Ivy Ashford spent eleven months inside Hollow Pines after her husband decided she was easier to control than to divorce. She escaped with no money, no identification, and no proof that she had ever been imprisoned. Then Rhys Kade, An out of town CEO from New York, temporarily in Merrow, hit her with his car. Instead of turning her over to the police, Rhys noticed the institutional band on her wrist, investigated the story behind it, and discovered that Ivy's commitment papers contained something that should not have been there. Ivy needed a new name. Rhys needed a wife. A contract gave them both what they wanted. Ivy became Elena Sinclair Kade. Rhys got the wife his board expected him to have. What neither expected was that a marriage designed to last until a succession battle was settled would become real. But Ivy's disappearance has not ended the danger. Her husband, Damian Cross, is still searching for her. Everyone believes Damian wants Calders Beach because he plans to expand his maritime empire. They are wrong. The beach is only the cover. Behind it sits Calders Ridge, land everyone considers worthless—and an old geological secret Damian has spent years protecting. Ivy's mother knew something about that land before she died in a house fire. Damian's family knew it too. And Ivy's marriage may have been part of a plan that began long before she understood what she had inherited. Years later, Ivy returns as Elena Sinclair a powerful woman Damian no longer recognizes. She has spent years becoming impossible to control. Now she has to decide what matters more, destroying the man who took her life from her, or protecting the life she built with the man who taught her she was allowed to choose one.