Chapter One

“In the final game of the season, the Sutton Woods Warriors take the State Football Championship title, closing out their 14-0 season with a sweeping 34-point victory,” Carter read, grinning. My friend dropped the newspaper on the table and slid it over to me. “Roz, he did it. Have you seen these pictures of the game? Your brother’s a living legend!”

“Local legend,” I said through gritted teeth. “Let’s not get carried away.”

I shoved the paper away from my plate, in no hurry to read another article boasting about the Sutton Woods quarterback who’d carried the Warriors through an undefeated season (and all the way up to the first state victory in our town’s history!).

It was bad enough I had to share a bathroom with my superstar brother; I didn’t need the million reminders of his boundless success.

“He’ll have his pick of colleges, that’s for sure.” Mel stopped by the corner booth to refill our glasses. “Your parents must be psyched.”

“I can only imagine.” Ally swept the newspaper off the table. From where she sat across from Carter and me, she read over the front-page article again. “To be a high school junior and have your entire future mapped out . . . that’s life-changing stuff.”

“I still can’t believe you didn’t go to the game,” Carter added.

“I wasn’t feeling well,” I said, feeding them the same lie I’d fed my parents as they walked out the door yesterday morning.

No one needed to know that I’d manipulated my way into some alone time, solely to hunt down a part-time job. Because I needed money—and fast—and I had no idea how I would come up with the kind of dough it would cost me to pay down a $5,000 debt without a job. So as my family trekked upstate, I’d spent my time all over Sutton Woods, dropping off applications for paid positions I didn’t want but desperately needed.

“It was one of those twenty-four-hour bugs, I guess.”

“Still,” Carter said. “That was probably the biggest day of your brother’s life, and you weren’t there to—”

“Okay, yeah. I get it,” I said. “He won a football game. Yay, Daniel. Let’s move on.”

“Oh, calm down, sourpuss.” Carter nudged me. “What’s with you lately? You should be happy for him.”

“Yeah.” Jasper leaned in. “Let’s not forget this wasn’t just a football game. It was the football game of the—”

“You know what? Roz is right.” Mel spoke over Ally’s boyfriend. She rolled the paper up and tucked it under her arm. “This is literally yesterday’s news. Maybe we should talk about something else.”

The table silenced at her suggestion, and I could sense each of my friends considering safe topics for a change of subject.

“Oh, Delta won a blue ribbon at the fair last month.” Mel nodded behind the counter to the diner owner and then leaned her hip against the ledge of our table. “Three years running. Best pie in the county.”

“Flavor?” Ally asked.

“Dutch apple. Last year she took first place with cherry. The year before that, lemon meringue.”

“Any of this award-winning pie on the premises?” Jasper asked, sitting taller. Of course he’d want to try it; though I’d taken to calling him the Cake Man, Jasper was incredibly skilled at any dessert he tried his hand at. “I need to see what I’m up against.”

“You’re not ‘up against’ anything.” Ally giggled. “Delta serves Sutton Woods; you serve Cedar Lake. You’re not in competition.”

“Well, maybe someday I plan on bringing my competition to town . . . say, in a year or so?”

“I’m counting down the days,” Ally said, leaning into him.

Jasper draped his arm around her shoulder and pulled her closer, and I swear the rest of us sighed at the thought of someday finding a boyfriend half as sweet as him. Ally was smitten. Jasper was clearly love-struck. It was freaking adorable how happy they were, especially at any mention of his eventual move to Sutton Woods for their planned business venture at The Red Barn.

Jasper flashed a gorgeous smile up to Mel. “Where’d we land on that pie?”

“You name it, we’ve got it.”

“Great. I’ll take a slice of each.”

Ally dropped her head and groaned.

Our last few Saturday nights had ended just like this, with dinner and dessert at Delta’s Diner. Unfortunately for Mel, that usually meant she served her friends, missing out on the chance to sit down and enjoy our company. But she never complained, and neither did Delta; as long as the other tables were kept up, Mel was afforded plenty of opportunity to swing by and chat.

Our time was precious together; Mel, Ally, Carter, and I made up the tightest group of friends in Sutton Woods, and having just entered the second quarter of our senior year, it was now more important than ever that we take the time to be together between school, jobs, and everything else we had going on.

