Written in the Margins

At thirty-five, Dr. Claire Hayes is a masterclass in preservation. Impeccably dressed and utterly untouchable, she has spent twelve years wrapping herself in the cold, quiet routines of academia-a fortress built to protect herself. Claire's world is small, structured, and safe from the threat of feeling anything at all.

Then, Anna Cross disrupts the silence.

Anna is twenty-two, brilliant, and entirely on her own. Having grown up in the foster system, she has survived by learning to read the rooms she occupies like shifting weather patterns. She isn't looking for connection.. she is looking for solid ground, using academic excellence as a shield against a world that has never protected her.

When Anna starts to work with Claire on her Master's thesis, the sterile, professional distance keeping them safe begins to unravel, leaving them both exposed.