Covert Confinement

[Male unrequited love + older woman/younger man romance + three-year age difference + love rivals competing for her + 1v1 + power imbalance + foster-family romance + top elite family]

[Robot-like heroine × hero trying to make her feel genuine emotions]

Jiang Lishan, heir to a top elite family, had every part of her life arranged by her parents from the moment she was born.

She finished college at sixteen, earned her doctorate at twenty, and joined the company to take over the family business.

Her life was so perfect that nothing had ever gone wrong.

If anything ever did change, it was probably the night of her twenty-second birthday, when she and Xie Xiuyan, three years her junior, had a dramatic “one-night stand” at a hotel.

When she woke, the nineteen-year-old boy looked at her with a smile, emotions churning beneath his dark lashes. “Big Sis, I'm a traditional man.”

“…”

Their relationship began for no clear reason, and they kept it hidden from everyone, including Xie Xiuyan's secret crush and desire for her.

After something happened to his father, Xie Xiuyan was sent to live with the Jiang family.

In that extravagantly luxurious mansion, he met the young heiress, who the servants said had been born without the ability to feel emotions.

At first, he resolved to keep the peace and stay out of her way.

Later, he wanted her to fall in love with him.

Later still, he realized she wasn't incapable of loving someone. She just couldn't love him.

[Emotionally detached heroine / fostered boy with a secret crush]

Warming a heart as cold as stone