Reese Jackson has tried to live up to the expectations that everyone else set for her, but it isn't easy to do. At times she feels as if the world is going to swallow her whole and she can't breathe. All the mistakes she's made come back to trouble her and finding a way out seems impossible.
Detective Dane Hunter has loved Reese since the first moment he met her over a decade ago, but she never really saw him. Her strict upbringing wouldn't allow for her to be rude to him; however, that same social standing dictated he would never be good enough for her either. Still, he longs for her and his heart waits hoping she will one day love him back.
Danger that is a part of both of their pasts comes back to haunt them and Dane is tasked with protecting Reese. Age old wounds fester within them with each passing day. Fighting for survival must be their priority, but it's hard to ignore the pull of the heart.
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If Dane had to choose between roasting over a spit in hell, being prepared as a meal for a pack of hellhounds, or having dinner at Rachel Jackson’s house—he’d willing bind himself to the pyre and prepare to die a gruesome death. That’s how much he hated the Jackson family matriarch. He’d been to dinner less than a handful of times, and the woman always made him feel inferior in every possible way. Saying she was judgmental didn’t do her justice. She didn’t hold her opinions to herself, and everyone around her were potential targets. Her children were her favorite to nail to the wall or hang upside down from the ceiling—the better to smash a bat into their piñata hides… Then their proverbial insides spilled out into a mess of emotional chaos.
There hadn’t been a dinner he’d attended where someone didn’t leave either in tears or a rage. That was how they dealt with their mother, and often times it involved both. On more than one occasion, he’d been grateful he had it better than them. He may not have had a stellar father figure, but his mother had always been wonderful. Now he had to willingly enter the lion’s den and hope Mrs. Jackson didn’t chew them all up and spit them out to be stomped into oblivion.
“The things I do for my friends…” He muttered under his breath, and he walked to the front porch. He really hoped Carter had already made it. He didn’t want to deal with Mrs. Jackson without some support system in place. He’d always come with Carter when they dined, or rather his partner had forced him to attend. He was a convenient excuse for Carter to dine and dash without his mother sinking her claws firmly into his hide.
