Chapter 50
Chapter Fifty
LUCA
Hours later, she was finally asleep. Her face pressed to Bastion’s chest, her breath even at last.
But I hadn’t moved my hand from her. Not once.
Neither had he.
Bastion’s arm locked her, his hand spread over her waist, his mouth still pressed to the crown of her head like if he stopped, she’d vanish. My hand traced slow, steady lines along her thigh, the silk of her dress bunched under my palm. Even in sleep, she curled instinctively into our hold.
We hadn’t stopped touching her. We wouldn’t. Not after what she’d just given us.
The Liria Accord.
I stared at the ceiling, the numbers, contracts, names running like fire behind my eyes.
The Accord wasn’t just an inheritance. It was a spine of dynasty power. International waterway control. Trade routes older than empires. Whoever held it decided which houses prospered and which starved. It was leverage dynasties killed each other for.
And now it sat in our bed. Breathing soft between us .
Dynasty law was clear. What she owned, her husband inherited.
My chest tightened. Bastion’s grip around her had been worship, but mine was calculation, the weight of dynasty law burning in my veins.
Damius would want it. Our grandfather had built his life around consolidating Crow power, but the Accord had never touched Crow hands. Now it would.
I could already see it: the council table, the old men arguing, bloodlines clawing for relevance. And Damius, eyes gleaming. He’d bend.
The Accord meant trade. Trade meant gold. Gold meant dynasty survival.
With the Accord bound to us, he would approve the marriage. With no hesitation.
Emilia Crow.
The words ran through me. Forcing me to close my eyes for a moment.
Our wife.
Finally.
I looked down at her.
It was the lock clicking shut. The last piece. The one chain that tied her to us in law as much as blood.
I slid my hand higher on her thigh, just enough to feel the steady warmth of her skin under my palm. Bastion’s eyes flicked open across her, meeting mine. His gaze was heavy, raw from hours of silence, but we didn’t need words.
We both knew.
She was ours in every way that mattered now.
The dynasties could circle. Alexander could rage. The Adams could call her liability. None of it mattered. Because dynasty law didn’t care about sentiment. It cared about contracts, names, signatures, oaths .
And those were ours to claim.
I thought of the advisors pressing contracts on her. The houses demanding renegotiations. The vultures circling her silence. Rage burned low in my chest. They’d pressed her until she broke. They’d given her migraines, stolen her sleep, convinced her she was disposable.
They’d made her cry alone.
Never again.
Every paper they pushed from now on would go through me. Every demand would choke in their throats before it touched her. Every dynasty that thought they could claw the Accord back would bleed for trying.
Because it wasn’t Adams anymore.
It was Crows.
And that changed everything.
I traced the edge of her thigh, slow, reverent, keeping her anchored in her sleep. Bastion leaned down and kissed the top of her head again.
I breathed out steady.
She was finally ours. Not just in body, but in dynasty law. In the one language men like Damius spoke.
Emilia didn’t realize it yet. But she would.
And when she did, she’d see there was no escape.
Not from the Accord. Not from us.
Our empire.
Our wife.
Our legacy.