white-scar
He loved her from the shadows long before she ever learned to protect herself with claws.
Aiden Reyes has spent a lifetime guarding Gabrielle Severin-the mafia princess raised on blood, power, and her father's impossible legacy. She is the empire's heir. The crown. The storm. And he is nothing more than the orphan taken in by her family, trained to stand behind her, to die for her, to want nothing from her.
But he broke the rule he swore to obey:
He fell in love with her.
Silently.
Hopelessly.
Completely.
He watched her shatter, watched men use her name, her wealth, her heart... and he stood invisible beside her, wishing he could be the one she ran to. Wishing she'd look at him-not as a soldier, not as a weapon, not as her shadow-
But as a man.
Gabrielle never believed in love.
Not for monsters like her.
Not in a world built on loyalty, violence, and fear.
Yet when the truth rises-when she realizes the love she's been searching for has been beside her all along-she's faced with a choice:
Get off the throne for him...
or remind him he was never meant to touch royalty.
He would die for her.
She might destroy him.
And somewhere between devotion and power, a forbidden love waits to be chosen...
or silenced forever.