Maya's POV
The eviction notice arrived on day twelve.
I stared at the paper taped to my apartment door, my hands shaking so badly I could barely read the words. Failure to pay rent. Thirty days to vacate.
Thirty days. I didn't even have thirty dollars left.
I ripped the notice down and stumbled inside, sinking onto the floor surrounded by the boxes Lauren had left behind. Two weeks ago, I'd had a career, a fiancé, a future. Now I had nothing but rejection emails and empty cabinets.
My stomach growled. I'd eaten ramen for lunch. And breakfast. And dinner the night before.
I pulled out my phone and checked my bank account for the hundredth time that day.
Balance: $847.23
The board hearing was in one week. The lawyer I'd consulted wanted fifteen thousand dollars upfront. I'd applied to forty-three hospitals in two weeks—forty-three rejection emails, each one colder than the last.
We've decided to pursue other candidates.
Your qualifications don't meet our current needs.
We're concerned about the allegations raised by Dr. Castellan.
Richard had poisoned every well. His family's name, his reputation, his carefully planted lies—they'd spread like disease through the medical community.
Nobody would touch me.
I was toxic.
My phone buzzed. Another rejection email from a clinic three hours away. I didn't even bother opening it.
Day fourteen brought a new low.
I stood in the grocery store, counting change at the register. Nickels, dimes, pennies—trying to scrape together enough for one more package of ramen and a carton of eggs.
That's $4.37, the cashier said, bored.
I counted again. $4.29. Eight cents short.
I'll... I'll put the eggs back.
The woman behind me in line sighed dramatically. The cashier rolled her eyes.
I grabbed the eggs with trembling hands, my face burning with humiliation, and started to step out of line.
Wait. An elderly man behind the impatient woman held out a dollar. Here, honey. Everyone has hard times.
Tears blurred my vision. I can't
Yes, you can. Take it.
I took it. Thanked him with a broken voice. Paid for my food.
Cried in my car for twenty minutes before driving home.
This was my life now. Charity cases and ramen. Counting pennies. Watching everything I'd built crumble to dust.
And Richard was out there living his best life with Lauren, probably laughing about how thoroughly he'd destroyed me.
Day fifteen, Ivy cornered me at a coffee shop.
I'd been avoiding her calls, her texts, everything. I couldn't face her pity, her concern, her inevitable realization that I was drowning.
But Ivy was relentless.
Maya Reeves, you ghost me one more time and I'm calling the police for a wellness check. She slid into the booth across from me, her dark eyes fierce. Talk. Now.
I'm fine.
You're drinking black coffee because you can't afford cream. Your hands are shaking. You've lost weight. You are the opposite of fine.
I wrapped my hands around the cheap coffee cup—my one luxury this week. The board hearing is in six days. I can't afford a lawyer. I've applied everywhere. Nobody will hire me. I'm going to lose my medical license, Ivy. It's over.
It's not over. She grabbed my hand. I've been digging into Richard's patient files. There's something hinky about Mrs. Patterson's case—timestamps don't match up, medication orders that got changed after the fact. I think I can prove he altered the records.
Hope flickered, weak and painful. Can you get access to the originals?
I'm working on it. But Maya, even if I find proof, the hearing is in six days. We need time.
Time. The one thing I didn't have.
I'll figure something out, I lied.
Ivy studied me with those knowing eyes. You have a plan. I can see it. What are you thinking?
Nothing. I'm just... surviving. One day at a time.
She didn't believe me. But she let it go, making me promise to call her every day.
I promised. Another lie.
Because there was no plan. No miraculous solution. Just the slow, inevitable collapse of everything I'd ever worked for.
Day sixteen, I went to the hospital.
Not my hospital, I was banned from there. A different one across town where I'd done a rotation during residency.
I waited outside the ER entrance, watching doctors and nurses come and go. All of them confident, purposeful, belonging to a world I'd been exiled from.
Dr. Amanda Liu emerged around noon. She'd been my supervisor during that rotation, had written me a glowing recommendation.
Dr. Liu! I caught up to her in the parking lot.
She turned, and her expression shifted from friendly to guarded in an instant. Maya. I heard about... everything.
It's not true. Richard framed me. I need someone to believe
I can't help you. She glanced around nervously. The Castellan family has made it very clear that anyone who supports you will face consequences. I have three kids, Maya. I can't risk my career.
I'm not asking you to risk anything. Just listen
I'm sorry. I really am. She got in her car. But you need to understand, Richard won. Whatever battle you think you're fighting, it's already over. Move on. Start fresh somewhere else. Because nobody in this city will touch you.
