Sophie Oak: Chasing Bliss

“Yeah. Maybe you should tell her,” Patrick said nervously. “She’s already like put down money for the wedding and stuff. I put her off as long as I could, but she put down ten grand to reserve some hotel for the wedding.”

Nonrefundable. That deposit was nonrefundable, as was the Vera Wang wedding dress she’d nearly killed two women over at a bridal gown sale. She still had a scar on her forearm over that dress.

Her stomach took a nosedive. She’d been an idiot. She’d worked ninety-hour weeks, slaving over reports and evidence and filing briefs. And her promotion was going to a woman who spent more time on her nails than her work.

“Patrick, I’m allowing you to head Daddy’s legal team. You can get rid of the idiot blonde.” Christina let out a long sigh. “And I want her fired. I don’t want to have to look at your ex-fiancée every day.”

Patrick’s voice came out on a little whine. She hated that whine. “Babe, I can’t fire her. She’s done nothing to get herself fired. She’s smart as hell. Do you think she couldn’t come up with a lawsuit? She was top of her class at Harvard. She’s honestly kind of slumming here.”

She wasn’t slumming. She was where she wanted to be. She’d decided long ago that she would conquer Manhattan.

Except she wasn’t conquering anything. She’d been chasing some fucking dream she’d had at the age of eight and all she had to show for it was a going-nowhere job and a lying weasel of a fiancé.

She wasn’t sure how it happened. One minute she was standing there, listening to them talk about how easily she’d been fooled and Patrick arguing that they should use her just a little longer, and the next she was being arrested by New York’s finest and hauled out of one of Midtown’s nicer apartment buildings, a good-size chunk of Christina Big Tits’ stylish brown hair still clutched in her palm.

“Sweetheart, you’re going to have to get in the car now.” The cop gave her a sympathetic nod toward the squad car.

She felt dazed. She was being arrested and her future was gone. And all she could think of was her damn bag. She wanted her bag.

“My purse?”

The cop’s partner, a solid woman, held up the bag. “I have it, honey. I’ll take care of it until you go through processing. Do you have someone you could call?”

They had been so sympathetic after they’d managed to pull her off Christina and had the whole story. Cops, it seemed, sometimes got the shaft, too.

Who could she call? God. She couldn’t call anyone at the law firm. Everyone hated her. She’d been kind of a bitch because it was the only way to get taken seriously. She had no friends. She had no fiancé. She only had one person in the entire world who might care that she was in trouble.

“My mom.” Tears started to fall. How was she going to tell her mother she’d ruined everything?

Tallahassee, Florida

Jesse McCann looked over the map. They had days of open road ahead of them. Just him and Cade. Normally he would be looking forward to the trip. It wouldn’t be the first time they’d jumped on the backs of their custom-built bikes and spent weeks exploring the country and picking up women.

They wouldn’t be doing that this time.

This trip wasn’t about fun times with the man he thought of as his brother. This trip was about revenge.

Cade strode in, stuffing a gun into his backpack. They had spent the last year learning what they needed to know. They’d learned how to track a man, and they’d damn straight learned how to kill one.

“You ready?” Cade looked up, a dark look in his eyes. Guilt weighed heavily on his face. Jesse would never forget the dark hole Cade slipped into when they’d learned how their foster mother died. Cade had been with their mother the longest. Jesse only had five years with Nancy Gibbs. Cade had come to their foster mother when he’d been barely nine, spending more time with her than his own mom.

Maybe if Jesse had spent more time with Nancy Gibbs, he wouldn’t have a juvenile rap sheet.

He just hoped he didn’t get an actual adult arrest when they finally took down the man who caused his foster mother’s death. It didn’t matter. One way or another, Christian Grady would pay for what he’d done.

“I’m ready.” Jesse had been ready from the moment he realized that Christian Grady was responsible for Nancy Gibbs’s misery and her eventual death. Grady bilked an elderly lady out of her life savings and left her to die in a rat-infested nursing home. Guilt burned at Jesse’s gut. He’d been partying with Cade while she was dying. He’d called every other day, but he should have visited. He should have made sure. He should have fucking stayed at home and taken care of her.

And his heartache was nothing compared to what Cade must be feeling. Cade didn’t know it, but Jesse had figured out Cade’s past long ago. He’d heard Cade’s nightmares. He’d put together the puzzle. What happened to Nancy Gibbs differed vastly from the way Cade’s parents and sister died, but the guilt would feel the same. Cade’s face was bleak as he pulled his gloves on.

“Stop it.” Jesse stared at him, a frown on his face. “I know what you’re thinking. We didn’t kill her. Grady did, and Hope McLean is going to lead us straight to him.”

Cade nodded but didn’t reply. It wasn’t anything they hadn’t gone over a hundred times. He hoped Cade actually listened to logic this time. They needed to concentrate on the plan. Christian Grady wasn’t dead. They knew damn well he was alive, and he couldn’t be allowed to get away with what he’d done. Grady would go after his wife. He would figure out Hope McLean was living in Bliss, Colorado, so Bliss, Colorado, was going to be their home for a while.

They had jobs. They had a place to live. They had a plan.

Jesse climbed on the back of his bike and slid a long look at his best friend. He couldn’t imagine what he would have done if he hadn’t met Cade Sinclair. Died, he suspected. Gone to jail. Something very bad. Cade might be fucked up beyond all recognition, but Jesse was his friend. Cade had taught him something important. Cade had taught him that there was something way more important than himself. Family. Family was everything. Not blood. Blood meant shit, but family, the people who loved a man, they were everything.

“What do we do after this?” Jesse asked.

Cade sighed, the sound deep and low in his chest. “I don’t know, man. I guess we come back to Florida and try to start our lives.”

Jesse nodded and gunned the engine. He wasn’t sure where the hell his life was going, but he knew one thing. Wherever the road took him, it was going to go through Bliss.

Cade took off, his bike revving before he hit the road. Jesse did what he’d done for the last ten years. He followed his brother and hoped for the best.

Bliss, Colorado

Six months later

“So let me get this straight, Miss Wells. In the week you’ve been in Bliss, you’ve had and lost two jobs.”

Yep, she was on a roll. “Stella hasn’t actually fired me yet.”

But she would. Oh, there was no doubt in Gemma’s mind that the firing would come. Waitresses weren’t allowed to use Tasers on the patrons of the café. It might not have been on her employment form, but it was one of those universal things. There was also the fact that she’d been forced to leave her shift after the sheriff arrested her. She was sitting in jail in a crapass small town. Her life might have finally hit rock bottom. She’d thought she’d made it there before, but it turned out the sinkhole she was in was so much deeper than she’d imagined.