Chapter 1

Bella

The glow from my laptop screen bathes my living room in a soft blue light, mixing with the warm amber of the string lights I draped across every available surface. I shift deeper into my favorite armchair and pull my knees up to my chest.

The numbers don't lie.

I refresh the page again, just to make sure I'm not hallucinating. Nope. Still there. Winter's Embrace has sold another two hundred copies in the last hour alone.

"Holy shit," I whisper to the empty room.

My phone buzzes with another notification. Another five-star review. I tap it open, my heart doing that weird fluttery thing it's been doing all evening.

"This book destroyed me in the best way possible. The scene where Marcus betrays Jade? I wanted to reach through the pages and strangle him. What an absolute asshole. Best villain-turned-love-interest I've read all year."

I bite my lip to keep from grinning too hard. If only they knew.

Marcus isn't technically a villain. He's just... inspired by one. A very real, very tall, very infuriating one who walked out of my life eight years ago without looking back.

My fingers trace the rim of my Santa mug—yes, I'm that person who breaks out the holiday mugs the second Thanksgiving ends—and I let myself sink into the memory. Those late nights at my cramped desk, fueled by spite and cheap wine, typing out every emotion I'd bottled up since I was eighteen. Every cruel word Marcus says to Jade in chapter seven? Yeah, those came straight from Aston's mouth. Every moment of doubt, every broken promise, every time Jade questions whether she was ever good enough?

All me.

The thing is, I didn't hold back. Couldn't, even if I'd wanted to. The words poured out like they'd been waiting eight years for their moment, and I let them. I made Marcus charming and beautiful and utterly devastating. Made him the kind of man who could make a woman question her own worth with a single dismissive glance.

And readers eat it up with a spoon.

Another notification pops up. Someone's tagged me on Instagram with a photo of my book, surrounded by twinkle lights and a caption that reads: "Finally found a book boyfriend who makes me want to commit murder and make out with him at the same time. #WintersEmbrace #MarcusTheManipulator"

I screenshot it and add it to my growing collection.

The hot chocolate in my mug has gone lukewarm, but I take a sip anyway, savoring the too-sweet marshmallow residue at the bottom. Outside my window, snow drifts past the streetlights in lazy spirals. December in the city looks like a postcard, all pristine and magical, nothing like the slushy nightmare it'll become by January.

But right now? Right now, it's perfect.

I open my email, and my breath catches.

The subject line reads: "Book Tour Opportunity - Winter's Embrace."

My hands shake as I click it open.

"Dear Ms. Malone,

We're delighted to inform you that based on the overwhelming response to Winter's Embrace, we'd like to discuss arranging a multi-city book tour starting in March..."

"Oh my God. Oh my God."

I read it three times. Four. The words don't change.

A book tour. An actual, legitimate book tour. Me, sitting at tables in bookstores, signing copies, meeting the people who've read my words and connected with Jade's story. My story, even if I wrapped it in fiction and gave it a prettier bow.

I grab my phone and pull up my best friend Simone's contact, my thumb hovering over the call button. But it's past eleven on a Tuesday, and she's got an early shift at the hospital tomorrow. This can wait until morning.

Barely.

I set the phone down and let myself just... feel it. The weight of this moment. The crystallization of every dream I've nursed since I was a kid scribbling stories in the margins of my math homework.

The apartment I'm sitting in, with its exposed brick and actually functioning heating system and kitchen that fits more than one person, exists because I took a chance on myself. Because I worked my ass off at that soul-sucking marketing job during the day and wrote until my eyes burned at night. Because I refused to let what happened with Aston define me.

Well, I mean, I let it define my debut novel. But that's different.

That's art.

I pull up my sales dashboard again because apparently I'm a masochist who needs to see the numbers one more time. The graph shows a steady climb over the past three weeks, but the spike from today is almost vertical. Someone with a decent following must have recommended it, or maybe the algorithm gods finally smiled upon me.

Whatever it is, I'll take it.

My gaze drifts to the stack of printed manuscripts on my desk, the sequel I've been outlining. Jade's story doesn't end with Marcus's first betrayal, and neither does mine. There's more to tell, more to excavate from the messy, complicated truth of being young and in love with someone who wasn't ready to love you back.

Or maybe wasn't capable of it.

I still don't know which is worse.

Another review notification lights up my screen.

"The way Jade stands up for herself in the end gave me literal chills. This is what we need more of: women who don't just forgive and forget. Women who demand better."

My throat tightens. That scene. God, that scene nearly killed me to write. I'd cried through the entire first draft, then again during revisions, then once more when I read the final proof. Jade tells Marcus exactly what his abandonment cost her, doesn't pretty it up or minimize her pain to make him comfortable.

I wish I'd had the courage to do that at eighteen.

But I have it now. And that's something.

The string lights cast dancing shadows across my bookshelves, filled now with my own work alongside the authors who inspired me. Toni Morrison. Roxane Gay. Tayari Jones. Women who wrote truth wrapped in story, who didn't flinch from the hard stuff.

I'm not in their league. Not yet, maybe not ever.

But I'm on the shelf.

My phone buzzes again. This time it's a message from my mom: "Saw your book is doing well, baby! So proud of you. When are you coming home for Christmas?"

I smile and type back: "Thanks, Mom. Still figuring out dates. Love you."

What I don't tell her is that I might have to adjust my holiday plans if this book tour thing happens. That for the first time in my life, my career might actually require me to make sacrifices, to choose myself and my dreams over family obligation and expectation.

It feels good. Terrifying, but good.

I close my laptop and carry my mug to the kitchen, rinsing it in the sink while staring out at the snow-covered fire escape. A cat from one of the neighboring apartments picks its way carefully across the metal slats, and I wonder if it belongs to the mysterious tenant in 4B who I've never actually met.

The book tour email sits in my inbox, waiting for my response. Waiting for me to say yes to everything I've ever wanted.

There's no question what my answer will be.

I pad back to the living room and sink into the couch this time, pulling a knitted blanket over my legs. The one my grandmother made before she passed, all mismatched colors and dropped stitches and love woven into every imperfect row.

"We did it, Grandma," I whisper to the empty room.

Outside, the city hums with its usual Tuesday night energy. Somewhere out there, Aston Calloway is probably living his best life, completely unaware that I've turned our disaster of a relationship into a bestselling romance novel. Completely unaware that thousands of readers now know him as Marcus the Manipulator.

The thought should bother me more than it does.

But right now, wrapped in string lights and success and the sweet possibility of more, I can't bring myself to care what he knows or doesn't know.

This is my moment.

And I'm going to savor every second of it.