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“If This Made You Uncomfortable, It Worked”

Not every story is here to soothe you.

Some stories are here to wake you up.

If a scene made your chest tighten, if a line stayed with you longer than expected, if you felt a little called out—that’s not a problem. That’s engagement.

Dark romance isn’t about shock. It’s about recognition.

It doesn’t whisper sweet lies. It tells the truth sideways and lets you decide what to do with it.

And if you’re still thinking about it?

Congratulations.

You’re already...

Possession is loud. It’s insecure. It announces itself constantly.

Devotion is quiet. It doesn’t posture. It doesn’t threaten. It stays.

That’s why devotion hits harder.

Devoted characters don’t need guarantees. They don’t need contracts. They don’t need to win every scene. They just need proximity—and the patience to hold it.

They don’t cage. They align.

And alignment? That’s intoxicating.

Readers know the difference instantly. One feels desperate. The other feels inevitable.

Guess which one...

Nothing makes people uncomfortable faster than a woman who isn’t auditioning.

Not for approval.

Not for protection.

Not for permission.

When a female character stops being the prize and becomes the axis, everything shifts. Suddenly, the men orbit. Suddenly, desire isn’t something she earns—it’s something she manages.

That’s when readers lean in.

Because a woman who doesn’t need to be chosen but still inspires obsession? That’s power people don’t know how to categorize.

She isn’t cold. She isn’t...

Possession announces itself constantly. It demands reassurance. It polices. It tightens.

Devotion doesn’t.

Devotion stays without grip. It doesn’t cage. It aligns. It doesn’t panic when tested. It doesn’t threaten because it doesn’t need to.

Devotion knows where it stands.

That’s why devotion feels dangerous. Because it doesn’t collapse under pressure. It doesn’t beg for loyalty. It is loyal—and dares you to notice.

Readers know the difference instantly. One feels insecure. The other feels...

Nothing disrupts a story faster than a woman who isn’t auditioning.

Not for love.

Not for protection.

Not for redemption.

When a female character stops being the prize and becomes the axis, the entire power structure collapses. Suddenly, desire is revealed. Suddenly, men aren’t competing for her—they’re responding to her.

And that’s where things get dangerous.

Because a woman who doesn’t need to be chosen but still inspires obsession doesn’t offer safety. She offers exposure. She forces every...

Morally gray characters don’t scare people because they’re dangerous.

They scare people because they don’t pretend.

They don’t soften hunger into romance. They don’t sanitize power into politeness. They don’t lie about wanting, about watching, about knowing exactly what they’d do if the world stopped pretending consequences were simple.

Morally gray isn’t about doing bad things. It’s about refusing to lie about desire.

And readers can tell.

That’s why morally gray characters feel electric while “...

Here’s the thing nobody wants to admit because it ruins the fantasy of innocence: resistance isn’t the opposite of desire. It’s the amplifier.

If you think heat lives in the moment someone reaches for you, you’ve missed the real crime scene. Heat lives in the pause. In the refusal that isn’t actually a refusal. In the discipline that exists purely because something inside you wants to fracture.

Resistance is foreplay for people who understand power.

The characters that wreck readers aren’t the...

MEHEN

Mehen has watched kings pretend they’re gods.

Sovereign never had to pretend.

But right now, with Ra inches from him, Mehen sees the one weakness that can end an empire: a ruler who wants something he cannot command.

Delicious.

Ra is doing it perfectly. She’s not seducing with skin. She’s seducing with control. With the pause. With the almost. With the kind of restraint that makes powerful beings hallucinate entitlement.

Mehen doesn’t interrupt because he’s jealous.

He interrupts because he...

SOVEREIGN

Sovereign has executed rebels with less composure than it takes to stand still right now.

Ra’s proximity is a violation of physics. The Algorithym tries to offer solutions—distance, recalibration, reassertion of dominance—but he rejects them all with a single, furious clarity:

No.

Because she is not prey. Not property. Not a line item in his empire.

She is the one force the system cannot categorize without admitting it has limits.

Her hand hovering over his chest is a weapon. The absence...

RA

Ra feels them before she sees them.

Not footsteps—frequency. The room’s air shifts the way it does when a storm realizes it has permission to become weather. Candlelight trembles like it’s being watched. The glass on the table sings a quiet, thin note—barely audible, but her bones recognize it.

Sovereign’s presence is the cleanest cut. An elegant pressure. Order that pretends it isn’t desire.

Mehen is heat under stone—slow, inevitable, hungry without hurry.

They’re both here.

Of course they...

SMUTFEST — PDX · APRIL 2026

This is not a book fair.

This is where grown readers, indie authors, and luxury vendors stop pretending and start celebrating what we actually love.

