Biggest Regret (DWYM series #2)

PROLOGUE

Jace

I sit next to Rowan in Club Opal, drumming my fingers against my knee in sync with my heart pounding against my chest. I feel the cold leather couch seep through my jeans, creating goosebumps along my skin.

“Start from the beginning. I want everything.” This is my second time asking, but I don’t care. It doesn’t make sense. His story is not processing in my brain.

I feel Rowan’s weight lifted off the couch and I let my head fall into my hands, peeking through my fingers to see his feet disappear out of the VIP room.

I stare at the red carpet that Axel installed.

I told him to go black, but he felt that red was a better color for business.

I met Axel, the owner of Club Opal, while I was disposing of a body in a schuch years ago.

Apparently, the land I was using was his, which made sense why, when I was digging my holes, I kept finding bodies that I had not put there myself.

We ended up chit-chatting, and he told me about this club he planned on opening.

He said he would discount Rowan’s and my membership if we coordinated our business with his.

I lift my head from my hands when I hear the VIP curtains rip open.

Rowan walks back in with a bottle in his hand and dips down onto the couch.

“I got a call from Lance. He told me to come to the house. By the time I got there, there were cops surrounding the place. Lance told the officer that she hasn’t been home in three days.

” Rowan takes off the bourbon cap, shrugging his shoulders and taking a sip of the whiskey.

We have known each other since we were children.

We went to school together, fought together, at one point even lived together.

Our lives weren’t like the other children’s growing up.

Yes, Rowan came from old money, but he wasn’t treated like the other kids who grew up with money, nor did he act like it.

He used to come to school bruised and beaten.

Nobody seemed to care except me.

I glance at the kid sitting beside me. I read the name tag placed on his desk.

I recognize that name on the large building I walk past every morning on my way to school.

My eyes roam from his name tag to his ripped jeans and long- sleeve shirt.

He has scattered bruises and cuts along his fingers and ankles.

His black hair covers most of his face as he leans into his arms, coloring on his desk.

The bell rings and I see all the kids get out of their seats, heading to the door to leave for recess. The only kids

who have not moved are me and Rowan. I see his hand scribbling faster on the desk.

“Can I see?” I ask. Rowan turns his head over his shoulder to look at me.

I remember that day like it was fucking yesterday. Young Rowan with a busted lip and black eye. Now, he’s labeled New York’s most eligible billionaire in multiple magazines.

“And Lance doesn’t know where she fucking went? He keeps track of her like she is a dog,” I snap.

Rowan leans back on the couch, taking another gulp of the now half-empty bottle.

Joan Harper went missing tonight. Gone without a word, without a trace.

Rowan’s mother was everything to him. To us.

I can’t sit back and wait for the police to pretend to do their job.

For Lance to pretend to care about his wife.