Willow hadn’t written anything that day, though she chalked it up to travel, getting settled, and plain old exhaustion. Except now that it was past midnight and she was finally snuggled into the bed that truly could fit three of her, sleep refused to come.
She grabbed her phone off the nightstand, ready to dive into a four-hour TikTok rabbit hole that would at the very least keep her occupied until daylight. But before she’d even unlocked her screen, a crash sounded outside her room—something shattering against the hard kitchen floor—followed by a muffled voice.
What had she told her brother? That she had this whole life thing under control? Yeah, that was before she’d considered someone breaking and entering into a secluded,lockedguesthouse on very private property.
She so did not havethisunder control.
“Shit,” she hissed under her breath before crawling out of bed wearing nothing but a ribbed tank top and her most comfortable underwear…men’s boxer briefs.
“Weapon, weapon, weapon…” she mouthed silently to herself as her eyes scanned the dark for any sort of protection. She found it in the way of a ceramic vase on the dresser that Colt’s wife, Jenna, had filled with beautiful wildflowers that Willow now scattered—along with the water that was keeping them alive—on the rug at the foot of her bed so the intruder wouldn’t hear her pouring anything onto a hard surface.
She inched toward her closed bedroom door and heard the unmistakable sound of the knob turning, the latch unlatching.
The mix of fear and adrenaline coursing through her blood was so potent that Willow thought she might levitate off the floor or lose consciousness completely. She really, really hoped the universe would grant her the former rather than making her a sitting duck for whatever lay on the other side of the door.
She held her breath as the door creaked open and her would-be assailant stumbled inside.
It all happened so fast, like something out of a vaudevillian silent comedy. Willow raised the vase above her head as a man lumbered toward the bed. She sucked in a breath just before striking, allowing barely enough time for him to turn. Their eyes met, and as she swung the vase, she heard him groggily say, “Willow?” Then the vase shattered against his temple, and he fell backward against the mattress.In the moonlight she could see blood trickle down his cheek and onto the duvet.
She flipped on the light and gasped.
“Ashton Murphy, what thehellare you doing in my room?” she asked.
His eyes fluttered open and locked on hers. “I missed you too, darlin’,” he replied, pushing himself up to sitting. But then his eyes rolled backward. “No hospitals,” he mumbled, then collapsed again.
Willow swore and rushed toward him, dipping her head to make sure the man was still breathing, only to be greeted with an exhale so clearly full of bourbon she was stunned it didn’t get her drunk on contact.
“I swear to god, Ashton Murphy,” she began through gritted teeth as she battled the deadweight of his legs to swing them onto the bed. “If you die on my watch and they give me a lie-detector test, it won’t matter that this was very clearly self-defense. They’re gonna lock me up for life.” Just because she’d neverplannedon killing the man, she’d maybe—at one of her lower points—fantasizedabout it.
She propped a couple of pillows under his head and then retrieved a first aid kit and a damp towel from the bathroom and got to cleaning him up the best she could.
“Ash…” she said softly at first. “You’re gonna have to wake up and hold a conversation with me ifyou don’t want me to call 911. Whether you’re just drunk or drunk and concussed, I need some proof of life, or you’re shit out of luck.”
No response, but luckily the cut on his temple seemed happy enough with a butterfly bandage and had all but stopped bleeding.
“Ash,” she tried again, this time a little louder, and received something akin to a snore in reply.
“Ashton Murphy, you lying, cheating asshole of a human parading as a man, wake the hell up, or I’m calling an ambulance and every TMZ reporter I know!”
Ash’s eyes flew open, and he bolted upright, knocking Willow right in the forehead with his own.
Willow swore.
“I’m awake!” Ash exclaimed.
Great. So, no manslaughter charges for tonight, but now Willow was pretty sureshewas concussed too.
“Next time,” she grumbled, “I’m staying on the damned bus.”
Chapter 2
Ash woke to the cacophony of cabinets opening and closing, metal clanging, and water running. He tried to open his eyes, but the light felt like a knife stabbing his irises, so that option was out. Instead, he decided to roll over, bury his head in whatever pillows he could find, and pretend that whatever was happening beyond his closed lids was not, in fact, happening. Except when he rolled, he dropped to a hard floor with a painful thud.
“What the…?” He seemed to be tangled in some sort of yarn-based creation with holes of varying sizes that had cuffed one of his hands and possibly a few of his toes. So now, instead of ignoring the outside world and sleeping off his hangover, he was battling with a blanket after falling off of a bed that seemed way too small.
He finally freed himself, rolling the sorry excuse for a blanket into a ball and tossing it back on the…couch?
Where the hell was he?
