Chapter 1Her Broken Pet Bites Back

I was born with the kind of unnatural, freakish strength that makes diplomats shudder and barflies pray.

Growing up, whenever a pack of neighborhood bullies tried cornering me behind the bleachers, I didn't cry or tell a teacher—I put all seven of them in the dirt. Years later, when an armed predator tried snatching a kid off my block, I snapped his femur with two bare hands like a dry piece of kindling. I became a local urban legend.

The trouble with becoming a neighborhood folk hero for hand-to-hand violence is that your romantic prospects dry up overnight. By the time I hit thirty, not a single matchmaker within a fifty-mile radius would take my calls. In a fit of petty, stubborn spite, I booked out the entire VIP floor of an upscale club, surrounded myself with bottle service, drank top-shelf bourbon until my veins buzzed, and popped an aneurysm from pure, unadulterated adrenaline.

When I opened my eyes, I had somehow woken up inside the battered skin of a doormat husband in some melodramatic soap opera.

The good news? I had a gorgeous, impossibly wealthy heiress for a wife.

The bad news? Anchored to her hip was a venomous little leech named Keegan—her self-proclaimed "gay best friend" and emotional lapdog. For three miserable years, Keegan had exploited her blind spot, chipping away at the original owner of this body until nothing was left but bruises, silence, and shame.

Right this second, Keegan was crowded against Camille in the low, ambient red light of the private lounge, play-wrestling and gossiping, his linen-shirted elbow swinging back with unmistakable malice until it slammed dead into my sternum.

I let out an involuntary grunt, the unfamiliar body reacting before my brain could stop it.

Keegan’s eyes flickered with practiced disdain. He threw his hands up, grinning around the plush leather booth.

"God, Dean, relax! We told you this was just drinks for the inner circle. You insisted on tagging along like a stubborn bodyguard, and now you’re pouting because somebody bumped your shoulder?"

Camille Townsend barely glanced up from her smartphone, her sculptured eyebrows pinching together in cold irritation.

"If you can't handle being here, Dean, take an Uber home," she said, her voice smooth and dismissive. "Stop embarrassing me in front of everyone."

I felt the corners of my mouth pull back into a slow, unfamiliar grin. I didn't say a word. I simply stepped forward, planted my back foot, and delivered a short, explosive right hook straight into Keegan’s jaw.

His head snapped back like a cracked whip, and he dropped like a sack of wet flour, utterly limp against the mahogany coffee table.

I shook out my knuckles. "That it? I thought your girlfriends were supposed to be tough."

* * *

The lounge fell into a tomb-like silence.

A woman across the table in an expensive silk slip dress froze, her cigarette tumbling from her lips and scorching a neat brown circle into the fabric of her skirt.

"Holy shit—" someone whispered.

Camille snapped out of her trance with a violent gasp, lunging across the velvet cushions to hoist Keegan up. The left side of his face had already ballooned into an ugly, mottled purple, dark blood trickling from the corner of his split lip. His eyes rolled around the ceiling, dazed and glassy.

Camille whipped her head toward me, her gaze black enough to freeze water.

"Dean! Have you lost your goddamn mind?"

I ignored her, cutting straight through the frozen cluster of trust-fund socialites and dropping into the center of the plush leather banquette, kicking my boots up onto the marble table.

"Didn't you tell me to blend in?" I asked, tilting my head toward the girl whose skirt was still smoldering. "I figured this was how your inner circle talks to each other. Right?"

The girl managed a pathetic, strangled squeak, fumbling to jam the cigarette back between her trembling lips, eyes darting anywhere but at me.

Keegan finally came to, clutching his jaw and pointing a manicured, trembling finger at my face. "Dean... you hit me? You actually hit me?!"

I rolled my wrist in a lazy circle, testing the tendons. "You’re the one who’s always saying real sisters don't hold back. I’m just trying to build some sisterly solidarity with you, man."

Camille’s jaw set so hard the tendons in her throat stood out like wire. "Dean. Apologize to him. Now."

I looked her dead in the eyes. "He checked me first."

"Keegan is clumsy," she snapped, her tone dripping with conditioned defense. "He didn't do it on purpose!"

