He’d been tagging ass for so long with his heart belonging to another woman, he forgot that shit could happen, it did, and it did it all the time.

I knew two things.

I wanted to fuck wild and laugh hard with Merry.

But I didn’t need the heartbreak that would lead to in my life.

I lifted my phone, hit the text button, and tapped in my play.

I didn’t send it until hours later, when I was off shift, sitting in my running car, ready to put it in gear and go pick up my kid from my mom’s.

I hit send, threw my phone on top of my purse on the passenger seat, my eyes so dry they stung, and I set my car on course to get my boy.

* * * * *

Garrett

I’m happy spinning my wheels.

Garrett stared at the text.

Then he drew his arm back and let fly, the phone sailing through the air and embedding in the shitty-ass drywall of his living room.

He stared at it a beat before he walked out to his balcony to have a smoke.

Chapter Five

Proceed

Cher

Late the next morning, I was leaning over the basin in Ethan’s and my bathroom, stroking on waterproof mascara, when my cell on the counter rang.

I looked down at it, and since I’d seen that number before, I knew who it was.

God, my life sucked.

I hit the screen to take Walter Jones’s call.

I then immediately hit the screen to hang up.

I went back to stroking on mascara.

The phone rang again.

The motherfucker probably thought he lost connection.

I took the call and then hung up.

He called again.

I engaged and disengaged.

Done playing, I went in, blocked his number, and went back to finishing my makeup.

* * * * *

I walked into J&J’s, surprised to see the place was deserted.

Then I saw Feb pop up from behind the bar.

Years ago, when I’d first met her, seeing all that was her did not do good things for my mental health.

There was a reason Dennis Lowe picked me, having obsessed on Feb and Colt since they were all in high school together.

Wanting Feb for his own, he’d found a replacement in me.

In other words, we looked a lot alike.

Obviously, we still did, both of us tall, built, blonde, and brown-eyed.

Though, there was more to it and it was uncanny.

Honest to God, she looked like my older sister.

For obvious reasons, these making me a target of an ax murderer, even when she turned out to be awesome, it had fucked with my head. Lowe had even called me Feb and February, saying it was a nickname because we’d met in that month, but doing it because that was who he saw in me.

He also told me his name was Alexander Colton and he was a cop, not what he was in reality—a geeky software guy who hid the batshit crazy.