[A brooding, obsessive powerbroker and a clear-eyed, pampered heiress | Everyday life | A slow, steady romance | Slow-paced; not for readers who want a fluffy love story]
[Coercive love + possessive pursuit + amnesia + long-laid plans + a groveling pursuit for his wife + sweet before angst + love and hate + revenge + sweet, indulgent wish fulfillment + dazzling young lady]
They first met at a military camp. He was an official of the Privy Council, sent by imperial decree to reward the troops. Her father, a third-rank General of the Cloud-Veiled Banner, had just returned from a victorious campaign.
She rode back to camp against the light, dressed in a crimson hibiscus gown, her long hair tied with a red ribbon. She was beautiful and bold.
As he watched her, he thought the young woman had been spoiled by her family, leaving her too kindhearted and easy to manipulate.
A woman like her needed her wings clipped and had to be locked in a gilded cage.
He would wear down every sharp edge until she became a creeping vine who could only cling to him and could never leave his side.
And later, that was exactly what he did.
In the stately marquis’s manor, amid brocade curtains and soft beds, Rong Shubao believed she was the happiest woman in the world.
She had loving parents and a gentle, considerate husband. Her life was peaceful and content.
But each time she stumbled upon another truth, she learned that her parents were impostors, their loving marriage was a lie, and everything was an elaborate deception woven by the man beside her.
Her husband had long since started a family with another woman, while her real parents were dead and her home was gone.
She faked her death to escape, but he found her again and again.
“Do you really want to leave me that badly? What’s so wrong with staying by my side?”
The last time they met, he collapsed before her and smiled as he said, “Don’t let our child call someone else Father. Don’t forget me.”
