A birthday gift she never asked for: A five-year-old secret.
On the night of her birthday, Amy Atlas-the beloved heiress to the Atlas Corps empire-trusted her step-sister and her boyfriend to celebrate with her. The night turned from champagne to chaos when she was drugged and forced to flee from unknown assailants. Her desperate escape ended in the room of a mysterious woman, Vesta Vlad Valerius, who vanished by morning, leaving only questions behind.
A month later, the nightmare deepened when Amy discovered she was pregnant. But with no memory of how she became pregnant, the father was a terrifying mystery. Branded a disgrace by her step-mother and disowned by her powerful father, Amy was cast out, forced to raise her daughter alone in the cold shadow of her former life.
For five years, she built a new world for her child-until the day the past returned with a crown. Vesta, the formidable Monarch of Valerius, reappears, not with an explanation, but with a claim: the child is hers.
Terrified of losing the one good thing to come from her trauma, Amy is drawn back to the opulent and dangerous world of Valerius by the calculating Vesta. Now, she must uncover the truth about that fateful night to protect her daughter, navigating a web of power, betrayal, and a monarch who will stop at nothing to get what she wants.
The question is no longer how she got pregnant, but who is the father?
