It began as a ruse. Take a girlfriend. Divert the press from the fucked up mess that's my family until my father is re-elected. Stage a public breakup. Move on. Only that brilliant plan went straight south the moment I set eyes on Willow Blackwell. I found her. My center. My future. A soul mate with the will of a mule and the mouth of a harpy. I now want things I never wanted before. Permanent kinds of things. Only Fate -- and her ex -- have other plans for us. In some sort of cosmic impossibility, our lives unknowingly intersected years before when tragedy befell both our families. Once the devastating truth is finally revealed, the future I'd found in her will come crashing down around us and for the first time in my life I'm completely helpless. I may very well lose the only woman I've ever loved to a past neither of us saw coming.