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Chapter one
"Skittles?"
Sawyer was sitting on his couch reading the book he’d started back on the ranch. He’d been in Missoula for a week now. It seemed he’d been spending more time at the Three Oaks, then he did in his apartment. But he had a fight to get ready for. He didn’t consider the apartment home. The ranch was home. But Missoula was where he needed to be if he wanted to fight.
This match would be a big one. It would be a test match or sorts, to see if he had the stamina to go ten rounds. As an amateur his fights were only three rounds and he generally knocked out his opponent in the first or second. He was currently undefeated and it was time for him to move up or get out. He’d been thinking about it for over a year and he stillhadn’t made up his mind. But at the very least, he would prove to himself he could go the distance.
He was having trouble concentrating and he reread the page he was on. He missed home and his annoying sister. Being away from home and living in Missoula, was a lot easier when Sage was here going to school. But she’d graduated last spring and he was here alone.
When he heard a frantic knock. He set his book aside and looked toward the door. He rarely got visitors. Especially at eight o’clock at night.
While he was deciding on whether to ignore it, the knock came again. This time, louder and more urgent. Then a muffled, “Sawyer?”
Well, at least it was someone he knew. He got up and unlocked the door, then opened it a few inches. There was a woman standing on the other side of it in a wedding dress, complete with a veil.
The woman frowned. “Are you going to let me in, or what?”
“Um…” He looked closely at her.
Her frown turned into a scowl, and she cocked her head. “It’s me.”
“Skittles?”
She brushed some tulle from the veil out of her face. “No one calls me that anymore.”
Sawyer grinned, then opened the door. “I need to hear this story.”
Jade Emmerson stalked through the door, holding onto the sparkling tiara perched on her head with one hand, and gathering the long veil in the other. She went to the couch and dropped onto it with a whoosh of satin. She batted at the white tulle of her veil which was threatening to smoother her, then fervently started pulling out the hairpins holding the tiara in place. When it was free from her hair, which was up in anelaborate bun, she tried to toss it. But she was sitting on the end of the veil and it dropped ceremoniously to the couch.
Sawyer sat in the chair on the other side of the coffee table, watching in amazed amusement. “What the hell, Jade? What’s going on?”
“I was supposed to get married today.”
He grinned. “I see that.”
“The bastard chickened out.”
“He left you at the altar?”
She scowled again. “No. We never got that far. Thank God.”
“You don’t seem too upset. Pissed off, maybe. But not heartbroken.”
She folded her arms across her chest. “I’m not going to waste any tears on that bastard.”
“Right. Um…Maybe this was a good thing?”
“Of course it was. Look at me. This isn’t me. What was I thinking?”
It definitely wasn’t the Jade he knew. He’d nicknamed her Skittles, on account of her affinity for the candy, and he was basically her best friend through junior high and the first two years of high school. At that time she had short hair dyed black and she wouldn’t have been caught dead in a skirt. She wore tight jeans and combat boots, with a large collection of t-shirts from obscure bands. And she always had on a hoodie year-round, usually with the hood up. She was a reclusive rebel, and Sawyer was her only friend.
“Why are you here? On my couch? How did you even know where I lived? And that I’d be here? I’m not here very often anymore.”
“I didn’t. I had no idea where you were until a week ago. I figured you were at the ranch. Doing the ranch thing with J.T. and Sage. Cowboying it up.”
“A week ago?”
“I ran into Steve Wilson. He follows your… Boxing, is it?”
