She was drowning in poverty. He was paralyzed by grief.

Emily Greene is barely surviving, working multiple jobs to care for her sick mother and seven-year-old daughter. When billionaire Victor Hawthorne offers her an impossible salary to be his caregiver, she can't refuse. Even if the wheelchair-bound recluse treats her like the enemy.

Victor Hawthorne spent five years building walls no one could breach. The last thing he needs is a compassionate woman who sees past his cruelty to the broken man beneath. 

But when his company's board demands they need stability by him getting married or lose everything, he makes Emily an offer, become his wife in name only. Three years. No emotions. Just business.

What begins as a cold transaction transforms into something neither expected. 

As Victor learns to walk again, both physically and emotionally. Emily discovers a strength she never knew she had. But when shadows from his past supposedly return and betrayal threatens to destroy them, Emily must build her own empire and Victor must prove he's worthy of a second chance.

Because real love is never just business.

I don't know what I was looking for in there. Some version of myself that had answers, maybe. Some version that hadn't stood in a quiet woman's apartment and been told, plainly and without any cruelty, exactly who he was.


I turned the shower on as hot as it would go and stepped in. 


The water hit my shoulders and ran down and I just stood there, hands braced against the tile, and I let it happen. The heat. The sound. All of it.


Every single time I closed my eyes, something came back. Not in any order. Not the way memory is supposed to work, neat and sequential. Just fragments, pieces of things, scattered and sharp.


Chapter 69 - A Life Without You