Prologue
Luke
The air outside The Sin Bin felt wet enough to drown in.
Late August in Kimball Falls always carried that thick lake-country humidity that clung to skin and settled heavy inside your lungs, turning the entire town sticky beneath neon signs and bar lights. The windshield of my truck fogged faintly around the edges while music thumped from somewhere inside the building, bass vibrating low enough to pulse through the steering column beneath my hands.
I’d been parked across the street for an hour and sixteen minutes.
Not that I was counting.
The engine ticked softly as it cooled, the old leather seat creaking beneath my weight every time I shifted forward to look through the front windows again. The Sin Bin glowed gold and neon pink against the dark street, crowded with college kids in backwards hats and Fury hoodies while servers weaved through tables balancing trays of beer and wings.
And there she was.
Bliss.
My pulse thudded once, hard enough I felt it behind my ribs.
She laughed at something one of the customers said while swiping a rag across the bar top, blonde hair falling over one shoulder beneath the warm hanging lights. Tiny black shorts. Oversized Sin Bin tee tied at her waist. Bare legs that used to wrap around my hips while she cried and told me she loved me.
Mine.
The word settled heavy in my chest as another guy leaned across the bar toward her smiling too damn wide. Some collegekid. Fury hoodie. Drunk already from the way he swayed slightly against the counter while Bliss poured his beer.
Then his hand touched her.
Low on her back.
Friendly.
Casual.
Possessive enough that something hot and violent twisted behind my ribs instantly.
I counted to three before he moved it.
Three full seconds.
Three seconds too long.
The steering wheel groaned faintly beneath my grip, worn rubber pressing into my palms while heat climbed slowly up the back of my neck. My jaw tightened hard enough to ache as I watched her smile politely at him like she didn’t even notice what he’d done.
Or maybe she did.
Maybe she just liked the attention now.
The thought sent another ugly pulse of anger through me, sharp enough that my heartbeat started knocking hard against my throat.
She used to know better.
That was the thing that kept scraping at me lately. Bliss used to understand boundaries. Used to understand who she belonged to. Now she walked around this town pretending she was free just because she went away to college and started surrounding herself with rich little athletes and spoiled campus boys who thought being twenty-one made them men.
It didn’t.
None of them knew her.
Not really.
