Gabriel Poulanos is only half the man he was since his beloved sub, Sara, died in a senseless mugging. Now he goes through life in a daze which worries not only his closest friends at Olivia’s but also its newest member, Zhenya. He resists every matchmaking attempt and schemes his friends come up with, until the early spring day when a surprise visit by a group of submissives leads to dragging him kicking and screaming out of his self-imposed exile. Pregnant with her dead husband’s baby, Zhenya has experienced loss and it hurts her to see a man as vibrant as Gabriel wasting away. Then her new friends offer to throw her a baby shower, she agrees, but only if it is at Poulanos, Gabriel’s family restaurant. She never expects for her water to break nor the bad weather which keeps her confined, with not only a fainting submissive, but two over-bearing Doms and the grumpy restaurant owner. But that’s the least of her problems. Because once she gives birth to her daughter, her dead husband’s family demands she relinquish her. At least until Gabriel finds out. If there’s one thing that this grieving Dom understands is a submissive’s right to choose her own path.