By Meredith Wild
Tech entrepreneur meets billionaire investor
Subject
Themes
Erica Hathaway graduates from Harvard with a business degree and a tech startup called Clozpin, a fashion social network she built with co-founders Sid Kumar and Alli Mallory. At twenty-two, orphaned as a teenager and raised partly in boarding school, she pours everything into making the business succeed. The company is profitable but needs substantial investment to grow beyond modest college operations. Her chance arrives through a connection to Professor Quinlan, who arranges a pitch meeting at Angelcom Ventures.
Erica Hathaway graduates from Harvard with a business degree and a tech startup called Clozpin, a fashion social network she built with co-founders Sid Kumar and Alli Mallory. At twenty-two, orphaned as a teenager and raised partly in boarding school, she pours everything into making the business…
Hardwired represents contemporary romance's evolution toward protagonists with professional ambitions equal to romantic desires. Published in 2013 at the height of the self-published romance boom, Meredith Wild's novel participates in conversations about female entrepreneurship, power dynamics in…
Hardwired examines how gender shapes professional credibility in male-dominated industries. Erica's experience pitching to Angelcom crystallizes these dynamics. She prepares meticulously, dresses in her power suit and teal blouse, rehearses responses to anticipated questions, yet encounters…
Erica's relationship with control defines her entrepreneurial journey and emotional life. Having lost her mother to death and her stepfather to emotional withdrawal, she learned early that security requires self-reliance. Nobody rescues you, nobody stays, nobody prioritises your needs above their…
Blake and Erica's relationship explores how power differentials shape attraction and romance. Their connection begins with literal collision, Blake catching Erica when she stumbles, holding her possessively, releasing slowly whilst hands blaze trails across her body. This physical encounter…
Erica's emotional landscape centres on chosen rather than biological family. Her mother's death when she was a teenager severed her primary attachment, whilst Elliot's subsequent withdrawal (sending her to boarding school whilst he remarried and started a new family) completed her abandonment. This…
Erica's entrepreneurial ambition defines her identity but threatens to consume her entirely. At twenty-two, she has already achieved what most people spend careers pursuing: a profitable business with exponential growth potential, Harvard degree, and recognition from industry leaders. Yet she cannot…
Erica Hathaway emerges as a young entrepreneur navigating the intersection of personal ambition and emotional vulnerability. At twenty-two, she has built Clozpin, a fashion social network, from concept to profitable reality whilst completing her Harvard degree. This achievement becomes both her…
Blake Landon represents the self-made tech billionaire archetype with intriguing contradictions. At twenty-seven, he has achieved extraordinary wealth and influence, having founded Banksoft (acquired for twelve billion dollars) and now serving as executive director of Angelcom Ventures. Unlike the…
Marie Martelly serves as Erica's surrogate mother and emotional anchor following Patricia Hathaway's death nearly a decade earlier. Tall, slender, with cocoa-coloured skin and short twisted dreads, Marie carries herself with eternal youth and eclectic style that belies her actual age (she is…
Alli Mallory functions as Erica's best friend, business partner, and social counterbalance. As Clozpin's marketing director, she brings skills Erica lacks (networking ability, fashion expertise, and effortless charisma). With long brown hair, an intuitive sense of style, and the ability to make…
Sid Kumar embodies the brilliant but socially challenged programmer archetype. Towering over six feet yet extraordinarily thin, with dark skin and large brown puppy-dog eyes, he possesses technical genius that makes Clozpin possible whilst maintaining lifestyle habits that would horrify most people.…
Max Pope embodies privilege attempting redemption. As heir to shipping magnate Michael Pope, he possesses wealth and connections most entrepreneurs spend lifetimes pursuing. Young, blonde, impeccably dressed in three-piece suits, with dark blue eyes and a tan suggesting minimal time in New England…
Erica Hathaway graduates from Harvard with her business degree, celebrating with Marie Martelly, her mother's best friend who became surrogate parent after Patricia died nearly a decade earlier. The graduation brings bittersweet emotions (pride in her achievement tempered by grief that her mother…
