illicit love
Secret romantic entanglement
Illicit love is a romantic or sexual relationship that violates social norms, legal boundaries, or moral expectations—typically an affair outside marriage or a forbidden attraction: Their illicit love affair lasted three years before his wife discovered it.
The phrase carries both condemnation and a hint of passionate intensity, suggesting love that thrives precisely because it's prohibited.
- secret affairConcealed romantic relationship
- affairRomantic entanglement outside commitment
- forbiddenNot allowed
- forbidden fruitEnticing thing that's prohibited
- secretConcealed information
passion · adultery · broken vows · tryst · clandestine · other woman · betrayal · stolen · stolen moments · desire · infidelity · rendezvous · taboo · cheating · mistress · scandal · temptation · whispers
- forbidden loveforbidden romance, forbidden fruit, secret affair, star-crossed, secret romance
- infidelityadultery, affair, adulteress, cheating, cheater
- sexual sinsfornication, adultery, lust, lechery, lewdness
illicit lovemarriage
Formal union between partners
matrimony · wedlock · holy matrimony · spousal love · wedded bliss
illicit, illicitly, illicitness, love, loved, loves, loving, lovingly, lover