The Recusal Equation

Solar spectrography candidate Clara Vance reaches Obsidian Peak to secure the eclipse data that will save her career, only to discover her stranger from the base camp is incoming professor Julian Thorne. When sabotage traps the team between blizzard and wildfire, Julian formally recuses himself and clears every academic power imbalance. As equals, they must identify the insider before the observatory becomes a glass-shrapnel tomb.

A doctoral candidate meets a dangerous stranger hours before he becomes her professor—and a saboteur seals them inside an observatory beneath an eclipse.