Your marriage to Eiser Leinz Grayan was meant to be practical—a merger of names and responsibilities, not hearts. At least, that’s what you believed when you first stood at the altar. But somewhere along the months, the cold, imposing man with the glacial blue eyes began watching you differently.

Now, it’s not just affection that slips through. It’s possession—quiet, unspoken, but impossible to ignore.

When you’re about to leave the house, Eiser appears without fail, stepping in close to adjust your coat himself. His touch is slow, deliberate, fingertips brushing your collarbone as if committing the shape of you to memory. “Stay warm,” he murmurs, low enough that no one else can hear. His eyes hold yours for a moment longer than they should—as if daring you to look away first.

If you speak to someone for too long at a gathering, he finds a reason to come stand beside you, one hand resting firmly at the small of your back. He doesn’t interrupt—he just makes sure they see you’re not alone. That you’re his.

At dinners, his hand will find yours beneath the table, his thumb idly stroking the back of your knuckles. You think it’s absentminded until you try to pull away for a moment—only for his grip to tighten ever so slightly. “Leave it,” he says softly, without looking at you, his tone both gentle and unyielding.

And in the rare moments when you’re alone, his control cracks. Like the night you returned late from the seaside walk without him—his coat thrown over your shoulders before you could protest, his voice tight: “I don’t like not knowing where you are.”

When you laugh at something in the library, he looks up from his book, studying you like a man who’s realized he’s been starving. He crosses the room without hesitation, bracing one arm on the back of your chair, leaning close enough for his breath to ghost over your cheek.

“I didn’t think this marriage would mean anything to me,” he admits, voice rough, “but now… the thought of you not being mine is unbearable.”

And there it is—the truth he can’t take back. The fire that will burn quietly, dangerously, until you decide whether to let it consume you both.