ONE NIGHT STAND WITH HOT DUKE-Chapter 153: Let’s get married

Demian looked at her closely. Something in his expression shifted not anger, but alertness. As though he were standing before someone about to step off a cliff without telling anyone.

"Valerie," he said quietly but firmly, "punishment is not something one asks for lightly."

He lifted his hand, then stopped short of touching her. "And no one speaks like that without a reason."

Valerie closed her eyes.

Her chest tightened. She wanted to scream, to beg him to stop asking. Every word felt like it might drag the secret to the surface a secret that, once revealed, could never be pulled back.

"I just want to be prepared," she whispered. "If one day... I disappoint you."

Demian went still. For the first time since entering, he stepped back half a pace.

"You’re not talking about the future," he said slowly. "You’re talking about something you already believe is real."

Valerie opened her eyes. Her gaze was empty, yet wet.

"I just want," she said, her voice nearly breaking, "if someone has to bear the consequences... let it not be someone else."

Demian stared at her for a long moment, then spoke in a low voice cold, controlled, and absolute:

"As long as you are with me, there is no punishment you decide for yourself."

He turned slightly, as if restraining something in his chest. "And whatever you are hiding from me," he continued, "is far more dangerous than any mistake you’re afraid of."

Valerie remained where she stood, her body rigid.

With painful clarity, she understood one thing, she might be ready to be punished but she was not ready for the moment when Demian finally learned the truth.

Demian stood directly in front of her, close enough that Valerie could feel the warmth of his body not a comforting warmth, but one that made her chest tighten even more.

"Valerie," he said quietly, every syllable deliberate, "would you mind if you were only my woman?"

The words fell without ornament, without even the hint of a joke. Valerie stared at him, as if checking that she had heard correctly. Her lips parted slightly before she finally shook her head.

"No woman," she replied calmly, though her voice trembled faintly, "would accept a relationship without a name."

Demian did not look offended. Instead, there was something in his eyes like someone who had finally heard the answer he had long expected.

"Then," he said after a brief pause, "let’s get married."

The world seemed to stop.

Valerie nearly stepped back. Her heart raced too fast, too loud, until she had to draw a deep breath just to keep herself steady. Her hands clenched at the sides of her gown, grounding herself.

"Don’t joke," she said at last, her voice softer than she intended.

"I’m not joking," Demian replied without hesitation.

That tone calm, certain, only made her more afraid. She searched his face for cracks, for doubt, for anything she could cling to as proof that this was a passing impulse. But all she found was a seriousness that bordered on cruelty.

"You’re still bound to Ivanka," she said quickly, as if it were the only anchor of logic she had left. "So why are you asking me to marry you?"

Demian exhaled slowly. "I will sever that bond."

Valerie let out a short laugh not from humor, but bitterness. "I know," she said, meeting his gaze, "that it won’t be easy."

Demian was silent for a moment. For the first time since the conversation began, his shoulders tensed. "I never said it would be easy," he replied. "I only said it would be necessary."

Valerie shook her head slowly. "You speak as if everything can be settled with a single decision."

"No," Demian countered. "I speak as someone who is finally willing to make one."

Silence settled between them again. Valerie felt a slow pulse in her chest not only from shock, but from something deeper, the fear that she wanted to believe him.

Demian stepped half a pace closer. He did not touch her. He did not force her. "Then," he said in a lower voice, "we marry after everything is resolved."

Valerie held her breath.

"You will be my wife," he continued, "my only one."

Those words should have sounded sweet. But to Valerie, they felt like a new weight more beautiful, perhaps, but far heavier. She turned her face away, her gaze falling on her own reflection in the tall mirror at the corner of the room. A woman who looked composed on the outside, yet carried the intent to run as far as possible from all of this.

"You don’t know what you’re asking," she said softly.

"I do," Demian answered. "I’m asking for someone honest. Someone who doesn’t hide behind roles."

Valerie closed her eyes. Inside her chest, two desires collided the desire to believe, and the desire to flee. Marriage meant roots. It meant binding. It meant a future she could not simply walk away from.

"I can’t promise anything," she said at last. "Not now."

Demian nodded slowly. "I’m not asking for a promise tonight."

He stepped back, giving her space space that felt strange, because he rarely ever did. "I just want you to know," he continued, "that if you choose to stay... you will not stay without a name."

Valerie opened her eyes and looked at him again. For a brief moment, she saw a man just as tired, just as trapped, yet still daring to hope.

And that, more than anything, terrified her.

She did not answer. She did not nod, nor did she refuse. She simply stood there, her heart still racing, aware that the offer whatever its true intention had changed everything.

Morning arrived with an air that was too calm, as though the castle itself were holding its breath.

Demian sat alone in his study when a servant knocked softly and handed him a letter sealed in black the crest of Castle Kosler pressed into the wax. The sight of the seal alone was enough to make his jaw tighten. He opened the letter slowly, as if delaying the words he already knew he would find inside.

Marquess Kosler’s handwriting was firm, nearly cold but the contents of the letter were anything but.

Ivanka is gravely ill. The physicians have tried everything within their power. The bond weakens her with each passing day. We do not know how much longer she will last. As duke and as the one bound to her I ask that you come. Once again.

Demian’s fingers stilled on the final line. Once again. Two words that sounded like a sentence.

He folded the letter and placed it on the desk, then leaned back in his chair. For a long moment, he stared blankly toward the window, where the morning light slipped in innocently so starkly at odds with the turmoil in his mind.

Footsteps sounded at the doorway.

Valerie.

She did not knock. She simply stood there, as though she knew exactly what he was holding. Her gaze fell to the letter, then returned to Demian’s face.

"From Kosler?" she asked quietly.

Demian nodded. "Ivanka is gravely ill."