1715. Saint Helena. Kaylani Clarke, the daughter of an ambitious slave trader, was only fourteen when her parents told her she was to be married to a man she had never met. "To make sure the family will continue to thrive," her father said, not unkindly, but with the measured tone of a man who saw futures in profit and legacy rather than in choice. But Kaylani dreamed of something else. A life built from her own choices. One evening, as lantern light flickered across the harbor, she slipped into the shadows and stowed away on the Company ship. The Wicked Wench. Ahead lay freedom, adventure, her own life to command. Behind, the shadows of loss, regret, and all the certainties she would never reclaim.