Chapter 1
Chapter one
Lou
Havenwood, July
My key doesn’t fit the lock.
I stare at the dinged-up bit of metal in my hand. Countless energy drinks and pure, frustrated rage powered my all-night drive home, but now that I’m here, maybe the unhealthy amount of stimulants has me hallucinating. Maybe this isn’t the right key.
My brain struggles to turn over, not unlike the engine of my old Buick, and for several long seconds I blink down at the key.
It’s the right key. It’s slightly bent, curving to the side just enough to occasionally make the door tricky to unlock.
Mumbling a curse, I raise it to the lock again and freeze.
I might have the right key, but this is the wrong lock. It’s shiny and new. Nothing at Gallo’s is shiny and new. The dive bar’s glassware is older than I am. The wooden surfaces of the bar and the tables don’t shine unless I polish them, and let’s face it, I don’t.
Fucking Travis.
I hiss at the door, throw my useless key on the ground, and stomp around the building, the glint of light on a cherry red sports car parked under some trees drawing my eyes.
No one living in Havenwood with sports car money spends it on a vehicle that can’t handle six inches in winter.
Sometimes the out-of-towners get drunk and someone gives them a ride to their house or cabin, leaving an odd assortment of cars and SUVs parked out front.
But a shiny red sports car is precisely the shit Travis would buy if he came into some money.
Which means he’s turned my bar into an illegal pharmacy while I was out of town. The fucker.
The late morning is sunny and sparkly. A perfect summer’s day to murder my cousin. I’m going to strap his carcass to the front of the Buick and drive down Main Street like it’s the fucking Fourth of July parade.
Muttering every colorful curse my Aunt Rita taught me, I drag a couple of discarded tires out of the bushes where Travis throws the stuff he’s too lazy to take to the dump, and stack them up under the ladies' room window.
I’m mad as hell as I snap open the knife I keep in my pocket, climb onto the tires, and set to work prying the screen off.
The old thing sticks for a minute, but pops free before I have to get too aggressive.
I lean it against the side of the building, pocket my knife—because I’ll be needing it again shortly for murdering the bastard—and push the window, already open four inches, up as high as it goes.
I haven’t gone through this window since I was a teenager, and for a heart-stopping second after I hoist myself up, I fear I’ve misjudged. The last time I did this, I hadn’t yet been blessed with the generous curves I’m now endowed with. My boobs make it through—barely—but I get stuck at the hips.
The last thing I need is for Travis or any other nosy asshole to wander over and see my denim-clad ass hanging out the window of my own goddamn bar.
Wiggling helps. Carefully, slowly, I inch through until I can grab hold of the sink below me. Blood rushes to my head as I puff and swear.
I am very clearly not fifteen anymore.
The next part is tricky, but somehow I don’t face-plant into the sink or the floor. I manage to get one leg through, then the other, and when I fall, I land on my feet. Like always.
Do you hear that, universe? Like always.
Aunt Rita always said landing on your feet was the most important thing. Well, it might have been the third, after ‘don’t trust sweet talkin’ men’ and ‘don’t let the skinheads and militia shits in’. Fourth, maybe, after ‘you’ll get more tips in a low-cut top and a push-up bra’.
Dusting myself off, I take a quick look in the mirror. My face is flushed, and my makeup is yesterday’s.
Well, shit. I look like an unhinged raccoon fueled by rabies and enough energy drinks to stop a weaker heart.
I take a deep breath and try to channel my inner Rita.
There’s a lot of my aunt in me. Something in the eyes, the line of the nose, the shape of the lips.
I resemble her more than Travis does. But it feels like I’m cosplaying being her, trying to put on her tough-as-nails exterior when it doesn’t quite fit.
My attempt to clean up my winged eyeliner with my pinkie is futile. It only makes me look more raccoon-ish. My handbag is outside, but there will be time between committing the murder and my morbid little parade to freshen up so my mug shot looks good.
I still take a moment to straighten my black t-shirt and dust off my curve-hugging jeans before I stride out of the ladies' room and into the dark, musty hallway.
The low heels of my boots click and clack angrily—a rhythm I happen to enjoy—but I freeze as another rhythm drowns it out.
The slap of skin on skin. It’s punctuated by a moan and a woman’s desperate, muffled words coming from my office.
“You’ve got to be fucking kidding me,” I mutter up at the ceiling.
Men are a curse to the women of my family, and not only do I get a thieving ex, but also a fuck-up of a cousin currently banging someone in my office, where I do the paperwork he can’t be trusted with.
