Pathological Dependence

Claire has loved Dean since they were children, abducted and left with nothing, when ten-year-old Dean promised to protect her. He kept that promise through juvie, dangerous jobs and broken ribs, and together they built a life in New York where everyone knew not to cross her.

Now, while she tries on wedding dresses, Dean tells her the mermaid gown suits his secretary Chloe better, admits he has slept with her, and says he feels no desire for Claire anymore. When scandalous photos of Dean and Chloe go viral, he expects Claire to handle the media herself. She comes home to find Chloe in their bed, then discovers her own assistant, the girl she saved and raised like a sister, has also been with him.

Claire fights back, but Dean strips her from the board and sends the girl abroad, making her the laughingstock of New York. Then a new woman appears in the tabloids, Brenda, thirty-three and older than Claire, and everything Claire thought she understood about Dean begins to fracture.