Chapter 1
Kara
The bell above the convenience store door rang for the hundredth time that day.
I didn’t look up.
“Welcome,” I called, keeping my eyes on the magazine I was pretending to read.
It was Christmas Eve, and Bellwood had somehow become even quieter than usual.
Outside, the road was almost empty. A thin layer of snow covered the fields beyond the parking lot, turning everything white and still. The kind of peaceful that made you forget there was a whole world beyond this town.
I had spent most of my life here.
Same roads.
Same grocery store.
Same little convenience store where I worked six days a week.
Same faces coming in for coffee, cigarettes, batteries, milk, or whatever they had forgotten to buy before the holidays.
It wasn’t a terrible life.
It just wasn’t the life I wanted forever.
I looked toward the window.
Across the road, the fields stretched toward the old farmhouse that had belonged to my grandmother.
Or, technically, had belonged to her.
That was the problem.
I still remembered the first time she’d told me what happened.
The mayor had wanted the land.
He’d offered her money.
She said no.
So the offer stopped being an offer.
People came. Papers appeared. Pressure followed. And eventually, my grandmother was gone from the land she’d spent years caring for.
She didn’t receive what she’d been promised.
And somehow, everyone simply carried on.
That was the part that stayed with me.
Not that the mayor had wanted the property.
Not even that he was powerful.
It was that everyone acted as though power made the injustice acceptable.
I’d seen things like that happen more than once.
Someone wealthy made a mistake, and suddenly there were lawyers.
Someone important caused a scandal, and suddenly there were explanations.
Someone with the right surname was accused of something, and somehow the story changed before the truth could catch up.
But ordinary people?
They didn’t get explanations.
They got consequences.
I shut the magazine.
“Still staring at that same page?”
I looked up.
Steph.
She stood in the doorway wearing a long cream coat, boots that had absolutely no business touching Bellwood mud, and a smile so wide I knew immediately she was about to ruin my peaceful evening.
“Steph?”
She dropped her bag beside the counter.
“Surprise.”
I stared at her.
“You’re supposed to be in New York.”
“I know.”
“Working.”
“I know.”
“Being a lawyer.”
“I know.”
“So why are you here?”
She grinned.
“Because I missed you.”
I narrowed my eyes.
“That isn’t the whole reason.”
“It isn’t.”
“Thought so.”
She walked around the counter and hugged me before I could protest.
Steph had always been like that.
She could walk into a room after months away and somehow make it feel like she’d never left.
We’d grown up together, but our lives had gone in completely different directions.
I stayed.
She left.
Now she lived in New York City and worked as a lawyer for one of the biggest companies I’d ever heard of.
I still wasn’t entirely sure how she’d managed that.
“Come home with me,” she said.
I blinked.
“What?”
“For New Year’s.”
I laughed.
“No.”
“You didn’t even think about it.”
“I thought about it.”
“You thought for half a second.”
“That’s enough.”
“Kara.”
“Steph.”
“You’re twenty-something years old, working in a convenience store in the middle of nowhere, and your idea of an exciting Friday night is reorganizing the snack aisle.”
“That aisle was a mess.”
“Exactly.”
I smiled despite myself.
She leaned against the counter.
“Come to New York.”
I looked toward the window again.
New York.
The name itself sounded expensive.
Distant.
Like a place designed for people who had somewhere important to be.
People with penthouses and private drivers.
People whose names appeared in magazines.
People who could walk into a restaurant without checking the prices.
People who could make one phone call and change someone else’s entire day.
“I wouldn’t fit there,” I said.
Steph’s expression changed.
“That’s exactly why you should come.”
I frowned.
“What does that mean?”
“It means you’ve spent your entire life thinking the world is this little place around you.”
“And you think New York will change that?”
“I think you need to see what you’re always complaining about.”
“I don’t complain.”
She stared at me.
I stared back.
“Okay,” I admitted. “Maybe I complain.”
She laughed.
“You talk about power all the time.”
“Because people abuse it.”
“Then come see how it works.”
I crossed my arms.
“And what exactly am I supposed to do in New York?”
“Stay with me.”
“For how long?”
“Until whenever”
I hesitated.
Steph noticed.
She always noticed.
“You don’t have to become one of them,” she said quietly. “You don’t even have to like them.”
I looked at her.
“But you should understand the world you’re judging.”
That sentence stayed with me.
Because maybe she was right.
I’d spent years watching powerful people from a distance.
Judging them from newspapers.
