Introduction

They threw me out of this city three years ago, calling me crazy, an obsessed medical student trying to ruin a business heir' s life because he chose someone else. Now I' m back, a doctor, ready to face the judgment all over again.

But at my parents' suffocating welcome-home party, the news blared, announcing the brain death of renowned neurosurgeon Dr. Ben Carter. My world shattered.

My glass hit the floor, and a raw, guttural sob tore through me.

Everyone stared, not with judgment for Ethan, but with confusion for a grief I couldn' t name for a man I didn' t remember.

They thought I was breaking over Ethan Hayes' engagement to Emily Vance.

But I hadn't shed a single tear for him. Instead, I was destroyed by the death of a stranger on the news.

That moment, kneeling amidst broken glass and a grief too immense to comprehend, was the beginning. It ignited a desperate, burning need to understand who Dr. Ben Carter was and why his death felt like the end of my world.