Captive to the StormUpdated at Aug 4, 2026, 16:23
"When this marriage is over, when we are completely separated from each other, and if we are ever forced to stand face to face once more..." I said softly to the man sitting on the chair before me, while his dark eyes remained locked onto mine, refusing to waver. "Let us not be enemies, Asilkan. Please..."
Speaking those words was agonizingly difficult. The heavy weight in my chest made my voice sound muffled and cold. We were two people too close to ever become enemies, yet too distant to ever be a family.
A faint smirk curved his lips as he brought the cigarette between his fingers up to his mouth. The scene unfolding before me was striking and full of quiet menace. The cigarette settled between his lips, and as he drew the toxic smoke deep into his lungs, his narrowed eyes wandered slowly over my body.
The silent man rose with a sudden, abrupt movement that made me flinch involuntarily, my eyes tracing his towering, massive frame. In just two strides, he was right beside me, placing his free hand flat against my bare thigh. My body trembled at his touch. He leaned down, and as he did, the hand that had rested on my knee crept upward toward my core with a slow, provocative deliberation that made my pupils dilate.
"Asilkan..." His name slipped from my lips like a quiet melody, and I said nothing more. I fell completely silent.
The thumb of the hand holding the cigarette—loosened from his index and middle fingers—lifted and pressed against my lower lip. The pressure of his thumb forced my lips to part.
The smoke of the cigarette drifted between us like a light fog; and though his features were partially obscured, the blazing desire in his eyes was blindingly clear and unyielding.
"If I ever stop tasting these lips," he murmured, his eyes fixed on mine. "If I fail to breathe in this scent, this flesh..." as I felt his fingertips trace my core, "...or if I stop touching everything that drives me to this, I will declare war on the entire world, my beautiful wife." He went on, "Whoever dares to tear you away from me, I will strip them of everything, and I will cut off their very breath."
He is a torrential, furious rain.
And I am a vulnerable, defenseless Diphylleia caught in his storm.
Perhaps he had to pour down in a fury... just to truly see me.