PROLOGUE
Three months ago…
“And just like that,I am officially on vacation!”
Rose Goodwin’s attention was pulled from the padlock in her hand to the source of the overly cheery voice. She instantly recognized the voice, and the woman who’d just walked through the door markedEmployees Only.
“You do know it’s not nice to brag, right?” Rose lifted one corner of her mouth in a grin so her one female friend in the world would know she was only teasing. “What time is your flight?”
There was a definite bounce in Brooke Jensen’s step as she made her way across the restaurant’s spacious breakroom, coming to a stop at the locker to Rose’s right.
“Nine o’clock sharp.” The twenty-seven-year-old blonde beamed back. “Which means I have to be at the airport no later than eight. But I’m planning on getting there even earlier in case the line at the baggage check is as crazy as last year.”
A twinge of jealousy twisted inside Rose’s gut as she disengaged the padlock before opening the gray metal door ofher own employee locker. But then she remembered how excited Brooke had been about her upcoming vacation and immediately felt guilty. After all, it wasn’t Brooke’s fault her grandparents had offered to take her entire family—including Brooke’s live-in boyfriend—on a two-week cruise to the Bahamas.
If someone offered to pay for a trip like that for me, you’d better believe I’d be packing my bags.
The familiar envy currently filling Rose’s veins had nothing to do with vacations or money. Her friend could have grown up with an alcoholic mother, no father, and lived in a run-down apartment with barely enough money to make ends meet, for all Rose cared.
After all, that was exactly howshe’dbeen raised.
It was thefamilypart she coveted most.
“Rose?”
The question in Brooke’s voice had Rose looking back over at her friend. “Sorry, what?”
“I said, when is your next day off?”
“Oh. Um…” She had to think. “Three days.”
“You have to work all weekend?” The woman’s button nose wrinkled with a grimace. “Damn. That really sucks.”
To someone like Brooke, a weekend spent waiting tables probablydidsuck. Of course, the other woman was only using the waitressing job as a second source of income until she was finished with nursing school.
For Rose, getting hired at the swankiest Mexican restaurant in town was an absolute Godsend.
Unlike her previous jobs, her boss was super friendly, and the customers at La Cocina were almost always pleasant to deal with. An even bigger plus was that Rose had been making enough in tips alone; she almost had enough put back to cover half ofnextmonth’s rent.
It was the first time Rose could ever remember being financially ahead. Not by much, mind you. And tips were never a guarantee, which was why she was still skimping and saving every dime she didn’t absolutelyhaveto spend. Hence, this weekend’s three extra shifts.
Even so, Rose was in the best financial spot she’d ever been in, and it was all thanks to the woman standing beside her.
She turned to Brooke with the flash of a genuine smile. “Hey, I know I’ve already said it a billion times, but…thanks again for getting me this job. If you hadn’t talked Brian into giving me a chance despite my record?—”
“Are you kidding?” The other woman shot her an incredulous look. “One, it’s not like you’re some career criminal, Rose. You got pulled over with weed in your car. And it wasn’t even yours.”
Damn right, it wasn’t mine.
A familiar anger threatened to surge from the memory of that horrible, terrifying time in her life. Sure, she’d tried pot before. Every sixteen-year-old within a ten-mile radius of her crappy, run-down neighborhood smoked up back then. But dealing?
Rose had never been much of a rule breaker, regardless of her upbringing. So peddling drugs…
That was something Rose would never,everdo.
Not that the cops had believed her. The cops. The judge. Even her worthless, court-appointed public defender had thought she was lying about the “birthday gift” she’d been trying to deliver to a “friend” on behalf of her dirtbag boyfriend wasn’t actually hers.
To make matters worse, when the douchebag Rose had been seeing learned she’d been caught making a drop with his drugs—drugs she’d knownnothingabout—he’d split town.