VELROSE

After a sheltered life inside Velrose Agricultural Trust and the Whitlock household, Lilah arrives at Alderidge University with most of her future already planned. She is expected to earn an education, make the right connections, find a suitable mate, and eventually return home to the life waiting for her.

Alderidge moves at a pace Lilah has never had to keep up with, full of unfamiliar people, new expectations, and freedoms she has never had reason to think about before. She begins meeting people her family would never have chosen for her, making decisions without asking permission, and experiencing parts of college life she was never prepared for.

Then the Ravelles take an interest in her.

The family is wealthy, influential, and complicated enough without Lilah becoming involved with them, but keeping her distance proves difficult. The more time she spends with the Ravelles, the more she encounters relationships, choices, and ways of living that challenge what she has always been told to expect from her own future.

Lilah came to Alderidge knowing these few years might be her best chance to shape a life of her own. The longer she stays, the more that possibility begins to feel real, and the harder it becomes to imagine returning home and letting someone else decide what comes next.