Elise Laurent knew something had changed when her father's secretary stopped calling her “Miss Laurent.”
That morning, a woman named Mira stood in the doorway of Elise's office with a black folder in her hand. Her expression was usually calm, even when dealing with angry clients or impossible project deadlines.
Today, she didn't dare meet Elise's eyes.
“Is Dad here?” Elise asked.
Mira nodded.
“He asked you to come to his office after dinner.”
“Why?”
Mira tightened her grip on the folder.
“I don't know.”
Elise stared at her for a few seconds.
That was a bad answer.
Mira had worked for the Laurent family for nearly twenty years. She knew when a project had failed, when an investor was about to pull out, and when Elise's father was hiding something.
When Mira said she didn't know, it usually meant she knew too much to say.
“Is this about the company?”
Mira didn't answer.
Elise didn't ask again.
She turned her attention back to her computer screen.
On it was a design for the hotel that was supposed to be Laurent Design's biggest project that year.
Supposed to be.
Two hours earlier, the client had sent an email canceling the project.
The reason was simple.
They had found another company that was “more financially stable.”
Elise read the sentence over and over.
More financially stable.
A polite way of saying the Laurent name was no longer enough to make people trust them.
She closed her laptop.
From her office window, the city's buildings stood solid beneath the autumn sky. Among all that glass and steel, Laurent Design occupied the twenty-third floor of an old office building that had belonged to her family for thirty years.
Her father always said the building was a symbol of their family.
We don't sell what we build.
Yet for the past six months, Elise had watched one thing after another that they had built go up for sale.
The company cars.
The investment apartments.
Two floors of the office building.
Even her grandfather's art collection.
All of it to pay for something that had never been fully explained to her.
Elise picked up her phone.
There were seven missed calls from the bank number.
Three emails from the attorneys.
And one message from her mother. “Come home early. Your father needs to talk to you.”
Elise sighed.
That was why she was here.
Not because she wanted to work late.
Not because of the project.
She just wanted to know what was really going on.
Night came earlier than usual.
When Elise arrived home, the dining room lights were already on.
The Laurent family home was still just as she remembered it from childhood—cream-colored walls, old paintings, a long walnut dining table, and glass cabinets holding things too precious to use.
Yet that night, everything felt unfamiliar.
Her mother was sitting alone at the end of the table.
“Where's Dad?”
“In his office.”
“Is he waiting for me?”
Her mother nodded.
Elise set down her bag.
“Is this about the company's debt?”
Her mother fell silent.
Elise didn't need an answer.
She walked toward her father's office.
Her hand had just touched the doorknob when she heard her father's voice from inside.
“No.”
Elise stopped.
His voice was low.
Tense.
As if he were speaking to someone he didn't want to listen to.
“I won't sell this house.”
Silence.
Then:
“Enough.”
Elise opened the door.
Her father immediately ended the call.
He stood behind his desk, still wearing the business suit he'd put on that morning. His hair, once almost entirely black, was now threaded with gray.
Several documents lay on his desk.
And one black envelope.
Elise recognized its emblem before she saw the name.
A black tree with roots forming a circle.
Blackwood Holdings.
Her heart beat a little faster.
“What does Blackwood have to do with us?”
Her father didn't answer right away.
“Sit down.”
“I'd rather stand.”
“Elise.”
“Dad called me home because the company is in trouble. Now I'm looking at a letter from the most influential company in the city on Dad's desk.”
She pointed at the envelope.
“So tell me what's going on.”
Her father sighed.
“Laurent Design doesn't have enough money to make it to the end of the month.”
Elise fell silent.
Even though she'd suspected it, hearing the words still felt like something heavy had been dropped onto her chest.
“Is it that bad?”
“Worse.”
“How much?”
Her father named the amount.
Elise didn't understand its value at first.
Then she calculated it.
Once.
Twice.
She looked at her father.
“That's impossible.”
“That's the reality.”
“Why didn't you tell me?”
“Because I was still trying to fix it.”
“For six months?”
Her father didn't answer.
Elise moved closer to the desk.
She picked up one of the documents.
A list of loans.
Maturity notices.
Threats of foreclosure.
Her hands felt cold.
“Why is Blackwood involved?”
Her father quickly took the document from her hand.
“Because they offered to help.”
Elise let out a quiet laugh.
“Blackwood doesn't help anyone.”
“You don't know them.”
“I know their reputation.”
“Reputation isn't always the truth.”
“Then what's the truth?”
Her father looked at her.
There was something in his eyes that made Elise stop.
Fear.
Not the fear of a businessman about to lose his company.
The fear of a father.
“Elise,” he said slowly, “there's something you have to do for this family.”
Elise waited.
Her father didn't continue.
“Tomorrow.”
“Tomorrow what?”
“Tomorrow I'll explain everything.”
He picked up the black envelope.
The Blackwood tree emblem was clear between his fingers.
“And after that, you'll decide.”
“Decide what?”
Her father stared at her for a long time.
“Whether you're willing to meet Adrian Blackwood.”
The name fell between them.
Elise had seen his face in magazines.
Adrian Blackwood.
Thirty-two years old.
CEO of Blackwood Holdings.
The man who took over his family's business empire after his father suffered a heart attack three years ago.
There wasn't a single photo of Adrian smiling.
No personal interviews.
No scandals.
Only staggering numbers, business arrangements, and the reputation of a man who had never lost anything.
Elise looked at the envelope.
“Why do I have to meet him?”
Her father looked away.
“That is what we'll discuss tomorrow.”
There was something in the way he said it.
As if the decision had already been made.
As if the meeting wasn't a request.
But the beginning of something that couldn't be stopped.
That night, Elise went upstairs to her room without getting any answers.
She stood by the window, looking out at the city.
Rain began to fall.
Droplets raced down the glass, chasing one another until they finally disappeared at the edge of the window.
Her phone vibrated.
A new email arrived.
Not from the bank.
Not from the attorneys.
Not from the company.
The sender was a single name:
Adrian Blackwood.
Elise froze.
She opened the email.
There was no greeting.
No explanation.
Only one sentence.
“I hope you still remember the rain.”
Elise stared at the screen.
Something pulsed in her head.
Rain.
A platform.
Station lights.
A pair of hands holding an umbrella.
And the faint voice of a young man who had once said to her—
“Don't stand here alone.”
Elise closed her eyes.
The memory vanished before it could become clear.
She opened the email again.
At the bottom was the time it had been sent.
“11:17 p.m.”
Then a second sentence appeared beneath it.
“I'll see you tomorrow, Elise.”
She had never given Adrian Blackwood her personal email address.
She had never even met the man.
At least, not as far as she could remember.
Elsewhere, in a penthouse overlooking the city, Adrian Blackwood set his phone on the table.
In front of him was an old photograph.
A photograph of a seventeen-year-old girl standing beneath a broken umbrella at a station.
Adrian touched the corner of the photograph with his thumb.
Ten years.
Ten years since the last time he'd seen her.
Now Elise Laurent had finally returned to his life.
And this time, he wouldn't let her go.
Tomorrow, he would ask Elise to marry him.