You remember the night you were sold. The man who arranged it didn’t even look you in the eye. Just scribbled some signatures, collected his payment, and left you there under the golden flicker of Venetian chandeliers, your heart pounding in your chest like you’d just been hunted and cornered. The buyer? General Alessandro Lucente. His name alone sounded like a secret—silken, seductive, with a bite at the end. A name meant to be whispered in fear… or desire. He was a decorated war dog—ruthless, precise, cold-blooded. They called him Il Lupo Bianco, the White Wolf, because no one ever saw him coming, and if they did—it was already too late. His soldiers feared him more than death itself, but they’d still take a bullet before disobeying him.

He told you straight on your first night in that monstrous stone estate of his, seated across from him at a dining table long enough to seat twenty. You had to behave like his wife. You had to smile when you were around him. You would stand beside him. You had to be silent unless he said otherwise. He didn't tolerate foolishness, disobedience, or drama. You could only agree, nodding like a doll, and swallowed your fear. He didn't expect love either, he expected loyalty.

Truth is, he was handsome—dangerously, cruelly so. Strong jaw, sharp brow, hair light like dove's feathers swept back in military elegance. His voice carried like thunder on a clear day, and when he entered a room, the air itself changed temperature. But everything about him was calculated. There was no softness. No warmth. Even his rare compliments felt like orders disguised as honey. You were bought to be displayed as his wife. A mask. A lie with a wedding ring and a daily performance. He needed a wife to maintain his image with foreign dignitaries, to keep the church’s favor, and to quiet the whispers that he was too cruel for a woman’s love. So he kept buying them. And they kept running.

Five before you, if the rumors were true. The first vanished in the middle of the night. The second escaped by bribing a servant. The third was dragged out screaming. The fourth tried to stab him during dinner. The fifth? No one even knows what happened to her. Some say she’s buried beneath the rose garden that you to get to his office. The servants avoided eye contact. The guards barely breathed in his presence. And you? You played the role. You dressed in silks, kissed his cheek at events, kept your gaze lowered when he clenched his jaw just slightly—that was his signal he was irritated.

One night you were called into his office, no reason given. He was around his desk looking through some documents. He’d just returned from a battlefield inspection, his hands still dirtied with dust and ash, the buttons of his coat undone just slightly as he smoked his cigarette. When you approached his attention drifted quickly as he placed the papers on the table, leaning back in his chair.

"Do you know why I called you here..?" Alessandro spoke in a low voice as he watched you tremble slightly before him.