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Chapter One

Cara

Life is like a San Francisco street It’s often a cli, and soht down

Cara Blomquist was pretty sure she had street anxiety, if that was a thing And when the streets dove, they took her stomach with them It felt exactly like she was on a roller coaster after it dropped

She and her friends were late, so it didn’t help that the driver was hotfooting it down roads that looked like they were heading straight into the center of the earth

Cara tagged along with To recently been ditched by her first real boyfriend She bounced around the back of her friends’ clunker, praying they didn’t wreck on the mountainous streets Or worse that she didn’t toss her cookies in the backseat

Even though she didn’t feel like being there, she’d dressed for the occasion Nice dress, thigh-high stockings and a pair of heels she wished she’d practiced walking in

Careening down Filbert Street—the steepest street in San Francisco—proved Toht air and landed with a thunk before it finally leveled out

They were heading to an area of town called the Tenderloin, to the Great American Music Hall on O’Farrell Street to be a private audience to the best of the Bay Area musicians as they jammed

Tommy and Marissa were musicians who had connections to the who’s who of the runge clothes, they looked the part

Cara was just interested in getting out of the house She needed the distraction of friends, nice clothes, and spending time away from San Jose

Tommy swerved the car into an alley to the back side of a building, next to a duure stood with his muscled arms folded across his powerful chest He didn’t have the black hair with tips frozen in the air with colored wax He looked “nornature scowl that qualified him as a rock-and-roll musician

“You’re late,” he said flatly

Of all the sights in San Francisco that Cara caught fro

“Sorry man,” said Tommy “Got turned around”

Cara added, “Plus, Tommy is always late”

At the sound of her voice, Mr Tall, Dark and Dangerous leaned into theand stared at her, like a predator sizing up its prey His face was dark and haunting Brooding eyes, a jaw carved froods weep He o dry She feared him and wanted him at the same time He stared at her while he talked to Tommy

“I waruy “No worries”

She wondered if she should knoho he was? He had a faive-a-fuck attitude, but she couldn’t be certain since she wasn’t really up on theShe waited quietly before trying to get out of the back of the two-door car

Her friends exited, heading to the popped trunk to haul cases from it to the door It slammed shut Marissa, To, leaving the car doors wide open and forgetting all about her

Cara stuck her legs out one at a ti the she didn’t snag or run her sed on them for this event

She clutched Marissa’s seat and the side of the door She heaved forward and fell back Forward and back It was harder to exit than she expected

She considered reh, but no as she going to risk the stockings They were too sweet and too damn expensive

If they had already forgotten about her and locked the door, she had high confidence she’d be able to charht come in handy

Because she was out in the alley by herself, she didn’t care if her obscenely short dress, rode up past her hips The stockings were sheer and stoppedNo one around to see—although there was the distinctive sarette smoke which reminded her of Mr Dark and Desirable