Spending time together, though, now meant that we were also spending a lot of our downtime in the company of Jasper St. James. We’d practically adopted him as one of our own since he had dual connections within the group; not only had he and Ally been dating since Halloween, but he was also Carter’s cousin. So, at least for now, we were stuck with him—and that wasn’t a complaint. I liked the guy.

“Okay, I’m out of here,” Carter said a half hour later, once we’d helped Jasper polish off six slices of pie. The general consensus gave lemon meringue the edge, and he’d taken that as a challenge to outdo eighty-year-old Delta. “We’re still on for Wednesday, right?”

Everyone agreed, nodding and voicing their excitement for our annual Thanksgiving tradition.

“But don’t forget about Tuesday,” Ally added. “Try to be here by noon. We have to finalize the plans.”

“Right, of course.” Carter waved. “Night, guys.”

Ally and Jasper were out the door shortly after Carter, leaving me alone to say goodnight to Mel as she cleaned up the table.

“You’re sure you’re okay, Roz?”

“I’m fine,” I promised, because she needed the reassurance. She’d asked so often lately, which meant I desperately needed to step up my game. She could see through this crappy wall I’d put up, and I couldn’t have her worried. Worry would lead to speculation, and I had to stomp any kind of suspicion before it started. “Really, I am. I’m great.”

“You can call tonight if you need to talk,” she said, checking her watch. “I’m off in an hour.”

“Thanks, but—”

“You’re fine, I know,” she said, though concern etched lines around her tired eyes. “But the offer stands. Always.”

“Great, thanks.” With a quick wave, I ducked out of the diner before she could press any further.

Stopping on the sidewalk, I closed my eyes and took in a deep breath. Dropping my head back, I invited the gentle drops of cool November rain to roll across my face.

I needed moments like this—quiet, uninterrupted moments of pause.

I hated that I had to lie to my friends. Lately, it’d become such a chore to maintain the dramatic version of myself they always expected.

I was supposed to be the happy one in our group—the ever-smiling, energetic, never-short-for-words Rosalind Bingham. But stress weighed heavy on my heart, and the more I let hints of my anxiety seep to the surface, the more they’d come to suspect something was wrong.

And something was wrong—big time. But this problem went so far beyond anything the girls, my parents, or even a part-time job could fix. I would need to work full-time if I ever wanted to make a dent in this sudden debt I found myself in.

Five thousand dollars on a three-month deadline was unfathomable, and there were no leads pointing me in the right direction.

With a last cleansing breath, I promised myself a harder search tomorrow. I’d hit the road, drive out to the neighboring towns, and keep looking. Persistence was bound to pay off. I’d find something. I had to find something . . .

One block away from the diner, I rounded the corner as a large SUV took a too-wide turn to park, slamming into the driver’s side of my old, beloved Geo Metro. The tires screeched and the metal scraped, and the eerie sounds of the low-impact collision echoed through the quiet streets of Sutton Woods.

“Oh my god!”

I searched the sidewalk for another witness, hopeful for a familiar face. It was my kind of luck this guy would take off, leaving me a stranded victim of a hit-and-run. But the street was empty, and the driver wasn’t going anywhere; he’d made no attempt to flee the scene.

The man rushed out of his vehicle. He was dressed in a black hooded jacket and jeans. His face was shaded beneath a dark baseball cap, which made it nearly impossible to make out his features as the night shadowed him.

“You hit my car.”

“I’ll cover the costs,” he said, rounding the front of his vehicle. I couldn’t even look at him as he stepped under the streetlight and out of the darkness; my eyes were locked on the wreckage. The driver’s side of my Metro was caved in, and the glass from the window lay scattered in a puddle beneath my feet.

The damage was extensive. My tiny two-door car hadn’t stood a chance against his giant SUV. There’s no way I could drive home. Not tonight. Not tomorrow. Not anytime soon . . .

“You hit my car,” I said again, because apparently the English language was lost on me. I was helpless; he’d hit my car!

“I’m sorry,” he said quietly. “It was an honest accident.”

“No shit. I can’t imagine you did this on purpose,” I said, dropping my face into my hands. My life was over.

“Then I guess I should also apologize for how insensitive this is going to sound.” He stepped closer and lowered his voice. “But how much will it cost to make this go away?”

“Go away?” I surveyed the damage again. “I have to call my parents. And the police. We have to call the police!”