My fuse has been burning for weeks, but this sets me off, and I burst through that door like an avenging demon from hell.
I don’t want to see my cousin naked, so I look at the woman sprawled on her back across my desk instead.
My jaw drops. “Kristen?”
Kristen Donnelly, divorced mother of two and the second-grade teacher at Havenwood Elementary School, stares up at me in horror. Her blouse is undone, her tits are everywhere, and okay, they’re really nice. It’s honestly upsetting she’d lower her standards to sleep with my douche of a cousin.
Except—
The man who is frozen balls-deep in her is not my cousin.
He looks bewildered. And handsome. Too handsome for a place like Gallo’s or a town like Havenwood.
Like Alexander Skarsg?rd and a young Paul Newman had a baby who grew up to have perfectly sex-tousled ash-blond hair and honey-brown eyes that have a cruel coolness instead of a sweet warmth.
His face is too perfect, an artist’s flawless reject. I can’t look at it, so I drop my gaze.
Which is a mistake.
His white shirt is unbuttoned, revealing smooth, light golden skin stretched over muscled pecs and six or eight abs—I’m too shocked to count—and I follow the V cut of his hips. His pants are pushed down, and yeah, they were fucking. He’s still inside her on my—
Goddammit. They’re doing it on my IKEA Vebjorn desk. It’s a miracle the desk is still standing, considering I had leftover screws after hours spent putting it together.
Now I’m really mad.
“Who the fuck are you and what are you doing in my bar?” I cross my arms over my chest and level a glare at the man as Kristen finally comes out of her sex fugue to tug her blouse over her tits.
“This is my bar,” he replies in a cool tone at odds with the light sheen of sweat on all that gorgeous skin, “and unless Miss Donnelly wants an audience, you’re interrupting. Please leave.”
“Miss Donnelly?” It’s the lack of sleep that makes me laugh.
“Am I interrupting some principal-teacher role play?” It’s out of my mouth before I can stop it, before I realize, as Kristen pushes her skirt down to hide where he’s still inside her, that she is dressed like it’s a school day, not like it’s the middle of summer vacation.
I can’t look at her. Her face will be as red as mine.
“Get out,” he says to me, irritation bleeding into his calm voice.
“My office,” I say firmly. “You get out.”
“Maybe I should—” Kristen’s voice tips up like she’s asking a question, but he doesn’t seem to hear her.
“Who are you?” he demands. Those cold amber eyes are meant to intimidate, but good luck, honey. I grew up in this dive bar. Not much daunts me, and I’ve had it up to my hairline with shitty men being shitty. I’m not taking it anymore. Not from him, not from my cousin, not from my shitty ex.
It is fucking open season, baby.
“I’m Lou Gallo,” I say, jutting my chin out and standing straighter, taking up more space.
I’m barely five foot four in these heels, but he’s not going to make me feel small.
I’m a goddamned pufferfish, overinflated and spiky.
Toxic liver and all. “Owner of Gallo’s Tavern.
You might have seen my name on the sign outside. ”
“I’m going to leave,” Kristen says a little louder. The way she’s positioned on the desk, she can’t easily dislodge him from her pussy, apparently. She gently pushes him. He startles at her touch, withdraws from her, and steps back so she can slip off the desk.
Now he’s standing dick-out. My interruption hasn’t dimmed his ardor. He’s rock-hard and pointing at the ceiling rather than shriveling into a button at the power of my glare.
Thankfully, for Kristen’s sake, he’s wearing a condom.
He notices my gaze and takes the base of his dick in one hand, carefully unrolling the condom with the other.
Kristen and I watch. I hate to admit it, but he has a pretty dick.
The length is impressive without crossing into terrifying, and he’s got some girth.
Appropriate amount of veins, blemish-free, nice head, no weird hook to one side.
If this man hadn’t been fucking her in my office, I’d be tempted to high-five Kristen.
I don’t think she’s dated since her divorce, and this is a hell of a way to get back on the horse.
He tucks himself into his pants and zips them up, but leaves his shirt open.
Kristen springs into action, grabbing her purse and rifling through it. I ignore her and let my gaze slowly drift back up to his.
He doesn’t say anything. Not who he is or what he’s doing fucking Kristen Donnelly on my Vebjorn desk. He stands there glowering at me.
Kristen gives me a nervous look as she steps up to him, going up on her tiptoes to whisper in his ear as she puts something in his hand.