A hidden cipher. A forgotten inheritance. And a secret someone would kill to keep wound tight.
Elena Thorne didn't come back to Ironwood Creek for a mystery. She came to bury her grandfather's secrets and sell his crumbling Victorian estate. But when she finds a 1920s gold pocket watch hidden beneath the floorboards, she discovers that her grandfather wasn't just a surveyor-he was a guardian.
Caleb Vance likes his life predictable. After years of Army chaos, he's found peace in the rhythmic ticking of his clock repair shop. But when Elena Thorne walks in with a watch that beats like a human heart and a black SUV trailing her every move, Caleb's protective instincts override his common sense.
The watch isn't just a timepiece; it's a mechanical key to a vault hidden deep within the mountain's silver mines. As a winter storm closes in and the shadows in the Thorne Manor grow long, Caleb and Elena must decode the past before the present catches up to them.
One thing is certain: in Ironwood Creek, time is running out.