The Maid and the Merchant

(Not spicy)

In a quiet market town divided by fields and iron gates, Baxton's life is simple: harvest the wheat, sell the bread, keep his head down. Trouble isn't something he goes looking for.

But one evening, a cry from a dark alley leads him to Elodie-a servant from the powerful Harrington estate, bruised, guarded, and far more dangerous to know than he realizes.

Elodie has spent years surviving inside the manor's cold stone walls, where obedience is safety and silence is survival. The last thing she needs is the attention of a kind-hearted merchant boy who refuses to look away.

When Baxton steps into her world, he becomes a problem the estate cannot ignore.
Because in a town where power watches everything, kindness can be the most dangerous act of all.

And some connections are not meant to exist.