Chapter 1:The
Elenas pov
There’s something about Mondays that always feels like a warning.
The coffee pot had already betrayed me by sputtering halfway through the brew, my son Aiden was late for school because he couldn’t find his favorite Spider-Man socks, and my inbox... well, it was full of the usual chaos. Deadlines, client updates, but one email flagged in red with the subject line: Blackwell Wedding – URGENT RESPONSE NEEDED.
I nearly deleted it without opening it. Blackwell? As in those Blackwells? Manhattan’s version of royalty? It had to be a scam or worse, a cruel coincidence. But something in my gut asked me to check it out, so I clicked.
> “MS. ELENA HART,
You come highly recommended for high-profile event planning. We’d like to offer you the opportunity to coordinate the upcoming wedding of Ms. Veronica Blackwell. The event will take place at the Blackwell estate in New York. Full discretion required. Serious inquiries only.
Avery Clarke, Blackwell Enterprises.”
My hands went cold. I hadn’t heard that name in nearly eight years. But it haunted me in every corner of my life: in Aiden’s golden-brown eyes, in the shadows of the dreams I never chased, in the echo of a love I never quite stopped feeling.
Blackwell. LIAM BLACKWELL
My heart beat harder by just thinking about it, I told myself I’d moved on, built something better and safer. That I had my own business, a beautiful, brilliant son and a quiet life but my fingers hovered over the keyboard.
This was the kind of job that could launch my career into an entirely new bracket. Celebrity-level and Manhattan elite, even five-star clients and I could finally move us out of our tiny two-bedroom in Queens, maybe afford the art classes Aiden kept asking about.
And it wasn’t like Liam would be there. He probably didn’t even know I existed anymore, let alone that I had his child.
I clicked Reply before I could talk myself out of it.
> “Dear Ms. Clarke,
Thank you for the opportunity. I’m interested and available to discuss the Blackwell wedding further. Please let me know the next steps.
Elena Hart"
I hit send but immediately regretted it. Then I whispered to the empty room.
“What the hell did I just do?”
By Wednesday, I was standing in the Blackwell tower lobby, my heels were too high and my blazer was also too tight, and my stomach twisting itself into knots. Everything about the place screamed opulence: shining tiled floors, a crystal chandelier that could fund Aiden’s entire future, and a front desk staff dressed better than most CEOs.
Avery Clarke met me with a polite smile and a tablet in her hand. She was the kind of woman who wore her authority like perfume, always impossible to miss.
“Ms. Hart,” she greeted. “Follow me, Veronica is waiting.”
We stepped into the elevator, and I stopped breathing the second the doors slid shut. Memories flooded in, memories of another elevator, another time, Liam’s mouth on mine, my back pressed to mirrored glass, laughter between kisses.
Get it together, Elena.
The elevator opened to a conference room with floor-to-ceiling windows overlooking the city. Veronica Blackwell stood at the head of the table, sharp as ever in an ivory pantsuit, her dark hair pulled into a bun.
“Elena Hart,” she said, like tasting a name she hadn’t expected. “Well, I didn’t think you’d say yes.”
I lifted my chin. “Neither did I.”
She smirked. “Let’s get started, then.”
And just like that, I stepped back into the world I thought I left behind, into the mouth of the dragon I once loved.
His world.
