into something unyielding. Yet he unraveled it all with a touch that demanded more than heirs. Possession. Trust. The kind that defies whispers in drawing rooms and rivals circling our fragile alliance. Sweat gleamed on our skin as we moved together, baring souls amid the rumpled linens, my guarded heart cracking under the weight of what felt like salvation.
I crave the surrender he offers, raw and unrelenting, even as it risks everything. My independence, so hard-fought in shadows of empty halls. The dukedom itself, hanging on this heir we chase through ecstasy that mocks every decorum. He built walls of strategy around his obsession, but I breach them nightly, defiant in my need. One sun-warmed garden rose, roots twisting deep in soil, mirrors us perfectly, fates entwined beyond escape.
What if this blaze consumes us before we claim what's ours?
