Feeling sluggish and nauseated Elle leaves the restaurant located on the NYU campus to wait in the car for Cynthia, her best friend and roommate, to drive her home. In the ten minutes it takes Cynthia to follow her out a man slams her against a car in the low lit parking lot and attacks her from behind. When she regains consciousness Elle can no more point a finger at her attacker than she can remember what really happened. Three years later, unable to leave her home for fear of her attacker finding her, shut-in Branelle 'Elle' Brighton must fulfill a promise by traveling to a faraway country to attend her best friend's wedding. Never having made a promise she hasn't kept she forces herself to leave her home for the first time since the attack. Suffering from debilitating panic attacks and an overwhelming fear that she is being watched, she conquers the airport to arrive in Dolva. Scared and in desperate need of somewhere to hide the last thing she wants to deal with is meeting the royal family Cynthia is marrying into. Unwilling to let her friend suffer any longer, Cynthia devises a plan to not only get Elle out of the house but to move her, without her knowledge of course, to Dolva permanently. With the help of Elle's neighbor she manages to get Elle on a plane and in route to Dolva. Now she just had to give Elle a spectacular reason to stay. Hopefully the single King, her fianc's brother, will snag her attention long enough to distract her while Cynthia finalizes her plans and Elle's future.One look at the petite terrified auburn haired Elle and Sterling is lost. He fought the plans his brothers and Cynthia threw at him but can he resist the woman herself? While relaxing in the dark library with nothing but a cozy fire to light the room, Sterling overhears Elle venting off steam to his portrait about a disastrous day. Well, if the woman is to be believed it had been a bad three years with no end in sight. Sterling now has a choice to make. Make himself known and