“IF I CAN FIX THIS MESS, WILL YOU GIVE ME ANOTHER CHANCE?”

She shook her head. “Alex, I—”

“Zoe, listen.” His voice dropped, brittle and tight. “I’ll find a way to get it done. But I can’t lose my job, which means you can’t boot me. Please.”

The words took a straight path to her sternum, kicking the air from her lungs without the argument she’d intended to use it for. Alex’s eyes glittered, dark blue and determined in the dusky light shining down from the bare bulb over their heads. His normally cocksure demeanor was nowhere to be seen, replaced instead by an expression so oddly intense, Zoe’s pulse sped even faster through her veins.

For just a stop-time sliver of a second, Alex Donovan was vulnerable.

And she could either give him one last chance, or she could sign his walking papers out of her kitchen.