Binky Huckstable has a number of problems. A ridiculous name, for one. Her genius I.Q. (Not always a blessing.) An arid, meaningless lovelife. Being the CPO - Chief Product Officer - of her family's billion-dollar company. Oh, and the upcoming company dinner-dance - where her former fiancé, Horatio Karlsson, is to be wooed as a potential new client. Her job, of course.
Ten years ago, she had a whole different bunch of problems. Being a college drop-out - disowned and disinherited by her loaded family - and waitressing to pay the bills, amongst others. Her history hadn't seemed important, when she met Karl, a customer in the restaurant where she worked. To him, she was the honest blue-collar service worker, the pretty working-class waitress he had a crush on. And he was the spoilt rich kid she should have known better than to fall for...
Her love had been sincere. But his friends - well, gold digger was one of the nicer names they'd had for her. Perhaps their break-up had been inevitable, after all.
What the hell is she supposed to do, when they meet up again at that dinner? And Horatio finds out the truth?
Cover image ADFstore on Flickr, https://www.flickr.com/photos/shopadf/, licence https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/2.0/
Chapter image public domain https://openclipart.org/detail/244947/penny
As Claire aims to leave her oppressive stepfamily behind, she befriends Zion. Will he be her ticket to freedom or a distraction in achieving her dreams?
*****
Claire Olsen has had a crush on Zion Petrakis since the first time she laid eyes on him, but he never noticed, instead only having eyes on the school's it girl, Maddie Jennings. Knowing she couldn't compete with Maddie, Claire hid her feelings for Zion, satisfied with admiring him from afar. However, when a series of events led Claire closer to Zion, her feelings for him grew from infatuation to love. And despite fighting hard to keep her feelings contained by distancing herself from Zion, he was determined to show her that he's earned a spot in her life.
[[word count: 100,000-150,000 words]]