Adrian expected the words to shift the room... to command respect, to instill fear, to make Catherine reconsider everything she had just thrown in his face.

But the expression on her face made him pause.

She was smiling.

Not nervously. Not with shock or fear or any of the reactions he'd expected when he finally dropped the pretense and spoke to her as an equal... as a power... rather than a supplicant.

She looked... satisfied.

Like she'd been waiting for this exact moment.

Like he'd just confirmed something she'd suspected all along.

'What... why is she...'

He glanced to the side, almost involuntarily.

Victoria was staring at him.

Not with fear.

Not with anger.

Not even with pity anymore.

She looked at him the way someone looks at a sacrificial lamb that has finally realized what the knife is for.

The expression hit him harder than anything Catherine had said.

'What...?'

"You think this is funny?" The words came out sharper than he intended. "You think I won't..."

"There it is," Catherine said softly, and the smile widened just slightly. "I was wondering when you'd stop pretending."

Adrian's jaw locked.

"What are you talking about?"

"This." She gestured at him, the motion casual. "The real you. The one who thinks love and possession are the same thing. The one who believes his title gives him the right to make demands."

Her eyes gleamed with something dangerous.

"I've been waiting for you to drop the mask, Adrian. It's exhausting watching someone perform devotion when all they really want is ownership."

'She baited me into this.'

The realization should have shamed him.

It didn't.

"You think I care?" His voice came out flat. Hard. "You think I'm going to fall apart because you've seen through whatever game you think I was playing?"

He took a step forward.

"I don't care, Catherine. Not anymore. Not about your opinions. Not about your feelings. Not about whatever moral high ground you're trying to claim."

"My father ordered me to seduce you. To make you mine. And so what?"

He laughed, and the sound was harsh.

"You want me to feel ashamed of that? You want me to apologize for being honest about what I am?"

His hands spread wide, the gesture almost mocking.

"I won't. Because that's how our world works. That's how it's always worked."

He noticed their expressions shift — both Catherine and Victoria watching him with something like fascinated horror.

Good.

Let them see what he really was.

"Because I love you? Because I spent twelve months playing the devoted suitor?" The words came faster now, building momentum. "You think hiding behind the Blackwood name will protect you from me? From consequences?"

He laughed again, bitter and sharp.

"So what if you're a Blackwood?" Adrian's hands spread wide, gesturing at the office around them.

"You don't represent the whole family. You're one woman. One heir who inherited a position she's barely qualified to hold."

"But I..." He pointed at his own chest, cultivation base humming beneath the surface. "I represent my entire family. My father. The Blackwell influence. The vassal families who follow our lead."

Catherine's lips parted slightly.

Almost spoke.

Didn't.

The silence made him bolder.

"And right now," Adrian said, voice dropping lower, more dangerous, "I'm the only thing standing between you and political isolation."

His eyes locked on hers.

"Do you know how many houses have been waiting for an excuse to withdraw support? How many of them think Richard should lead? How many whisper that a woman can't hold Blackwood together in these times?"

Another step.

"I silenced them. My family made them think twice before openly challenging you."

His voice dropped to something almost intimate.

"And you just threw that away."

Catherine still hadn't spoken. Still wore that same expression.

It should have warned him.

It didn't.

"So maybe," Adrian continued, conviction burning hotter with every word, "you should reconsider who actually has power in this room."

He leaned forward, hands pressing against the edge of her desk hard enough that the wood creaked.

Victoria's weight shifted.

Ready.

Catherine didn't move.

Silence stretched between them... thick, dangerous, full of calculation on both sides.

Adrian straightened slightly, a smile curving his lips.

This was how he was supposed to speak. Not begging. Not pleading like some lovesick fool.

He looked at her again, that expression on her face softening into something almost pity... and nothing infuriated him more.

She thought she could dismiss him?

Not anymore.

He straightened, shoulders rolling back, aura tightening around him like a coiled blade.

"But…" he said, voice lowering into something cold and deceptively calm, "for our old times' sake, I can still give you one more chance."

He stepped closer, letting the menace sit heavy in the space between them.

"I'm giving you until this evening," Adrian said, each word deliberate, calculated to wound. "If you come to me and beg... properly beg... to be my woman, then I'll agree. I'll overlook this... outburst. We can move forward with the marriage as planned."

His smile widened, cold and possessive.

"But if you don't? If you're still clinging to this delusion that you can succeed without me?"

He leaned in closer.

"Then my family withdraws all support. Not just passive... active opposition. We make sure no other family backs you. We ensure Richard's succession. We demonstrate to everyone watching that rejecting the Blackwells has consequences."

The threat hung in the air, ugly and raw.

Catherine's expression didn't change, but something in her eyes suggested she was seeing him clearly for the first time... not the devoted guard, not the hopeful suitor, but the entitled heir who believed power gave him rights over her future.

Adrian straightened, forcing himself to project confidence despite the madness churning in his chest.

He turned toward the door, every movement deliberate, calculated to project authority rather than the desperate rage actually driving him.

'She'll come. She has no choice. Once she thinks about it rationally, once she calculates the political reality, she'll understand that I'm right. That she needs me.'

Adrian reached the door, his hand on the handle.

'This evening. She'll come to me. And then she'll understand that some things aren't negotiable.'

He pulled the door open and stepped into the corridor, leaving Catherine and Victoria in silence behind him.

The door closed with a soft click.

Adrian walked down the hallway, each step steady and measured.

His mind churned with possessive certainty mixed with rage... convinced that his ultimatum was strategic genius rather than the desperate threat of a man whose delusions had just been brutally shattered.

'Why did I waste twelve months playing the gentle, patient loyal dog?'

Idiot.

Stupid.

He should have acted like this from the beginning — like a man, like a true heir — not some submissive pet sitting at her feet.

'And when she comes... when she begs... I'll make sure she understands exactly what that means. That I'm not her subordinate anymore. That if she wants my support, she'll give me everything I've been denied.'

He turned the corner, already imagining Catherine's inevitable surrender.

The knock on his door this evening.

Her voice, trembling with the weight of political necessity.

The moment she finally understood her place.

Never considering that he'd just destroyed the last thread of tolerance that had allowed him to remain at Thornhaven Manor at all.

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