Chapter One
The first sign that tonight is going to suck?The bag of groceries I’m holding splits open, sending a half-dozen oranges bouncing down the staircase.
The second sign? I’m about three seconds away from falling down after them.
"Taylor!" I yell, my voice echoing off the grimy walls of my overheated apartment building. "If you don’t open this door, I swear to?—"
Nothing. No footsteps. No sister coming to my rescue.
I clench my jaw and adjust my grip on the remaining bags, which are cutting off circulation to my wrists. The hallway is a furnace, the pipes rattling somewhere behind the walls, probably plotting their next catastrophic leak. My shirt sticks to my back, and my arms shake under the weight of my dumb decision notto make multiple trips.Why did I promise to make dinner for her?
A floorboard creaks above me.
I freeze.
"Taylor?" I call again, but this time my voice is quieter. There’s a pause, just long enough to make my pulsedo something weird. Then, another creak. Slow. Deliberate. Goosebumps rise on my arms despite the heat.
But still, the door stays closed.
I swallow hard, shift my grip on the railing, and bolt up the last few steps, kicking the door with enough force to shake the frame.
It swings open violently, and before I can process anything else, I’m tumbling inside. The weight of the grocery bags finally wins, and the bottoms give out, sending loose grapes and oranges rolling in every direction. I curse under my breath, dropping to my knees in a desperate attempt to salvage what I can. My fingers, slick with sweat, fumble uselessly as fruit skitters across the floor.
Taylor stands over me, fanning her freshly painted nails in front of her face. "I hope you don't mind," she says breezily, "I helped myself to some of your nail polish."
I clench my jaw, resisting the urge to scream. Instead, I force a tight smile, though I’m sure it looks more like a grimace.
A mountain of beauty supplies has taken over my kitchen table, making it look like a salon exploded in my apartment while I was out working my ass off all day. Her perfectly made-up appearance, with fresh lashes, contoured cheeks, and glossy lips, only adds to my irritation.
She flicks a glance at me. "Took you long enough to get home. I’mstarving."
I don’t have the energy to explain that dinner won’t be ready for at least another hour—or that all I really want to do is order takeout, drink a bottle of wine, and collapse into bed. My entire body feels like it’s been shoved through a meat grinder after a physically brutal day. I gesture weakly to the floor. "There’s some fruit."
Taylor rolls her eyes and steps over the scattered mess of groceries. She beelines for one of the torn bags and pulls out abottle of wine, a Riesling, her favorite. "This used to be fruit," she announces, holding up the bottle. "Let’s open it."
As she rummages through the drawers for a corkscrew, I wipe my forehead with a trembling hand.
"We're going out for drinks at the Rum and Room after dinner," Taylor declares, grabbing two glasses from the cupboard.
I blink at her. "What? Why?"
She sighs dramatically.
I groan as I struggle to stand upright. My fingers feel numb, and there are bright red welts across both my forearms. On top of that, there's a sharp pain in my back from unboxing pantry supplies all day, like someone’s tugging on my spine through my skin.
Taylor watches me struggle and rolls her eyes again.
Yeah. This night isdefinitelygoing to suck.
A headache is already brewing behind my eyes, but I know better than to argue with Taylor when she’s set on something. It’s just one more thing to add to the ever-growing list of stress I’ll have to deal with this week.
"Because I have a date later," she says, lazily twirling the wine in her glass. "And that’s where I’m meeting him.Andyou work there so, duh—free drinks."
I pause, narrowing my eyes. "You’ve been in town forless than twenty-four hoursand already have a date?"
Taylor shrugs as I gather up what’s left of the fallen food, clearing space on the crowded table.
"Aren’t you seeing someone? I thought?—"
