Chapter One
Britta
Eight days.
Eight short, ridiculous, life-flipping days.
That’s how long it had been since some psycho decided to shoot me.
Rude.
I stared up at the ceiling above my childhood bed, tracking the faint hairline crack that ran from the corner near the smoke detector toward the window.I’d noticed it when I moved back in here a week ago—when my mom had practically shoved me into her car after I got discharged from the hospital and announced I was staying with her until I healed.
The crack hadn’t changed.
Neither had the stupid glow-in-the-dark star stuck above my dresser.
My mom had put those up when I was twelve and going through my “space phase.”I’d begged her to take them down when I was sixteen because they were embarrassing.
She’d refused.
Now here I was at twenty-something, back in my childhood bedroom, recovering from a gunshot wound and staring at those same damn stars like they were my only entertainment.
Somehow, this was my life now.
I sighed and shifted on the mattress, immediately regretting it.
Pain shot through my shoulder like my body was personally offended I tried to move.
“Son of a—”
I sucked in a slow breath through my teeth and let my head fall back onto the pillow.
Being shot sucked.Ten out of ten would not recommend.
During the day, the pain was manageable.Annoying, but manageable.A dull ache that throbbed when I moved wrong.
But at night?It was like the pain clocked in for its shift.
Every time the house went quiet and I tried to sleep, my shoulder started pulsing like it had its own heartbeat.I’d toss and turn until three in the morning, half delirious and cranky.
Then I’d finally fall asleep and wake up at eight-thirty feeling like I’d been run over by a truck.
Which explained why I was currently lying on my back staring at the ceiling like a bored house cat.
Eight days ago I’d been working behind the bar at the Badger’s Den.
Pouring beers.
Talking shit.
Laughing with Tempi.
Now I had a hole in my shoulder and a biker babysitter on my mom’s porch.
A soft knock sounded on my already open bedroom door.
I lifted my head and saw my mom standing there in the doorway.
