He’s a dick. The most beautiful man I’ve ever set eyes on, and he’s an arrogant douche.

Figures.

Maybe all the beautiful ones are like that. God knows Nick was pretty, and he was a monster inside. The shinier the package, the dirtier the soul, it seems.

I step away from this Jesse guy and the disgruntled girl he obviously just fucked and forgot about, turning to go.

So with my luck, it makes perfect sense that Ev blocks my path right in that moment and points a finger at Mr. Beautiful, smiling brightly.

“Jesse Lee. I see you’ve already met. He’s the third apprentice at the tattoo shop.”

Yup, makes perfect sense that the asshole I never want to meet again is best friends and colleagues with my best and only friend’s boyfriend. Which means I’ll probably get to see him all the time.

Awesome. And I’ve only just returned to town.

***

Jesse Lee, according to Ev, is a good guy and a hell of a friend. When her psycho ex attacked Seth and then Micah, beating them up badly, Jesse stood watch over them at the hospital and offered to go hunt the son of a bitch down and drag him to the police station, after bashing his face in.

Sounds violent. But also fair.

Watching him talk to the other guys, waving his bottle of beer in the air, those stunning eyes crinkling in the corners when he grins, is addictive. The way his long mouth curves, the way muscles ripple in his arms with his every move, the way his green T-shirt stretches over his chest, molding over perfect pecs... Oh dear God.

Too bad I don’t lust after men. I don’t chase after them. I don’t need them. They can’t be trusted. In fact, few people can.

I desperately force my attention back to a story Micah is telling us about this customer who walked into the tattoo shop—Damage Control is the shop’s name, and talk about weird, as names go—who first refused to take a seat and then folded down into a dead faint when he saw the needle of the tattoo gun, before it even touched him.

“A fucking mess.” Micah rolls his eyes. “I have this guy sprawled on the floor, and customers peeking into the cubicle, all pale and stuff, preparing to run before I get my hands on them, too. Zane had to go lock himself up in the bathroom because he couldn’t stop laughing, and Tyler was left to block the exit and calm everyone down.”

Kayla, my new roommate, throws back her head of blond-streaked hair and laughs. The sound has a nervous edge to it, and she keeps glancing in Jesse’s direction. I wonder if he’s the reason she’s acting all giggly, flaunting her shiny earrings and long legs, or if she’s always like that.

Not sure which of the two is worse.

When I turn toward Ev, who’s telling the story of how she met Micah on the street one winter day, I find Jesse has switched from the blue-haired guy he’d been talking to, Ocean, to another busty blonde. He has her cornered with a hand braced on the wall next to her head, his dark head dipped forward.

She says something that makes Jesse crack up, and for some reason he turns and looks straight at me. Caught in his sparkling gaze, I fight a wave of panic.

Are they talking about me? Laughing about me?

Old fears rush back with a flutter of black wings, and I retreat a step, my breath frozen in my lungs. I think every set of eyes is turned on me, every smile twisting into a mocking grin, a grimace of malice.

I think I feel hard hands pushing me, shoulders shoving into me, and I’m back at school with voices calling my name, calling me an idiot, a dimwit, a retard for having difficulties reading and writing. Nick, the leader of the bully gang, calling me an ugly, stupid bitch.

Crap. If I don’t get out of here right now, I’m going to lose it, curl up in a ball and bawl. Not something I’d want anyone to witness, much less during this party, on my first night in town.

So I spin around and push past Micah, stumbling through the hump and grind of bodies, trying to find a way out.

It’s this place, I tell myself again as I push against sweaty backs and squeeze between couples to reach the door. It holds my fears, crystallized in time. That’s why I’m unsettled, uneasy in my skin. It’s a time capsule, unaffected by the passage of years, keeping me prisoner while outside the Earth turns and the world changes.

Coming here I took a step back, right into my past. I’m not in high school anymore, not a teenager, unsure of myself, of my looks, of my worth. I know how bullying works, and I know this isn’t it. Everything’s okay. I’m okay.

It’s over, it’s in the past, and this is the present.

Doesn’t help much with the cold ball of dread in my stomach, or the sweat running down my back. My heart is thumping at the base of my throat, making swallowing difficult, and my mouth is dry like the desert.

I finally reach the apartment door, wrench it open and step outside, onto the landing. It’s cooler out here, and quieter once I half-close the door behind me. We’re on the second floor. On one side, there’s a narrow window, and I crack it open, sucking in greedily the crisp night air that’s laced with car fumes and the oily scent of burgers and fries.

I draw a steadying breath, close my eyes, and feel my center of balance. Feel my weight on the floor, let my shoulders fall back, my back straighten.

My pendant is heavy around my neck. I touch it, feel its smooth contours, the tiny glass beads threaded on copper wire forming whorls and triangles. Forming a white rose, symbol of new beginnings.

I’ll be fine. I have my art to keep me sane, and if I was mocked for working on it in the past, I won’t let anyone mock me now. This is my town. It was taken from me. I was chased away, made to feel like nothing.

But I’m back, here to make new memories, find my place. I’m certainly not letting a man, no matter how jaw-dropping gorgeous, make me doubt and hate myself like I used to, not so long ago.

I have a plan, a path leading to my future, and nobody can stop me.

Chapter two

Jesse

The blonde chick is pulling on my hand, trying to drag me closer, nattering about how she’d like to decorate my dick with cherries, take a photo and put it up in her art class exhibition. Never heard anything so dumb in my life.

But hey, it’s her class, what the fuck do I care? I laugh, alcohol making everything easier for a while, and I crane my neck to see where the brunette Ev introduced as Amber has gone to. I swear I was looking at her one second and the next she just vanished.

Poof. Gone.

Fuck it, am I seeing things? My alcohol hallucinations normally don’t involve pretty, wide-eyed girls who glare at me, then vanish in smoke.

This is new, and well, sort of exciting. Because it’s new, idiot, I tell myself, but that’s not all. That girl… She reminds me of someone, and it exerts a strange pull on me, like an old, half-faded memory I need to chase after.

So I do, pushing the insistent blonde’s hands off me, ignoring her whiny voice asking me what’s wrong and where I’m going, and start after a certain dark-haired sliver of a dream.

Seth puts a hand on my arm and says something as I pass him by, but his words get lost in the music blasting from the stereo. Another familiar face appears before me—Dylan, my mind informs me, friend of Zane’s—and I sidestep him, so intent on my hazy mission that I almost plow into another blonde.

“Jesse, have a drink with me?” She gives me a hopeful look, and damn, it’s the girl who went down on me in the bathroom. I remember her pouring tequila on my cock and sucking it like she was dying of thirst.

Sadly, that’s all I recall—not her name, or anything else about her.

“Sorry, gotta go.” I send a strained smile her way and brush by. She grabs me from behind, snagging the hem of my T-shirt, and I curse out loud, twisting to shake her off. She’s strong, holding on tight, and I wonder what she thinks will happen if she doesn’t let go, and how much drunker she is than me—when luckily for me someone stumbles into us, and she is forced to let go.