Page 1

Chapter one

Sam barely moved a muscle as she stared down at the speakerphone in the middle of the wide wooden conference room table.

“Well Sam,” the man’s voice buzzed through, “I have to hand it to you. Everything looks great so far. The software you’ve developed seems very promising, and I think there’s a good chance your company could make a great addition to our portfolio.”

Somehow, her body both tensed and relaxed as she shot a glance at Caleb across the table. His eyes widened slightly, a sharp contrast to the calm expression he usually wore. The loose waves of his ink-black hair fell into his eyes as he ran a hand through it—a nervous habit she’d seen countless times over the years.

“We’ll need to really dive in and test things out, though, of course,” Howard added, his deep voice booming through the speaker.

“Yes. Absolutely,” she replied immediately, leaning forward in the office chair, as if being a few inches closer would somehow speed things along.

“So,” he continued, “that could take a while.”

Caleb shifted again, adjusting the cuff of his shirt beneath his jacket. His tall, thin frame practically folded itself into the chair as he leaned forward, one hand fidgeting with the pen he always kept nearby.

Sam glanced away, refusing to read the look on his face. It was pointless, anyway. She knew he had the same thoughts running through his head that she did.

Caleb had been with her from the start. They’d met fresh out of college after being hired by the same company. Sam worked as a software engineer, while Caleb was in finance and administration.And despite their different areas of expertise, the connection had been immediate—Caleb’s sharp analytical mind balancing her own relentless drive for innovation.

They each only made it through two months of grueling sixty-hour weeks, bonding over their tyrannical managers during rushed coffee breaks. And one day, they’d both had it. They decided that if they were going to be working that hard for anyone, it would be for themselves and not some huge corporation that cared even less about them than they did about it.

Sam had already been working on the first version of the financial reporting software in her spare time, which would later turn into a company more successful than either of them could’ve ever imagined.

And after they officially quit, those sixty-hour weeks instantly turned into hundred hour weeks. Although neither of them minded much. Working on something for themselves was a different level of satisfaction. One they both desperately craved.

But then, reality hit.

They needed money.Badly.

No matter how much she wanted to code all day, they also had to get clients to pay for and use the software.

Luckily, that’s where Caleb excelled. And the more clients he signed, the more work it brought.

At the beginning, the constant work had felt more like excitement. But after four years, that excitement had dwindled into something far less enjoyable.

No matter how hard they tried, it seemed like they could just never quite keep up. If they weren’t dealing with development issues, then they were moving to new cities to integrate clients onto the platform. And if they weren’t doing that, they were courting new potential clients.

And although they’d built it into a substantial company, every day still felt like a never-ending struggle.

So when the large corporation reached out to them with an interest in acquiring the company and software, it felt like they’d finally found an answer.

She’d known a handful of classmates from MIT who had gone that exact route. Creating a startup, then selling a few years later. And every single time, it launched them onto bigger and better things.

They could get funding for new ventures with a single email to the right person. They could do anything they wanted. Overnight, they’d proven themselves. They’d proven their worth. A worth that no one could question.

“What would the next steps be?” Sam asked, trying not to sound too eager.

“Well, I’ll reach out to a few of our investment firms,” he replied. “We’ll need to find one that would be a good fit for doing a trial run with integrating the software.”

Sam nodded to herself, mentally calculating how long that might take. The due diligence that typically went along with abuyout definitely wasn’t a quick process. Adding on weeks or potentially months of trial and integration just for testing would delay things even further. Not to mention they’d most likely need to pause work with existing clients in order to free up their workload to make it happen.

“You said you’re open to travel, correct? And no limitations on the length of the travel?”

“Yes,” Sam answered. “That’s right. We just arrived in Seattle last week for a new client, and we’ll be here for another couple of months at least. But after that, we’re flexible.”

They’d moved cities constantly, packing up every few months to move to the next location of their new clients and help their teams get started with using the software. And although it never bothered them much, this time felt different.

Never once in the four years since starting the company had they ever landed somewhere so close to her old home.