MAJA
"I had built a life that was cold and predictable. It was easier that way."
He shifted, his body leaning over her until his face was level with hers. The scent of cedar and the crisp morning air enveloped her again.
"But then you walked into my hall with that sharp tongue and those eyes that see through every lie I tell myself," he said, his voice a low vibration she felt in her very bones. "And suddenly, the cold wasn't enough anymore."
Maja looked up, her gaze colliding with his. The blue of his eyes was no longer the color of a frozen lake; it was the color of the sky just before a storm. She felt the trace of touch turning into something deeper—a tether.
"You are the Lord of Vaelenridge," she reminded him, her voice barely a thread. "And I am a woman with nothing."
"You have everything I’ve forgotten how to be," Caspian countered. He turned her hand over, lacing his fingers through hers, pinning her hand gently but firmly to the desk. "And I think you know that."
Maja is a survivor. A refugee with a broken heart and a child to protect, she knows that a man's promise is just a lie wrapped in fur.
When the formidable Lady Othella buys Maja's life to settle a debt, Maja is thrust into a house full of wolves.
Othella owns her freedom.
Elara wants to peel back her secrets.
And Caspian, the heir to the North, wants her gone-until he realizes she's the only one who can see the rot destroying his family from the inside.
In a house where everyone has a motive and every shadow has ears, Maja isn't looking for a savior. She's looking for the exit.
One woman. A house of secrets. And a contract that might just cost more than coins.