I shake my head, feeling my throat dry out.

“You really want to kiss me?”

I nod, suddenly overwhelmingly nervous.

And then his chest swells, and he takes such a long and thorough breath it’s like he’s surfacing from the deep sea.

“Stay here.”

I rear. “What?”

“I have to… I have to go do something.” Zac opens my bedroom door, eyes still fixed on me. “Stay here and wait up for me, okay? I’ll be right back.”

“But—Zac, I just—”

I reach for him, but he shakes his head with enough intensity that I hit the brakes. He slips out of my bedroom, inching the door shut between us, eyeing me through the shrinking crack.

“I’ll be back, Clover, I promise. Wait up for me.”

Chapter 1

Melody

“What a jackass.”

I focus on the pale blue cashmere sweater I’m folding, tucking it into the dresser drawer with so much care you’d think it was my most prized possession.

It’s not. What I’m really doing is ignoring the man sitting at the foot of my new bed. His eyes are burning into my back, waiting me out, but he should know me better by now. I don’t cave when it comes to Parker Woods, and he’s also stubborn when it comes to me.

Just not as stubborn as I am.

“Melody, I am begging you to say words to convince me you know exactly what kind of jackass this guy is. Hedumpedyou.”

“I know he dumped me. You don’t think I know he dumped me? I’m back in town, moving in with you, aren’t I?”

“Specifically, he dumped you so he could fuck his way through a boys’ trip to South America. You do know that’s what he’s doing, right?”

I wheel around to face him, immediately regretting the way I plant my hands on my hips like a stern mom. But I’ve committed to it, so I throw in some narrowed eyes for good measure. “You don’t have to rub it in. Okay, maybe he dumped me. Maybe I just spent the past month wallowing in our old apartment by myself. But it really was a great relationship while it lasted, and I don’t see why I can’t remember it fondly—”

With a groan, Parker falls dramatically onto the mattress. He’s fresh home from work, still dressed in a pair of athletic shorts and a t-shirt adorned with the UOB Huskies logo on the sleeve.

“Correction: he’s amanipulativejackass. He’s out there sleeping around, and he’s got you hereremembering him fondly. I don’t know what you ever saw in him, Mel. Is it the rich guy thing? Did he at least buy you nice things for tolerating him all these years?”

I move to the bed where one of my suitcases sits open, still full to the brim, staring down at Parker who’s now glaring at the ceiling.

There are boy-girl twin combinations who look totally alike.

That can’t be said for me and Parker. He’s got the same blue eyes as mine, the same scowl when we’re pissed off, and the same talent for conveying our disdain with just a half-second glance.

But we’re opposites in every other way. He’s dark-haired where I’m dirty blonde, and he got blessed with several extra inches in the legs. He spent his whole life here in Oakwood Bay, graduated from UOB and took a job as a physical therapist in its athletic rehab center. Meanwhile, I moved to the city for college ten years ago, and never made it back home outside of the holidays.

Except now, courtesy of the demise of my six-year relationship.

“Is this what it’s going to be like, moving in here with you?” I ask him. “Look, it’s bad enough I had to move out of the apartment I shared with Connor—”

“Andhightailed it out of the city you’ve lived in for a decade—”

“That part had nothing to do with him. I couldn’t afford to live there alone on a part-time salary.”