From television.
From stories whispered around town.
But I’d never actually been inside their world.
I’d never seen how they lived.
How they spoke.
How they protected each other.
How much power a name could really carry.
Maybe I should.
I looked outside again.
The snow was falling harder now.
For some reason, the thought of leaving didn’t scare me as much as it should have.
It almost felt like the beginning of something.
I just didn’t know what.
“Fine,” I said.
Steph’s eyes widened.
“Fine?”
“For New Year’s.”
She screamed.
Actually screamed.
I laughed as she grabbed my hands.
“Oh my God, Kara. You’re finally leaving Bellwood!”
“It’s temporary.”
“Of course.”
“And I’m not becoming a socialite.”
“Of course.”
“And I’m not wearing ridiculous clothes.”
She looked at my sweater.
“We’ll work on that.”
I rolled my eyes.
But I was smiling.
I didn’t know it then, but that Christmas Eve would be the last night my life felt simple.
Because within days, I’d be leaving the countryside behind.
And walking straight into a world where money could open almost every door.
I just hadn’t learned yet what happened to the people who held the keys.
Leaving Bellwood took less time than I expected.
Steph and I had barely started driving when the quiet roads of Bellwood began disappearing behind us. I watched through the window as familiar fields, small houses, and stretches of countryside slowly gave way to wider roads and heavier traffic.
I didn’t have much to bring with me.
A few clothes. Some shoes. A couple of books. And the small things my grandmother had left behind.
That was pretty much it.
My entire life fit into a few bags.
The drive was long—two hours by car, followed by another four hours by train. It sounded exhausting when Steph first told me, but somehow, the hours passed.
We talked.
We laughed.
Sometimes we barely said anything at all.
And somewhere along the way, the world outside the window began changing.
The roads became busier.
The buildings became taller.
The lights became brighter.
Then I saw it.
A billboard.
Huge and impossible to miss.
DAWN EMPIRE.
I stared at it for a second before turning to Steph.
“That’s the company you work for?”
She glanced toward the billboard.
“Yep.”
I looked back outside.
A few minutes later, there was another one.
DAWN EMPIRE.
Then another.
And another.
Some were massive digital advertisements. Others were posters on buildings and signs along the highway.
Different advertisements.
Different slogans.
Same name.
DAWN EMPIRE.
It was everywhere.
We weren’t even passing the actual Dawn Empire building, but I was already seeing its name over and over again.
“Okay,” I said, staring through the window. “How big is this company?”
Steph laughed.
“Big.”
“That’s not an answer.”
“It’s the only answer you’re getting.”
I rolled my eyes, but I couldn’t help smiling.
Another Dawn Empire advertisement appeared ahead of us, glowing against the city lights.
For a company I had never stepped inside, it certainly knew how to make itself impossible to ignore.
Eventually, the countryside disappeared completely.
New York was right in front of us.
And it was nothing like Bellwood.
The city seemed alive.
Lights covered the streets. Cars filled the roads. Buildings stretched so high that I had to tilt my head back just to see their tops.
I pressed my forehead against the window.
“This is insane.”
Steph smiled.
“Welcome to New York.”
By the time we finally reached her apartment, I was exhausted.
I dragged my suitcase inside and dropped it in the room Steph had prepared for me.
There wasn’t much unpacking to do.
Most of what I owned was already there in a few bags.
Steph ordered dinner, and we ate together while talking about everything and nothing.
For the first time since leaving Bellwood, I felt like maybe I had actually started something new.
Then Steph’s phone rang.
She looked at the screen.
Her expression changed.
She clicked her tongue and sighed.
I looked up from my food.
“What?”
She put her phone down.
“Work is going to be hell tomorrow.”
“Why?”
She leaned back in her chair.
“The chairman of Dawn Empire died.”
I paused.
“And?”
“And his son is coming back.”
“From where?”
“Abroad. He’s lived there for most of his life.”
She picked up her phone again.
“He’s returning to take over the company, so tomorrow is going to be chaos. Everyone’s going to be there.”
I frowned.
“Do you know what he looks like?”
Steph shook her head.
“Not really. Nobody here does. At least, not what he looks like now.”
I gave a small shrug.
“Sounds important.”
“It is.”
She looked down at her phone again.
“Trust me. Tomorrow, everyone at Dawn Empire is going to be talking about him.”
I nodded and went back to my dinner.
To me, he was just a stranger returning to a company that had nothing to do with me.
I had no idea how wrong I was.
