Damian saved Mabel.

He is glad, every day, that he could.

But he knows what it means that he had to — that her rescue required a billionaire’s fortune and a billionaire’s expertise and a coincidence out of a fairy tale — and it has made him a quieter and less certain man about the fairness of the world than the confident young one who left this town believing he would conquer it.

Chapter 9 — The Shell Company

The forensic team delivered preliminary findings in three weeks, and Damian drove straight to the cottage and laid a stack of financial ledgers flat on Mabel’s small kitchen table.

“The two hundred thousand dollars that vanished,” he said, “never touched a single account connected to you.