Page 1 of Angel’s Claim

Chapter 1 - Bree

I'm standing in the middle of O'Malley's Bar wearing sweatpants and an oversized Fleetwood Mac T-shirt I found in the back of my closet, and I'm pretty sure I've never made a better decision in my entire life.

Four hours ago, I was supposed to walk down the aisle in a fifteen-thousand-dollar Vera Wang gown and marry a man I caught cheating three weeks ago at his own bachelor party.

I was supposed to smile for the cameras and pretend my stepmother hadn't spent the entire morning telling me to suck in my stomach because the dress was tailored perfectly and if it didn't fit right, it was my fault for not losing those last ten pounds.

They wanted me to become Mrs. Bree Abernathy and spend the rest of my life pretending I didn't know what everyone already knew, that my husband didn't love me, that my father only cared about the business merger this wedding represented, and that my stepmother would finally get exactly what she wanted: me out of the house and out of her sight forever.

Instead, I'm here.

Millhaven. Last stop on the Greyhound line. A town I'd never heard of until the ticket agent asked me where I wanted to go and I said, "As far away as this will take me," and slapped two hundred dollars in cash on the counter.

The bar is nothing like the places I'm used to. No velvet ropes, no cocktail menu printed on thick cardstock, no waiters in black ties gliding between tables. Just wooden booths worn smooth by decades of elbows, a long bar with stools that don't match, neon beer signs glowing in the windows, and a jukebox in the corner playing something twangy and low.

It smells like grease, whiskey and something faintly sweet I can't identify. It's perfect.

I'm sitting in a booth near the back, nursing a beer I'm not entirely sure I like but ordered anyway because it felt like the kind of thing someone starting a new life would do. The bartender, a woman in her fifties with short gray hair and brown eyes, didn't ask questions, just looked at me for a long moment and then slid the bottle across the bar without a word.

I haven't checked my phone in six hours. I turned it off somewhere outside the city limits and shoved it to the bottom of my backpack, and I know the second I turn it back on, there will be hundreds of messages. Missed calls from my father. Texts from Victoria calling me selfish and ungrateful and stupid. Voicemails from Chase's mother demanding to know where I am and how I could humiliate her son like this.

I don't care.

I take another sip of beer and set the bottle down on the table, watching condensation bead on the glass. My hands are shaking slightly. I press them flat against the table and breathe.

I did it. I actually did it.

I left.

The relief is so overwhelming it feels like nausea.

"Hey there, sweetheart."

I look up.

There's a man standing beside my booth. Older than me, maybe mid-thirties, with thinning brown hair, a stained T-shirt, and a smile that doesn't reach his eyes. He's holding a beer in one hand and leaning slightly too close, like he's already decided this conversation is going exactly where he wants it to go.

"Hi," I say, because I was raised to be polite even when I don't want to be, and two decades of conditioning don't disappear in six hours.

"You're new," he says. It's not a question.

"Just passing through," I say.

"Passing through," he repeats, like he's tasting the words. "Pretty girl like you, all alone in a bar, just passing through. That's a story I'd like to hear."

I don't like the way he's looking at me. I don't like the way he's standing so close I can smell the beer on his breath. I don't like the way he's already sliding into the booth across from me without waiting for an invitation.

"I'm actually just—" I start.

"I'm Dusty," he says, cutting me off. "Born and raised right here in Millhaven. Know everybody, know everything. You need something, you come to me. I'm a helpful guy."

"That's really nice of you," I say, "but I'm actually fine on my own…"

"Come on, don't be like that." He leans forward, elbows on the table. "Girl like you, all alone, looking like you've been crying. Yeah, I can tell, you could use a friend."

I haven't been crying. My eyes are probably red from exhaustion, adrenaline and the fact that I didn't sleep at all last night, but I wasn't crying.

"I appreciate the offer," I say, keeping my voice steady, "but I'm really okay."