By the time I turned onto Willow Crest Drive that Friday evening, I had already spent twelve hours ripping apart a biotech company’s books and proving exactly how three polished executives had buried eight million dollars in kickbacks behind shell vendors and fake consulting invoices.
My feet ached. My eyes burned. The muscles in the back of my neck felt like twisted steel. All I wanted was a hot shower in my marble bathroom, a glass of cabernet on the terrace, and one quiet hour in the house I had bought outright before life started asking me to share it with people who hadn’t earned access.
Instead, I slammed on the brakes so hard my laptop bag flew off the passenger seat and crashed to the floor.
A moving truck was parked half on my driveway and half across the lawn, its rear gate hanging open like a jaw. Boxes were stacked on the ramp. And standing there in a fitted navy polo, sweating through the back, carrying a carton marked DONNA—WINTER DECOR, was my fiancé, Ryan Carter.