Erica receives an unexpected invitation to speak on a CEO panel at TechLabs, the premier tech conference in Las Vegas. Despite expenses she can barely afford, she and Alli decide the marketing opportunity justifies the risk. They pack frantically, with Alli insisting Erica embrace Vegas glamour…
Blake takes Erica out for dinner in Vegas as promised, maintaining gentleman behaviour though tension remains palpable throughout the evening. Over expensive wine and gourmet food, they discuss their backgrounds with unexpected vulnerability. Blake reveals details about his journey from being…
Erica and Blake begin a proper relationship, though Erica struggles constantly with trust given their complicated history. Blake proves surprisingly attentive for someone with his demanding schedule, checking in throughout the day with texts and calls, making time for dinners and spontaneous visits…
Someone begins cyber-attacking Clozpin's servers with sophisticated distributed denial-of-service attacks that threaten to crash the platform entirely. Sid works around the clock trying to defend against increasingly complex intrusions, but whoever is targeting them possesses serious technical…
The Angelcom deal finally closes after extensive negotiations where Blake's guidance proves invaluable in securing favourable terms. Erica retains majority control whilst receiving sufficient capital to scale Clozpin substantially. The funding validates everything she sacrificed, yet success brings…
Elliot contacts Erica unexpectedly after years of minimal communication, explaining he saw news coverage about Clozpin's funding and wants to reconnect. Erica experiences conflicting emotions (residual love for the man who raised her alongside anger about his abandonment). They meet for coffee,…
Erica discovers that someone within Clozpin has been leaking confidential information to competitors, explaining how rival platforms anticipated their strategies with suspicious accuracy. The betrayal cuts deeply because she trusted her small team implicitly, viewing them as family rather than…
Erica decides to reject the acquisition offer, choosing to maintain control over Clozpin's direction even if it means slower growth and continued financial pressure. This decision surprises investors who expected her to cash out, but she explains that building something meaningful matters more than…
Erica accepts Blake's second proposal, but on terms they design together rather than conforming to traditional expectations. They create prenuptial agreement that protects Clozpin's independence, ensuring Blake's wealth cannot be used to control company decisions. They agree to egalitarian…
Erica Hathaway emerges as a young entrepreneur navigating the intersection of personal ambition and emotional vulnerability. At twenty-two, she has built Clozpin, a fashion social network, from concept to profitable reality whilst completing her Harvard degree. This achievement becomes both her…
Blake Landon represents the self-made tech billionaire archetype with intriguing contradictions. At twenty-seven, he has achieved extraordinary wealth and influence, having founded Banksoft (acquired for twelve billion dollars) and now serving as executive director of Angelcom Ventures. Unlike the…
Marie Martelly serves as Erica's surrogate mother and emotional anchor following Patricia Hathaway's death nearly a decade earlier. Tall, slender, with cocoa-coloured skin and short twisted dreads, Marie carries herself with eternal youth and eclectic style that belies her actual age (she is…
Alli Mallory functions as Erica's best friend, business partner, and social counterbalance. As Clozpin's marketing director, she brings skills Erica lacks (networking ability, fashion expertise, and effortless charisma). With long brown hair, an intuitive sense of style, and the ability to make…
Sid Kumar embodies the brilliant but socially challenged programmer archetype. Towering over six feet yet extraordinarily thin, with dark skin and large brown puppy-dog eyes, he possesses technical genius that makes Clozpin possible whilst maintaining lifestyle habits that would horrify most people.…
Max Pope embodies privilege attempting redemption. As heir to shipping magnate Michael Pope, he possesses wealth and connections most entrepreneurs spend lifetimes pursuing. Young, blonde, impeccably dressed in three-piece suits, with dark blue eyes and a tan suggesting minimal time in New England…
Erica Hathaway graduates from Harvard with a business degree and a tech startup called Clozpin, a fashion social network she built with co-founders Sid Kumar and Alli Mallory. At twenty-two, orphaned as a teenager and raised partly in boarding school, she pours everything into making the business succeed. The company is profitable but needs substantial investment to grow beyond modest college operations. Her chance arrives through a connection to Professor Quinlan, who arranges a pitch meeting at Angelcom Ventures.