Jace Thorne
Nora Ashby came to Vael Academy for one reason the scholarship that would clear her mother's debt and give her a future that didn't taste like survival.
She did not come to become the vampire prince's fiancée.
But Caspian Vael needs a human anchor before he can claim his throne, and after Nora walked up to him at orientation and made him look down at a shirt that had nothing on it then laughed and walked away he decided she was exactly the problem he needed.
The arrangement is simple. One year. Public appearances. A convincing performance. At the end of it, she walks away with her debts cleared and her life back.
Except nobody told her about the second clause.
Nobody told her that the choice to leave would belong entirely to her. That no court, no prince, no ancient law could remove her once she'd signed. That the most powerful vampire on the island would have no legal way to protect her only a personal one.
And nobody warned her that somewhere between the arguments and the rooftop conversations and the way he looks at her when he thinks she isn't watching, she would stop wanting to leave.
Caspian chose her because she was the one human at Vael he was certain he couldn't fall for.
He was wrong about that. He knew it by the third week.
He just didn't know what to do with it.
1.0K