I glanced at Kirby, who looked entirely too happy about the situation.

“It’s not necessary,” I said.

“C’mon”—Taylor flashed his teeth, a deep dimple sinking in the middle of his left cheek—“I played along. The least you could do is let me buy you dinner.”

I blew my bangs out of my eyes. “Fine.” I untied my apron as I left him for home.

“Did she just say yes?” Taylor asked.

Chuck chortled. “You’d better take it and run, kid. She hasn’t said yes to anyone in a while.”

I jogged up the steps to my apartment above the café, hearing the front door click after someone had let Taylor out. After taking just a few steps to the window overlooking Tejon Street, I watched as Taylor walked to his pickup truck in the parking lot.

A long sigh separated my lips. He was too cute and too charming, and he was on a hotshot crew. I was already one statistic. I wouldn’t let him turn me into another. One dinner wouldn’t be hard, and I sort of owed him for playing along while I’d pissed off my parents.

I was well practiced in walking away though. One dinner, and we’d be done.

Chapter Two

My fingers flitted under the cool water gushing from the showerhead. The pipes sang a sad song, expanding and trembling within the thin white walls of my quaint two-bedroom loft above The Bucksaw Café. It seemed like it was taking forever for the hot water to kick in.

The carpets were worn, and it smelled of grease and mildew when a candle wasn’t burning, but for two hundred dollars a month, it was mine. In comparison with other apartments in the Springs, the loft was practically free.

Leftover decorations from Phaedra’s eclectic collection hung from the walls. I had left home with nothing but the clothes I wore and my Louis Vuitton purse. Even if I had wanted to take some of my things, my father wouldn’t have let me.

Dr. William Fairchild was feared at the hospital and at home but not because he was abusive or ill-tempered—even though he was the latter. William was a renowned cardiologist in the state of Colorado and married to Dr. Blaire Fairchild, one of the best cardiothoracic surgeons in North America, also known as my mother … and queen bitch of the universe by some of her nurses.

My parents had been made for each other. The only person who didn’t fit into our family was me, and I was a constant disappointment to them both. By my junior year of high school, I had been introduced to my favorite friend, my secret comfort, the promise of a stress-free good time—cheap beer. The more obsessed and well-known my parents had become, the more I’d nursed my loneliness and shame—not that they’d noticed.