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PartOne
Pregame
ChapterOne
Ava
While this isn’t the worst day of my life by a long shot, it’s definitely in the running for second place.In the past eight hours, I’ve lost my job at the coffee shop where I’ve worked for the past two years, found out I’ve been dropped from my summer internship—which means I’ll be graduating from NYU in exactly two weeks with exactly zero job prospects—and I just spent the last of my scholarship money on a plane ticket to Miami that I no longer need.I focus on the sidewalk in front of me, telling myself that if I can just make it home, it’ll all be okay.
I’m one block from the apartment I share with my best friend Emmett, juggling my book bag along with two containers of Chinese takeout that cost me my last ten dollars, when it starts to rain.But it’s not just raining.No, mere rain would be far too benign for the day I’m having.It’s pouring—big fat drops that permeate the thin T-shirt I’m wearing, soaking my dark hair until it’s hanging in dripping curls halfway down my back.
Perfect.
I trudge up the four flights of stairs to my apartment and unlock the door, lifting the handle and kicking the door in just the right spot until it swings open.I practically collapse into the open doorway, grateful for the welcoming comfort of our tiny but cozy apartment.My relief is short-lived.
“What in the hell?”I stare openmouthed at the naked woman handcuffed to the radiator.
She looks as horrified as I’m sure I do, her eyes wide with shock as she mumbles something unintelligible from behind the ball gag wedged between her teeth.
“Oh my God,” I mutter as soon as I recover, turning my back to her to give her some privacy.“EMMETT!!!”
I swear I’m going to kill him.If I don’t die of mortification first, that is.
He rounds the corner, his sculpted chest bare and the top button of his jeans undone.“Fuck, Ava, I thought you were at work.”
“Um, yeah.I got laid off.”The hopelessness of my situation sinks in, and I drop my keys despondently on the coffee table.
“Christ.”He scrubs a hand over his gorgeous face.“I’m sorry.Hang on.Let me just…um…take care of her.”
I stumble back to the tiny closet of a bedroom that’s mine and sink down on the sagging mattress.That’ll teach me to think things couldn’t get worse.I should know better by now.I know Emmett’s into the whole whips and chains thing with the endless parade of gorgeous women he goes out with, but knowing it intellectually and seeing an actual woman naked, bound, and gagged in my living room are entirely different things.
I love Emmett with all my heart, and given his past, I understand his need to be in charge, but really?Handcuffing a girl to the radiator?And why the gag?I shudder a little, shaking my head slightly (as if that could get rid of the image that’s irrevocably burned into my brain!) before I change into a comfortable and mercifully dry pair of yoga pants and an old T-shirt.
I’m still squeezing the water out of my hair with a towel when Emmett appears in my doorway a few minutes minute later, filling it with his six-foot frame.At least he’s put a shirt on.Not that it matters.Although I can objectively say that Emmett’s ridiculously attractive with gorgeous skin the color of buttered caramel and expressive deep brown eyes, and while I can certainly see why women fall all over themselves when he’s around, to me he’ll always just be Emmett—my protector, my confidant, my best friend, and possibly the only person I can trust in the world because he knows just what kind of hell I’ve been through.After all, he’s been through hell himself.
“I’m sorry, Ava.I never would have brought one of my subs here if I’d known you were going to be home early.”He looks so apologetic I don’t have the heart to lecture him about the rules we agreed to when we moved in together—namely, no romantic visitors without advance notice and the other person’s consent.Our apartment’s barely big enough for the two of us.Although to be fair, those rules have only ever applied to Emmett.I’ve never had the occasion to bring anyone home.
I sigh.“I know.”
He tugs my hair affectionately.“Come on.Let’s eat and you can tell me about it.”He smiles at me, his eyes twinkling.“Stop looking like you lost your best friend.I’m not going anywhere.”
“I think what I lost is my appetite,” I mutter as I trail after him into the tiny room that doubles as both our kitchen and living room, studiously keeping my gaze averted from the radiator.
Emmett’s easy laugh rumbles through me, easing the lump that had lodged in my throat when I learned my internship had fallen through and had only grown bigger when my boss at the Coffee Bean had told me he couldn’t afford to keep me on the payroll.If Emmett, who has endured more in a lifetime than anyone should, can still laugh like that, surely I’ll survive this.
“Don’t knock it ‘til you try it,” he says teasingly.
“Whatever.”Heat flushes my cheeks as I busy myself digging through a drawer for chopsticks.I find two pairs and hold one out to Emmett with a grand flourish.“Care to join me for my last meal?”
His grin fades as he takes the chopsticks and opens one of the boxes.“It can’t be that bad.What happened?”
I sigh.“Where should I begin?Let’s see.For starters, my marketing professor pulled me aside after class and told me my internship at Holt Designs has been revoked due to ‘unforeseen circumstances.’”
Emmett looks at me in surprise.“What?Two weeks before graduation?That’s crazy!”He frowns, and his face darkens.“Do you thinkhehad anything to do with it?”
“I don’t know,” I say, frustrated.“Why else would an internship just get revoked without an explanation two weeks before it’s supposed to start?But how would he have known?”
Heis my stepfather, Anthony Sanderson the Third, and while I have no doubt he would go to any lengths to ruin my life and he certainly has the connections and clout to get my internship revoked, I have no idea how he possibly could have known about it.Four years ago, I chose NYU in part because it was as far as I could get from Houston and him, although in the beginning I still went back occasionally to see my mom.But I haven’t been to Houston or spoken to him in two years.My relationship with my mom isn’t much better, although I finally broke my silence and texted her six months ago, opening—at least a tiny crack—the door I thought I’d slammed shut forever when she unequivocally chose her new husband over me.But I hardly exchange confidences with her.I pause, my heart sinking as I remember our last conversation when I had casually mentioned my summer job in Florida.Damn!