She drove away, leaving me standing alone in the parking lot.
It's already over.
Maybe she was right. Maybe I should give up, let the board hearing happen without a fight, accept that some battles couldn't be won.
But giving up meant Richard won completely. Meant he destroyed me without consequences. Meant every patient I'd saved, every life I'd fought for, every sacrifice I'd made—all of it meant nothing.
I couldn't let that happen.
I wouldn't.
Day seventeen, I sold my car.
The dealership gave me three thousand dollars for a vehicle worth twice that. But beggars couldn't choose.
I stood at the bus stop afterward, my bank account finally above four thousand dollars again, and felt the weight of defeat crushing my chest.
No car. No job. No future.
Just a hearing in four days that would end with me losing my medical license permanently.
I took the bus home, sandwiched between strangers, invisible and insignificant.
The apartment was dark when I arrived. Cold. Empty.
I heated up ramen on the stove, my dinner for the fourteenth consecutive night, and ate it standing at the counter because sitting at the table alone felt too depressing.
My phone buzzed. A text from Richard.
Heard you're job hunting. How's that going?
Rage burned through me, hot and cleansing.
He was enjoying this. Savoring my destruction like fine wine.
I typed back: Better than your marriage will go when Lauren realizes she married a sociopath.
His response came immediately: The board hearing is in 4 days. Do yourself a favor—don't show up. Accept defeat with some dignity. You've already lost.
I threw my phone across the room. It hit the wall and clattered to the floor.
He was right. I had lost.
Unless a miracle happened in the next four days, my life as I knew it was over.
I sank to the floor, pulled my knees to my chest, and let myself cry. Deep, ugly sobs that tore through my chest. Crying for my parents who'd died too soon. For the girl I'd been who believed hard work and dedication mattered. For the future I'd dreamed of that would never exist.
I cried until I had nothing left.
And then I just sat there in the darkness, empty and broken.
Day eighteen.
I woke up on the floor, my neck aching, my eyes swollen from crying.
The knock came at 10 AM.
Three sharp raps that made my heart jump.
I dragged myself upright, my body stiff and sore. Probably the landlord demanding rent money I didn't have.
I'm working on it! I called out.
The knock came again. Harder. More insistent.
I stumbled to the door and yanked it open. Look, I said I'm
The words died in my throat.
A man stood in my hallway. Tall, dark-haired, wearing an expensive suit that probably cost more than three months of my rent. But it was his eyes that stopped my heart, golden, with an intensity that felt inhuman.
He looked familiar. Hauntingly familiar.
Dr. Maya Reeves. His voice was smooth, controlled, with an edge of command. We need to talk.
Who are you?
Someone who owes you a debt. He tilted his head, studying me with those unsettling golden eyes. Three months ago, you saved my life in the ER. I was a John Doe mauling victim—you worked on me for six hours, refused to give up even when I flatlined twice.
Memory crashed through me. The massive trauma patient with wounds like he'd been mauled by a bear. I'd stitched him back together, fighting death with every tool I had.
He'd been dying. Barely human by the time we'd finished.
Now he stood before me looking like he'd stepped out of a magazine.
You survived, I whispered.
Thanks to you. He stepped closer. My name is Damon Blackridge. And I'm here to return the favor.
I don't need
Yes, you do. His golden eyes held mine. You're four days from losing your medical license. You have less than a thousand dollars in your account. You've been rejected from every hospital in the city. Richard Castellan has destroyed your reputation so thoroughly that nobody will touch you.
Ice water flooded my veins. How do you know
I make it my business to know things. Especially about the woman who saved my life. He glanced past me into my apartment, at the ramen cup on the counter, the packed boxes, the eviction notice on the table. You're drowning, Dr. Reeves. And I'm offering you a lifeline.
What kind of lifeline?
Damon's smile was slight, dangerous, and somehow predatory.
The kind that will solve every problem you have, if you're brave enough to accept it.
He paused, letting the weight of his words settle between us.
May I come in? What I'm about to propose... you'll want to be sitting down.
Every instinct screamed danger. Strange men with golden eyes and impossible knowledge didn't show up offering salvation.
But I'd spent two weeks drowning in ramen and rejection. Two weeks watching my life disintegrate. Two weeks knowing Richard had won.
And this man—this dangerous, beautiful stranger—was offering hope.
Maybe it was a trap. Maybe it was a nightmare.
But it was the only option I had left.
I stepped back, opening the door wider.
Come in.