Chapter 1

JENNA

New York smells like rain and ambition.

The cab window is cracked open, letting the city's cold air brush my cheek as I stare up at the skyline.

Neon lights smear across the glass, too bright, too loud, too alive.

Nothing in Montana ever looked like this.

Back home, the sky was the tallest thing for miles.

Here, I'm the smallest thing for miles, and somehow that feels like relief instead of fear.

I clutch my purse tighter, fingers trembling.

Three days here, and the city still feels like a giant I haven't learned the footsteps of.

"First time in New York?" the cab driver asks, glancing at me in the mirror.

"Is it that obvious?"

"You're looking up instead of down. Locals don't do that."

"I'll learn."

"You will," he says. "Everyone does. Or they leave."

"Which one are you?"

"Neither. I just drive them."

I laugh under my breath. "Fair enough."

He glances at me again in the mirror. "What brings you here? Job? Man? Running from something?"

"A job," I say. "Starting Monday."

"No man?"

"No man."

"Good," he says. "This city eats those alive first."

His words settle in my chest like a warning.

I'm not leaving.

Not after everything I sacrificed to get here.

Not after losing my parents, or my grandparents spending their savings on a dream they'll never see.

I'm here to build a future—a version of myself that isn't defined by tragedy.

I've rehearsed that line in my head so many times it barely feels like mine anymore.

But tonight, watching the city blur past the window, I almost believe it.

The cab stops outside The Blue Lantern, the sign flickering electric blue over the wet pavement.

I pay the driver and step into the night air, cold enough to sting my lungs.

Faith is waiting inside, waving wildly the moment she spots me.

"Nina!" She pulls me into a hug.

"It's Jenna. Nina's my middle name."

"Whatever. You're here! We're celebrating your new job!"

"I start Monday."

"As a secretary for a major corporation," she says proudly. "You're officially a city girl."

"I'm officially terrified."

"Same thing, different word." Faith squeezes my shoulders. "Your grandma would be so proud right now she'd probably cry into her coffee."

My throat tightens. "Don't. I'll ruin my mascara before I even order a drink."

"Fine. Later, then. Tonight we celebrate."

I try to smile, nerves twisting in my stomach.

I don't know anyone here.

I don't know the rules.

"You'll be fine," Faith says, reading my face like she always could. "You survived Montana winters. New York's just louder."

"Montana winters didn't judge my outfit."

"Honey, nobody's judging your outfit. They're too busy judging their own."

Faith drags me to the bar, ordering drinks, talking about her latest photography project.

"I'm shooting a series on rooftops," she says. "The city looks different from up there. Smaller. Almost honest."

"Sounds like a metaphor."

"Everything's a metaphor if you squint hard enough."

I nod along, trying to breathe.

Then a ripple moves through the room—a shift in the air, a hush.

I turn.

A man walks in with two others, and the whole bar tilts toward him.

Tall, broad-shouldered, in a black coat that costs more than my wardrobe.

His friends flank him, one laughing loudly, one on his phone, but he's silent, focused, unreadable.

He looks like he owns the night.

Faith whistles. "That's Jaxon."

"Who?"

"Billionaire. CEO. Heartbreaker. The kind of man who ruins your life and makes you thank him for it."

"He looks intense."

"He is. He never comes here. Something dragged him out tonight."

"You know him?"

"Everyone knows him. Nobody actually knows him." Faith takes a sip of her drink. "Big difference."

"Sounds exhausting."

"Sounds like every headline in this city for the last two years."

His friends shove him toward the bar.

"Come on, man," the blond one says. "You haven't touched anyone since Vivienne left. You're practically a monk."

Jaxon's jaw tightens.

"One night. One girl. Break the dry streak."

Jaxon says nothing.

"He's not going to do it," the other friend says, smirking. "He's forgotten how."

"I haven't forgotten anything," Jaxon says, voice flat.

"Prove it."

"Fine," the blond one says. "We dare you. First girl you choose, you take home."

My breath catches.

Jaxon's eyes lift and land on me.

For a moment the world stops.

His gaze is sharp, assessing, dark, like he's peeling back layers I didn't know I had.

I look away, heat rushing to my cheeks.

Faith nudges me. "Holy crap. He's looking at you."

"No, he's not," I whisper.

But he is.

"Jenna. He is one hundred percent looking at you."

"Stop staring back."

"I'm not staring, I'm memorizing this for later."

He pushes off the bar and walks toward me, and every step feels like a countdown.

My pulse races.

Faith grabs my arm. "Okay, actually, do not panic. Panicking is my job right now."

"I'm not panicking."

"You're holding your drink like a weapon."

He stops in front of me, close enough that I catch his cologne, clean and expensive.

"Hi," he says, voice low.

"Hi."

He studies me—my face, my hair, the nervous way I grip my glass.

"You're not from here."

"No. I'm from Montana."

His lips twitch. "That explains the innocence."

"I'm not—"

"You are," he says softly. "And that's not an insult."

"What is it, then?"

"An observation."

"You make a lot of those?"

"Only about things worth noticing."

"And I'm worth noticing?"

"You're the only one in this bar I haven't stopped noticing since I walked in."

"Why are you talking to me?"

He leans in, his breath brushing my ear.

"Because I want to."

My heart stutters.

Faith's eyes go huge, and she wisely slips away.

Jaxon pulls back just enough to look at me.

"What's your name?"

"Jenna."

"Jenna." He says it like he's testing the taste of it. "Pretty."

"You say that to everyone?"

"I don't say much to anyone."

"Comforting."

"It should be."

He gestures toward the door. "Let me walk you home."

"I don't know you."

"You're right. You don't." His eyes soften, just a fraction. "But I'm not going to hurt you."

"That's what everyone says right before they do."

"Maybe. But I'm still saying it. And I meant it about tonight—I don't do this. Bars. Strangers. Any of it."

"Then why me?"

"I'm still working that out."

"I can't."

"Why?"

The truth slips out before I can stop it.

"Because I'm not like the women from here. If you know what I mean." I smile a little.

His expression shifts—the heat in his eyes turning into something protective, something I can't name.

He steps back.

"How old are you?" he asks.

"Twenty-three."

"And you've never—"

"No."

He's quiet for a moment, studying me like I'm a puzzle he didn't expect to find in a bar on a Tuesday.

"Then I'm definitely not taking you home," he says quietly. "But I'll walk you there."

"You don't have to."

"I know."

"Your friends are watching."

"Let them."

He offers his hand.

I hesitate, my whole life in Montana pulling at me from three thousand miles away.

Then I take it, and the night changes forever.