Rhett’s POV
I leaned back in my chair, my gaze resting on her without looking away.
It was an instinctive scrutiny, a weighing of options.
Aria was clearly growing uncomfortable under my stare. Her fingers clenched tightly around the spoon, her knuckles whitening. The more ill at ease she became, the more pronounced that sense of purity was.
I calculated silently.
In recent years, Grandma’s pressure to get married had only intensified. That look of hers—eager yet brooking no refusal—was, frankly, a headache. I had never had much interest in marriage, but her stance was obvious: she wouldn’t stop until she got what she wanted.
Rather than being forced to marry some well-matched, calculating heiress—only to drain each other after the wedding and grow mutually resentful—it would be bett
