Strictly Forbidden
A Dark Age Gap Romance
by Isla Wilde
Pairing: MF
Heat: 🌶️🌶️🌶️🌶️ Scorching
Tropes: Dad’s Best Friend, Age Gap, Forced Proximity
He was supposed to keep me safe. Not keep me.
Lola Vance is chaos incarnate—twenty-one, aimless, and shipped off to her father’s best friend’s penthouse when she becomes too inconvenient to keep around. Cassius Thorne is everything she’s not: controlled, calculating, and cold as the marble floors of his Manhattan tower.
She’s a disruption he didn’t ask for. He’s a temptation she can’t resist.
When Lola pushes, Cassius pushes back—with rules, boundaries, and a dominance that awakens something she didn’t know she needed. What starts as a battle of wills becomes something far more dangerous: an obsession neither of them can control.
You’ll love this if you enjoy:
✓ Dad’s best friend with significant age gap
✓ Forced proximity in a Manhattan penthouse
✓ Possessive, dominant alpha hero
✓ Breeding kink and domestic discipline
✓ “We shouldn’t” tension that combusts
⚠️ Content Note: This is a dark romance with explicit content including breeding kink and domestic discipline. Reader discretion advised.
Strictly Forbidden features a possessive alpha hero, a fierce heroine who refuses to be tamed, and a guaranteed HEA.
Read Chapter One Free
CASSIUS
The penthouse was silent.
Not quiet—silent. The difference mattered. Quiet implied the absence of noise. Silence was an architecture I’d spent seventeen years constructing, beam by beam, room by room, until every corner of my life echoed with the precise frequency of nothing at all.
I preferred it that way.
My phone buzzed. “Arthur.”
“She’s on her way up. Flight landed two hours ago, but you know Lola—probably stopped for coffee and a crisis somewhere between baggage claim and your building.”
Lola Vance. Twenty-one years old. Arthur’s only child. The last time I’d seen her, she was eighteen, all elbows and attitude at her father’s wedding reception.
Behind me, the elevator chimed.
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Frequently Asked Questions
How dark is Strictly Forbidden?
This is a dark romance with explicit content. It features a significant age gap (Lola is 21, Cassius is in his early 40s), a “dad’s best friend” dynamic, breeding kink, and domestic discipline elements. If you’re looking for something morally gray and intensely possessive, this delivers.
What’s the heat level?
Heat level: 🌶️🌶️🌶️🌶️ (Scorching). This book earns its four-pepper rating with explicit scenes featuring power exchange dynamics. The tension builds through the forbidden nature of the relationship before exploding.
Is the hero morally gray?
Yes. Cassius is controlling, possessive, and absolutely shouldn’t want his best friend’s daughter. He’s not a villain, but he’s definitely operating in gray territory—which is exactly what makes him compelling.
Is there a happily ever after?
Always. Every Fractal Enigma book ends with a guaranteed HEA, even our darkest romances. Cassius and Lola earn their ending.
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