chapter 1

Samantha Reynolds sat at her kitchen table, shafts of winter sunlight streaming through the window, lighting her bill pile on fire. She sighed and tucked the strand of chestnut hair behind her ear before refiguring the numbers for the third time. It wasn't easy being a single mother, but it was what she had decided for herself, what she had set her sights on to build a whole life far from the chaos that once had been hers alone.

"Mommy, look what I drew!"

That was when Lily's high voice broke into her thoughts, shrill with excitement. She saw her three-year-old daughter standing there with a crayon drawing depicting their small family: Samantha herself, Lily, and Emma—Lily's twin sister.

"Oh, lovely, honey," Samantha smiled and hugged her daughter, allowing Lily's little curls to tickle her cheek. For a second, the worries receded. At reality of it, that was all that mattered—her girls, her little world.

"Can we go today?" her big blue eyes looked up at her mother.

"Maybe later, sweetie," Samantha replied, her smile tightening at memories of Greg Thornton. She shoved them away. This was their life now, simple and safe, just as she wanted.

The phone rang, making her jump. She reached for it, balancing Lily on her hip.

"Hello?"

"Uh—how do you do, Ms. Reynolds? This is Rachel calling from Ascend Design." The voice at the other end was crisp, chilly, businesslike. "We've gone through the kind of stuff that you've sent us over, and we feel that we could, umm, probably work out an assignment for you in one of our upcoming issues as a freelance project. It'd be great experience for you, because we do have a couple of pretty high-potential clients lined up, and the take for the gig's gonna be above average. Would you do me a favor and drop in for a chat day after?"

Samantha felt her heart leap into a gallop. Ascend Design would be one of the top firms—an opportunity that could just turn it all around for her and her girls. There was a catch. She would have to go back to the very city, the world that she had vowed to leave behind.

"May I ask who the client is, Mr. Whitman?" she asked, trying very hard to sound matter-of-fact.

There was a brief hesitation. "What I am not at liberty to say over the phone, but you can be sure it will be a prestigious account."

Samantha hesitated. She needed the money, and this very well could be what would provide her with the security she craved so dearly, so hard-won for her daughters. And yet, an angle of something, a slant of time's action drawing her back to a place she wasn't ready to go.

"I will be there," she said finally, pretending that she spoke very definitely, though within, she was churning with anxiety.

"Excellent. We will see you at ten."

Samantha looked down at the phone in her hand. Emotions built up in her chest between excitement and dread simultaneously, and she glanced across the room at Lily, who was already playing with Emma on the floor; their giggles filling the room.

Over the years, she had run and run from what she had left behind, had thrown herself headlong into a life that would keep her daughters ever safe from the secrets she buried. Yet now, with all the uncertainties staring her in the face, Samantha knew she couldn't keep running forever.

The decision was made. Tomorrow she would come back to the city to that world—power and riches—which she had once renounced. She only hoped that her most vulnerable secret wouldn't cascade down.

As she hung up the phone, she was cold all over. Little did she know that tomorrow would bring her face to face with that very man, whom she never forgot, and who was ignorant of ever being a father.

The day just seemed to zip by, after that. Samantha did all the usual routine things: made lunch for the girls, tidied up their little home, and worked on her assigned freelance work. All the while her mind was on the call. She couldn't help it; something about this JOB just didn't sit right with her somehow.

Samantha was well aware that by that evening, she would have wrestled Lily and Emma into bed and be sitting down to her desk with a steaming cup of tea right beside her. She opened her laptop and went straight into researching Ascend Design. The firm had always handled high-profile clients, but it wasn't the company that bothered her; it was who was perhaps behind the project. "It was madness that it could be anything to do with Greg Thornton," she told her reflection, but fear was immovable. And, after all, she had taken such pains to make sure that he would never find her.

Samantha's fingers hovered over the keys for a moment. It had been a long time since she looked anything up about him. However, she couldn't take it anymore. The anxieties got the best of her curiosity, so she took a deep breath and keyed in his name in the search bar.

The first hit was an article from last week about some big acquisition Greg's company just pulled off. She opened the screen, and there he was, sharp, handsome with those piercing blue eyes, never gone from her dreams. 'Still as powerful' he read, 'one of the most important billionaires of the decade.' She closed the tab right away. She had seen him, and her heart was pounding. That picture brought back too many feelings, all of which she wasn't prepared to deal with.

She slung back into her chair, her hands folding against her face. "You are over-thinking," she whispered to herself. "There is no way this project is connected with him."

But as she sat in her life that he had nothing to do with, the nagging voice continued within her head. What if somehow it was connected to Greg? What if joining this job gave way only to know more than she had tried to bury?

The way too early next morning arrived. Samantha really hadn't slept at all; her mind was alive with whirling possibilities. Sleeping in with caution, it was going to be a smart, professional outfit that steered well past being too garish or too trying too hard. Running her fingers through her hair, she looked at her reflection in the mirror and wondered if Greg would even recognize her by now. She was not that footloose girl anymore, whom he'd known to be easily untouched; motherhood had made her many things in that time—some visible and some invisible changes.

She kissed goodbyes to Lily and Emma, leaving them in good hands, before driving towards the city. Its skyline became more palatable, silhouetted against the towering buildings in relief against the quiet life she had created. With every mile that passed, she felt a step back toward a past that she wasn't certain she wanted to face.

Samantha drew a deep breath, shoving at the door to the sleek, modern offices housing Ascend Design. The smiling face of the receptionist bade her toward a glass-walled conference room. Samantha stood waiting, her nerves fizzing with anticipation. She had no idea what to expect or whom she was going to meet.

Moments later, the tall, immaculately dressed woman walked in through that door. "Hello, Ms. Reynolds. I'm Rachel," she said, smiling and offering her hand. "Thank you for coming in."

"Hello, thank you for the opportunity," Samantha returned, shaking her hand.

Rachel grabbed a chair and placed it just so and proceeded to yank an executive folder from her bag with a child's smile pasted across it. "So, as I told you on the phone, this is a really big project. The client is very particular and we think that your style is going to be right up their alley."

Samantha nodded as she seemed to try and hear the words Rachel was saying instead of the increasing sense of impending doom that had consumed her mind.

All he could do was listen to Rachel. "We are going for modern elegance, timeless sophistication. The client is just up into new acquisitions in the high-end property category and wants to rebrand."

Now there was no stopping Samantha. This was going to be her kind of project—all creative, high-stakes, and potentially life-altering.

But she wouldn't let herself believe in the impossible, not until.

And the minute she started letting herself believe in the impossible, there was that phrase from Rachel that let Samantha's heart almost stop. "We'll be working closely with Mr. Thornton's team to make sure everything aligns with his vision."

"pleasant surprise" indeed.