Prologue

Once upon a time, there was a guy, there was a girl, and some crazy shit went down.

The end.

Just messing with you.

I’m a full-service kind of guy, and I’d never skip the good part. When I tell a you’ll-never-believe-what-happened kind of story, I’ll stamp it with my personal guarantee that you’re getting the whole Oreo, from the delicious chocolate wafers to the sweet crème filling. And please, I encourage you to devour it all, every mouth-watering morsel of the tale.

Like that one time on the rollercoaster when we learned exactly why some people shriek at the top of their lungs on the downhill.

Or the tale of the quickie behind the lucky slot machine, when someone nailed three cherries while I nailed her.

Not sure either of those times topped the afternoon with the ladder, though.

What? You don’t have any fantasies involving ladders? You will soon, and you’ll never think of the top rung of a ladder the same way again.

But in between all of that so-insane-it-should-be-illegal stuff that I never could have predicted in my wildest imagination—and look, it’s lawless up there between my ears—there was some seriously real shit, too.

The type of real that fucks your heart with a chainsaw.

That damn near rips it out of your chest.

That was what happened to me.

So now, after nearly sixty-nine days with her—and the irony of that number is most decidedly not lost on me—I’m here.

On the steps of the courthouse. She’s going up. I’m going down.

I reach for her arm. Wrap my hand around it. “Is this how it ends?”

My voice barely sounds like my own.

Hers is a whisper, too. “You tell me.”

I could tell you I’m a player. I could tell you I’ve got a big dick, a rock-hard body, and a heart of gold. But you’re not here for my résumé. Besides, you’ve heard stories before of the player tamed.

You haven’t heard this one.

Warning: I don’t give spoilers, so you’ll just need to buckle up and enjoy the ride.

The only thing I’ll tell you is this—our ending is one you’ll never see coming.

1

I’m going to let you in on a little secret about guys. When we see a chick we like, we all say she is hot for us. Doesn’t matter who the woman is, what her situation might be, or if we even have a clue if it’s true or not. We just say it.

Like right now.

Floyd, the redheaded dude who was three days late dropping off the hinges for this swank Upper East Side penthouse, has parked an elbow on the counter and is yammering away. Guess he needs a break from the hard work of missing a deadline. I’m determined to meet it though, so I keep working, screwing the hinges into the cabinet door for one of my clients.

A client who Floyd believes is hot for his sausage.

His words. Not mine.

“Wyatt, did you see the way Lila stared at me when I walked in?” he says as he grabs his black and green energy drink, pounds it, then swipes his hand over his mouth, leaving a trail of droplets on his red-flecked goatee.

“Hmm. I must have missed that moment,” I say, and I’m glad that Lila is downstairs in the building’s gym right now and can’t hear him.

“I’m telling you, the chicks just line up for me at every job,” Floyd says, puffing out his chest.

I arch an eyebrow as I twist the screwdriver and give him my best deadpan retort. “This line of women—would you say it extends beyond the door and down the hallway of every client’s home?”

He nods, like he buys his own bullshit. Evidently, sarcasm is lost on the Hot Sausage King.

“Absolutely. I could have them all day long. One right after the other. That’s why we’re in this business, right, bro?”

He holds up a fist for knocking, but my hands are busy, so I just say, “For the tail?”

He nods. “Best tail I’ve ever had. Nothing quite like a hammer in the hand to nab the chickadees.”

I laugh at this incredible line of baloney. Because tail is exactly why I got into the home construction business. Not. “You’d probably never be tired, either? You’ve got constant stamina?” I ask, egging him on as I move to the next hinge, spacing it evenly along the back of the door.

“Oh yeah. But here’s the thing. This is the golden rule of our business,” he adds, then presses his finger to his lips.

Oh, lucky me. He’s going to let me in on his secret.

“I love rules. Tell me, tell me,” I say, like an eager acolyte.

“The golden rule is this—you can bang the clients, but you can’t ever screw your assistant.”

“That so?” I say in a completely serious voice, as if he’s just dispensed wisdom from Mount Olympus.

Floyd nods sagely. “Trust me. Learn from my mistakes. I lost the best assistant in the universe when I couldn’t keep my hands off her fine ass,” he says, then sighs wistfully as his gaze drifts to the ceiling. He must be remembering her sweet cheeks. “A good assistant is worth her weight in gold.” He taps his chest. “That’s why my new one is a gray-haired granny. That just removes the temptation entirely.”

I finish screwing the hinges to the door, and take the drill from my tool belt. Pointing it at him, I meet his eyes. “But consider this . . .” I let my voice trail off, take a pregnant pause, then say, “What if I was into silver foxes?”

His eyes widen, and his words come out dry and unsure. “You are?”