"Oh," I said easily. "Well, I’m clumsy too. Heavy hands. Terrible impulse control."

Camille looked as though she might choke on her own breath, a vein pulsing sharply at her temple.

Seeing her fury, Keegan slipped back into his favorite role: the gracious, long-suffering victim. He leaned weakly into Camille's shoulder, sniffling. "Look, it’s fine, Camille... Dean’s always been jealous of how close we are. You know how men get when they're small-minded."

I turned my neck slowly, letting the cervical vertebrae pop like small caliber rounds. "Say one more syllable, Keegan, and I’ll stitch your lips together with whatever’s in my pocket."

His mouth clicked shut instantly, his face alternating between chalk white and mottled green.

A guy in an untucked designer shirt scrambled to cut the tension with a nervous laugh. "Hey, hey—come on, guys, it’s Dean’s first night out with us! Let’s just play King’s Cup. Clear the air. Fun and games, right?"

A chorus of desperate murmurs broke out around the table. In the background, Keegan’s eyes narrowed, a greasy little spark of cunning flickering through the swelling.

Camille shot me a look that was pure threat. "Sit there, keep your hands to yourself, and don't make another scene."

I leaned back and let a quiet chuckle slip through my nose.

Keegan practically scrambled for the deck of cards, shuffling with theatrical desperation. He drew first, holding the card close to his chest before whipping it into the air, his voice unnaturally shrill.

"I’m King!"

The lounge hushed. Keegan let his gaze settle on me, an oily malice dripping from his swollen smile.

"Rule of the round," Keegan declared, trying to sound playful while his eyes drilled into mine. "Number One has to trade ten open-palm strikes across the back of the hand with me. Full force. No pulling away."

Everyone hastily turned their cards over, exhaling audible sighs of relief as the numbers cleared.

That left Camille and me.

I flipped my card face up on the table.

Ace of Hearts. Number One.

Keegan’s grin widened until the split on his lip cracked open again. Around the circle, people started snickering, the nervous tension bleeding back into casual cruelty.

"Watch out, Keegan," someone called out. "Dean looks pretty delicate. Don't hit him so hard Camille has to nurse him back to health."

Keegan scoffed, shaking his head with fake pity. "Hey, it’s a fair game. He gets to hit me back ten times too. Unless... our house-husband can’t handle high stakes?"

I looked at Camille. Her expression was completely hollow, her eyes daring me to complain. "If you agreed to play, you follow the rules, Dean. Give him your hand."

I looked at Keegan’s smug, punchable face. My heart did a slow, steady roll in my chest.

"Fair enough," I said, laying my left palm flat against the polished marble.

Keegan’s eyes glittered with sadistic triumph. He stood up, rolled his shoulders, and came down with everything his wiry frame could muster. "Crack. Crack. Crack." Ten rapid, brutal slaps, each one aimed to split the skin over my knuckles.

By the tenth strike, the back of my hand was inflamed, an angry, throbbing crimson. A few people winced, looking down into their drinks.

Keegan blew on his own stinging palm, offering me a saccharine, venomous smile. "You aren't mad at me, are you, Dean? We always play rough like this. You just have to get used to it."

I shook the numbness out of my fingers, resting my elbows on the table and beaming at him. "Mad? Never. I respect the spirit of the game."

I reached out, my own knuckles popping in the quiet room.

"My turn, Keegan."

Something in my eyes must have finally registered, because the color drained straight out of his cheeks. But then he remembered the man I was supposed to be—a weak-willed shell who couldn't even loosen the lid on a pasta jar—and thrust his hand forward with false bravado.

A second later, a sickening "crunch" echoed through the suite, followed immediately by an ungodly, high-pitched howl that didn't sound human.

"Aaaaggghhh!"

Keegan collapsed onto the floorboards, curling into a tight fetal ball, clutching his right wrist to his chest as snot and tears washed the expensive foundation right off his skin.

I stood up, shaking out my fingers, and pointed down at his dislocated, crooked joint with a bright, innocent smile.

"Must be all the deadlifts lately. Hard to gauge my own strength." I looked around at the room full of paralyzed, terrified faces. "None of you hold that against me, right?"