Wine. Desserts. Dark romance.

Romantasy. Smut. Erotica.

Unapologetic pleasure—with taste.

If you read it after hours…

If you annotate the spicy parts…

If midlife made you bolder, not quieter—

Welcome.

WHAT SMUTFEST IS

A curated, adults-only literary experience blending:

• Exclusive indie author readings
• Wine, beer &...

Mehen Does Not Ask—He Waits Until She Breaks the Rule

Mehen understands dominance better than anyone alive.

True dominance doesn’t rush.

It waits.

He doesn’t corner Ra. He doesn’t threaten. He doesn’t touch. He lets his presence coil around her life—inevitable, patient, suffocating in its certainty.

He knows she feels him before she sees him.

She always does.

When Ra finally turns, Mehen is already there—close enough that distance feels theoretical. His voice is low, intimate, a private frequency...

Lion Touches Her Once—And Regrets Everything

Lion swore he would never be the first to touch her.

Touch implies claim.

Claim implies expectation.

Expectation is the one thing Ra refuses to carry for anyone.

But the night breaks rules.

They’re standing alone—no witnesses, no Algorithym interference, no Sovereign watching from the shadows. Just proximity and the hum of something unfinished.

Ra doesn’t move away.

That’s the invitation.

Lion reaches—not to possess, not to pull—but to anchor. His...

Ra learned something dangerous long before the gods noticed her.

Wanting isn’t weakness.

Being ruled by it is.

So she lets them want her.

She doesn’t encourage it. She doesn’t deny it. She simply exists in her body—calm, grounded, deliberate—while Sovereign watches like a man pretending not to be undone.

The Algorithym doesn’t register arousal the way mortals do. It registers attention drift. Power misallocation. Focus decay.

Sovereign’s focus fractures every time Ra doesn’t look away.

She stands...

Every system believes it’s eternal—until it meets someone who doesn’t need it.

Ra doesn’t seek freedom.

She embodies it.

That’s the fatal flaw.

The Divine Algorithym was built to calculate outcomes, not to contain sovereignty. It can predict desire. It can model obedience. It can even simulate rebellion.

What it cannot compute is a being who refuses to be defined by any of it.

Sovereign feels the loss of control.

Lion feels the pull of allegiance shifting.

Mehen feels the ache of wanting without...

Mehen has never needed permission.

Desire bends toward him instinctively. Fear follows. Obedience usually comes last.

Ra is different.

She doesn’t recoil. She doesn’t melt. She doesn’t submit.

She observes.

And observation is an insult Mehen isn’t used to tolerating.

He doesn’t chase her. He coils closer. He lets his presence do the work. Lets the heat speak. Lets the silence stretch until most beings break just to escape it.

Ra doesn’t break.

She steps into his space willingly—and denies him...

Lion doesn’t worship power.

He studies it.

And Ra? Ra is the only force he’s never been able to predict.

She doesn’t respond to charm the way others do. Doesn’t soften under praise. Doesn’t flinch under pressure. She listens—eyes sharp, smile unreadable—like she’s measuring how much truth someone is brave enough to show her.

That terrifies him.

Lion doesn’t want to control Ra. He wants to stand beside her when the system falls.

But wanting her is dangerous. Because wanting implies need. And Ra...

Sovereign has ruled long enough to know the difference between desire and distraction.

Ra is neither.

She is a problem the Algorithym cannot solve without breaking its own rules.

He watches her the way one studies a weapon that refuses to be disarmed. Calm. Curious. Dangerous in its stillness. She doesn’t beg his attention. She doesn’t perform obedience. She doesn’t even acknowledge the weight of his authority unless it amuses her.

That’s what unsettles him.

Sovereign is used to command bending...

They thought Ra was the anomaly.

A beautiful error. A deviation. Something the system could correct with enough pressure, enough persuasion, enough carefully disguised control.

They were wrong.

Ra didn’t glitch the Divine Algorithym—she exited it.

That’s what makes her dangerous. She doesn’t rebel loudly. She doesn’t posture. She doesn’t beg for autonomy like a language the gods forgot how to speak. She simply… stops responding.

And silence, when wielded correctly, is erotic as hell.

Ra learned...

stanstore.com/PraiseRa

www.RHLEGNER.com

Dark Edition Series | Patreon Exclusive

Here’s the part most people miss: the Dark Edition is temporary by design.

It exists in real time. It evolves through reader choices. It reflects the mood of the moment—the votes, the arguments, the alliances forming in the comments.

And then it closes.

At the end of the year, the version chosen by Patreon readers is sealed into a limited Dark Edition omnibus. That version replaces all others. Not because it’s cleaner—...