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Chapter One

Mia Blake didn’t need to check her pockets again to know she wouldn’t find keys Mostly because when she peered into her locked car, she saw thenition

It was nine o’clock at night, the winter as gusting, and now she had to figure out how to kick herself for not getting a spareto do list A list that was growing by the day and she’d only been back in her small home town of Sweet Hill teeks

She rested her forehead against the cold pane and cursed It had been a shitty day She was down to her last spare four dollars until pay day, her brother needed new cleats for football and she found an application to the local grocery store in his rooot turned down for this

Standing in her flour stained clothes after a long day waiting tables at Annie’s Café, she stared down her car and seriously conte theBut that would be another expense to pay that she couldn’t quite afford She was lucky enough to get the waitressing gig thanks to her old friend owing the café, but the hours were part time and the tips were minimal, which meant it covered rent and little else The et a second job

Once upon a time she was considered an asset to her former eh end exclusive night club, but she got tipped really well to be a glorified gopher The perk for her was that she also got to plan the club’s events and thehts It also came with a false sense of self-esteem

When she was there, planning and hosting parties for Seattle’s elite, she could pretend people valued her for her ideas instead of her tits

But things were different now She had a chance to be seen the way she wanted As a person If she could make it in her ho last name were known, she could certainly prove to everyone and herself that she was more

First she just had to get into her car

She banged her head against theand let out a long, frustrated breath She just wanted to see the last quarter of Kyle’s football gaht today, it would be to ame Which here everyone else in town seemed to be since Main Street was dead and dark

No help

And she was back to busting theidea because, da on her Like he had been since theirhim to the city with her had proven too difficult on hiterrible grades and bouts of depression, she quit her job and moved him back here where he could finish out his senior year with his friends

She missed her job She missed the money But Kyle seemed to be happier here And that orth it In Seattle, it was just the two of them In Sweet Hill, he had a support system

Walking around the car for the third time, she finally saw an option

“Sun roof!”

It was open and if she could just get inside enough to reach in and pop the lock, she’d be in business Cli onto the hood, she dropped her purse on the front seat and eyeballed the opening She could fit…maybe

“Quick hop and shimmy,” she told herself and tried just that Only the hop came up short and instead of a shimmy, she closed lined herself on her Honda

But she was in! Sort of

Balancing on the ledge and the ri into her lower sto for the driver side lock

The sunroof was sh a bit led and—

“Umph!” Came to a dead halt The as like a vice around her hips She tried to pull herself through again and when that didn’t work, she attempted to backtrack

Stuck

“You’ve got to be kiddingover her shoulder at her butt and hating the genes her e backside