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It was the first visible crack I’d gotten. I went straight through it.

“And now you drag me out of a strip club because some men looked at me.”

“That is not what happened.”

“It is exactly what happened.”

“Piper.”

“No. Explain it.”

His jaw clenched. “You’re comparing things that aren’t the same.”

“Why aren’t they the same?”

“They just aren’t. Not remotely.”

My laugh this time held no humor at all. “Another excellent argument.”

His hand tightened around the wheel again.

I waited.

He didn’t elaborate.

I thought of him slamming Clayton against the wall.

All those guys… every fucking one of them now has that picture in their head. Her up there like that. Forever.

I had never heard him sound like that about me.

Not in two years. I had barely heard him sound like anything about me.

And I was tired. Tired of trying to find the rules.

Tired of getting punished for breaking rules no one had bothered to explain.

Tired of him acting like my existence was something he had to survive.

“You don’t get to tell me not to touch you and then lose your mind because somebody else looks at me.”

He said nothing.

“You don’t get both, Declan.”

I woke with a start, no clue what had roused me at first, just that something was wrong.

Not just off. Not just different. Wrong.

My stomach churned. My breath caught.

I glanced at my bedside clock. 12:04 a.m.

My parents were still gone. They’d gone out dancing with Riot and Marion and weren’t supposed to be home for hours.

Was it a noise that had woken me? I racked my brain.

I thought it was, and I tried to recall it.