It was only then that I looked at the stranger, and a single glimpse at his shaded face pulled me back a few steps.

It was the shock—anxiety, paired with nausea and fear. That’s all it was. Shock. Not reality.

My eyes were playing tricks on me.

There was no way I was standing there, looking into the apologetic eyes of Avery Chase. He’d gone missing—MIA for over a week now—and there’s no way he’d shown up in Sutton Woods.

It was all in my head; the world was starved for some sign of him, so this was just some sick, twisted game my mind was playing on me.

“Right, the police.” He dropped his head and rubbed the back of his neck, pausing for a minute before he turned his big, round, beautiful eyes back up to me. “If at all possible . . . I’d prefer we do this without involving them.”

It was bad enough he looked like Avery—I mean, dead-on, could-be-twin, carbon-copy lookalike, but he sounded just like him, too. There was no mistaking that quiet, smoky voice, coupled with the subtle undertone of a southern upbringing.

Either this was the worse case of shock in history, or I was only two feet away from the Hollywood bad boy himself.

“I’ll pay for the damage,” he said. “A tow truck, a rental car, all of the repairs. Anything you need until this is squared away.” He winced as if he hated himself for the situation he’d put us in. “Make your demands.”

I had a perfect excuse to overreact—to lash out, scream, or demand some kind of explanation. I’m not sure he would’ve blamed me for having a full-on temper tantrum. But I couldn’t form a word, let alone rattle off a list of demands. I was frozen.

The noises of the town drowned beneath the deafening beats of my heart, and as my pulse quickened, anxiety threatened to constrict my lungs. Air caught in my throat. Everything blurred. The glow of the streetlights swirled, and the darkness of the night taunted me. This was it. I was losing my mind.

I struggled to hold myself steady, but numbness crept into my legs, and I faltered.

“I can’t breathe.”

I stumbled forward, knocking into him, and his strong arms closed around me as I drifted. He held me to his chest, looking down on me with a protective gaze, and the world suddenly stood still. My breath steadied. The blurs of color came into focus. The cold rain poured harder, soaking us as his stare intensified, and for one fleeting moment, I was lost in a fantasy. His quick and deft reaction, his deep brown eyes, and the steady rainfall all around us . . . this wasn’t straight out of a dream. This was straight off the TV screen.

There’s no way this was real . . .

He guided me over to sit on the wet curbside, turning back to his barely damaged SUV to retrieve a bottle. He returned, passing the water to me.

“Is there anyone I can call?” He dipped down to catch my eye, but I never looked up. Was I crazy?

Avery Chase hadn’t hit my car, he hadn’t caught me midfaint, and he wasn’t in Sutton Woods. This was all some horrible nightmare.

“I’d feel better if you’d let me call someone,” he said. “Your parents, a friend . . . someone who’ll make sure you’re safe.”

“But my car . . .” It’s all I could say, and I was lucky to form even those few words. My lips were as numb as the rest of my body.

“I’ll take care of it,” he promised. “I’ll call for a tow truck.”

“Wes.”

“I’m sorry?”

“Wes Barrett.” I swallowed past the lump in my throat. His name was the only one I could think of. “He has a truck. Body shop. He can pick us up.”

“Right, I know,” he said quietly, as if I’d just offered him common knowledge. He pulled a phone from the pocket of his black jacket, turning to me. “I’m sorry, I didn’t catch your name. Who should I tell him I’m calling for?”

“Roz,” I said, trying to lick my dry lips, but even my tongue was useless. “Rosalind Bingham.”

“Okay, sit tight.”

He took a few steps away and surveyed the damage on the two cars. After a quick assessment, he dialed a number and lifted the phone to his ear.

“Wes, hey. It’s Avery. I need you to bring the truck.”

He paused, reading the signs at the curb.

“Corner of Main and Elmwood. I’m with Rosalind Bingham.”

My head felt lighter; my chest tightened. It was happening all over again—the sudden onset of anxiety, blurred colors, and deafening heartbeats.

Wes, hey. It’s Avery.

Four words of confirmation and the final bit of air in my lungs puffed out with a gasp. Lightheaded and dizzy, I drifted sideways, unable to pull my body upright. One last jolt of shock sent me reeling, and my head slammed against the pavement. And then the whole world faded to black.