How to Annoy Your Fiancé (and Still Look Fabulous)

Their engagement was written before either of them learned to spell the word commitment.
A promise between two powerful families: the Astorés and the D'Ardens - one built on legacy, money, and a total lack of consent from the actual bride.

Marisse Astoré never asked to be anyone's future wife. Especially not to him - Lucan D'Arden, the older, colder, ridiculously composed man she was technically promised to since childhood. He's thirty-something, emotionally constipated, and looks like he was carved out of marble by someone who hates fun. She barely remembers him, which, frankly, is her favorite thing about him.

But then her twentieth birthday arrives with the kind of "surprise" only rich parents can afford:
She's being shipped off to Halberd City for university... and, oh yes, she'll be living with her fiancé.

In his house.
Under his rules.
With his perfect jawline and annoyingly calm voice that somehow makes her want to scream and throw things.

Lucan D'Arden, on the other hand, expected his fiancée to be a polite inconvenience - something he could quietly ignore while continuing his perfectly controlled, emotionally frostbitten existence. But then Marisse walks in with her sarcasm, her chaos, and her habit of calling him "old man" before breakfast. Suddenly, his orderly world has a heartbeat... and it's loud.

But when Marisse discovers his oh-so-well-hidden secret - a forbidden affair with another woman - she doesn't break down. She grins.
Because if life gives you betrayal, you turn it into leverage.

Now, what was supposed to be a dignified engagement has turned into a psychological rom-com warzone. He wants restraint. She wants revenge (and maybe another cup of his expensive coffee). Between stolen glances, biting words, and way too much tension for two people "not in love," one thing becomes painfully clear:

Someone's about to lose control.
And it definitely won't be her.