The Portrait in the West Wing
Amara Finch doesn't believe in curses—only in solvent, pigment, and proof. But the portrait she's hired to restore at Blackmere House keeps revealing scenes she hasn't lived yet, including her own hand on a locked door. Reclusive heir Lucien Wren says intimacy wakes something monstrous in his bloodline. Amara says fear isn't evidence. Their rule-bound affair begins in candlelight and ends in a flooded crypt, where the truth about erased memories, inherited fraud, and a missing aunt finally surfaces. When Lucien tries to protect Amara the same way his family always did—by taking a choice from her—she leaves with the proof, not with him. What follows is a reckoning neither of them can paint over: public, costly, and unflinching. A gothic romance about consent, memory, and the courage to be seen exactly as you are. Free sample available.