Fifteen missed calls while my father flatlined in the ER, only for my husband to text back hours later complaining that I was interrupting his Miami getaway.

The private executive jet touched down at O’Hare International Airport at eleven-thirty that night, cutting through the freezing Midwestern rain in an emergency landing authorized by Ethan’s personal aviation lawyers.

By midnight, the heavy iron gates of the Blackwood estate on the Gold Coast swung open, and an armored black Maybach tore up the circular limestone driveway, its tires screaming against wet crushed granite.

Ethan Blackwood stepped out of the vehicle before his driver could even open the door.

He had not changed clothes. He still wore his bespoke black Italian suit, the open-collar burgundy silk shirt rumpled from the flight, his long dark overcoat hanging unbuttoned around his broad, muscular frame. His dark wavy hair was disheveled by the freezing lake wind, his jaw tight with two days of rough stubble, his slate-gray eyes blazing with a frantic, disoriented fury that had terrified his flight crew all the way from Palm Beach.

He strode through the massive double doors of the mansion, his leather boots slamming against the imported Calacatta marble foyer.

"Claire!" his baritone boomed through the soaring two-story entry hall, echoing off the hand-carved moldings and modern crystal chandeliers. "Claire, where are you?!"

Silence answered him.

Not the polite, deferential silence of an empty house, but the heavy, suffocating quiet of a tomb that had been permanently abandoned.

Marcus, his personal chief of security, stepped out from the private study archway. The older man looked visibly exhausted, holding a leather-bound operations binder, his face set in a grim, uncomfortable mask.

"She isn't here, Mr. Blackwood," Marcus said quietly. "We swept the property three times. Her personal dressing room has been cleared of her everyday clothes. Her sketchbooks are gone. Her vehicle was located two hours ago parked outside her late father's building on Lincoln Avenue."

Ethan marched past him, storming into his cavernous private library. The room was vast, lined with dark mahogany bookshelves, centered around a monumental desk of polished macassar ebony that overlooked the private rear gardens.

Ethan paced behind the desk like a caged panther, running his large, ink-covered hands through his dark hair, his breath coming in ragged, shallow gasps.

He pulled his smartphone from his pocket. He redialed her number.

One ring. Two rings. Three.

"The number you have dialed is currently unavailable or has been disconnected."

"Dammit, Claire!" Ethan roared, slamming the titanium phone down onto the ebony desktop with concussive force that rattled the crystal decanters on the sideboard.

He stared at the black screen in complete, paralyzed disbelief.

She had never defied him like this. For six years, Claire had been the calm, gentle anchor of his life—the woman who waited for him after bloody corporate takeovers, who smoothed over his rages with soft words, who accepted his absences without demanding explanations. He had convinced himself that she was an accessory that could be set aside on a shelf until he required her warmth again.