Prologue
Garret/Axle
1998
“Don’t cry, baby. Tell me you understand,” I croon, wiping at the tears on Angel’s cheeks.
“But I don’t,” she whispers. “I thought we were going to leave together?”
“We were,” I tell her. That had been the plan, but I knew if I stayed any longer in this godforsaken town that I was going to end up in prison. Her father would see to it. There’s no way the mayor wanted this sweet, innocent angel being dirtied up by the boy from the other side of the tracks. He’d made it clear several times.
“I’ll send for you once I’ve got something set up for us,” I promised. “I love you Ang, but I can’t stay here. You know that.”
“I know. I’m sorry,” she whispers, her lip trembling, blue eyes filled with tears. God she was beautiful, even with puffy cheeks and eyes red from crying.
To this day I don’t know why she’d given me a chance.
Other than having her father on my back, I didn’t regret a single minute of my time with her. She was the love of my life, but I also knew I couldn’t stay.
“No need to be sorry, Ang. You aren’t them; I know that. Give me three months, you'll be eighteen by then and you can leave. I’ll send word of where I am through Mike at the diner. I don’t trust your father not to go through your mail or check your emails.”
“Okay,” she nods, standing on tiptoes as she kisses me, sliding her tongue silkily along mine.
I almost decide to stay.
She pulls away from me and steps back, her hand lingering on mine for just a moment until she wraps her arms around her waist. “I love you Garret Peele, don’t forget me.”
“Never,” I promise. Kissing my fingers, I blow her a kiss. Turning away, my steps stutter at her broken gasp but I push on and swing my leg over my bike, starting it up.
Looking in the mirror, I watch her until I can’t see her anymore. My heart cracks in my chest as she falls to her knees, her arms around her waist as she folds in on herself.
My breath hitches, and I ignore the tears on my cheeks as they dry in the wind.
That was the last time I saw the girl who held my heart for the next twenty-eight years.
I did what I promised and three months later I sent for her, only to have Mike tell me that the entire family had left overnight. Nobody knew where to. She’d disappeared, and at eighteen I didn’t have the money to find her. Not that I stopped searching. Every town I went to I asked around, showing her photo. I did this for years after we parted.
Prologue
Angel
1998
Four months after my heart shattered as I watched the boy I’d loved for two years ride away on his bike, two pink lines on the test in front of me began to piece it back together. Only to break again months later.
I was pregnant. How? I wasn’t sure, as we’d always used protection. But somehow it had happened. I wasn’t sure what to do, or even how I was going to find Garret.
I somehow had to get word to Mike at the diner, but since we were watched like hawks, I wasn’t sure how that was going to be possible.
I was still trying to wrap my head around the fact that we were in witness protection. I’d been a baby when my parents had entered the programme, and they’d never said anything to me. For years we’d lived in our small town, just another family like any other, except for my dad wanting to be in control of everything.
He’d eventually been voted in as mayor when I turned sixteen, and that was our downfall. Seems he didn’t understand what flying under the radar meant. He’d been photographed, and we’d been found.
The guys after him were pretty bad guys; you didn’t fuck with the Irish mob. The first I’d known about it was when our door had been kicked in at two in the morning by the marshals, and we’d been hustled out of our house and into two vehicles. They’d taken my dad one way, and me and my mom the other.
I’d been so confused and terrified as I’d watched the town I’d grown up in disappear behind us. My mom was no help; all she did was cry and rock in the car next to me. I’d demanded explanations, but I’d been told to sit back and shut up. They’d have my parents explain everything to me once I was safe.
Turns out the only way I’d ever be safe was when my dad died by the hands of the mob.