Page 1 of Bloom

PROLOGUE

Brown eyes. Big smile. Sundress blowing in the wind.

Fuck.

He triedto take my keys again.

Well, more accurately, he tried to take my whole damn truck.

I need it, he’d slurred, and my gut told me it wasn’t for a leisurely drive. Not when his license was suspended a month ago.

I don’t know what he needs the money for. I don’t want to know. Nor do I want to know why he’s suddenly stopped dipping into what was supposed to be my college fund like he usually does whenever he finds himself strapped for cash. Suspecting he’s already burned through it is bad enough; I think the confirmation would break my heart.

Bright side; it's not like I needed it. College was never in the plan for me. Nothisplan, anyway. Too poor for tuition, too dumb for a scholarship.

His words, not mine.

I really didn’t want to fight with him, I never do, but I couldn’t let him sell my truck to settle yet another debt. Years of working every shift I could get my hands on, saving everything I earned—and losing a good chunk of my dignity when I wore a low-cut shirt and hoped the sleazy guy from the dealership was a boob man—got me that truck. My safehouse on wheels. My sole escape route.Mine.

There’s a bruise the size of Texas on my hip as a consequence of saying no, but that’s okay. He didn’t mean to body-check me into the kitchen table. He was just drunk and off-balance and unaware of his own strength.

His words, though, were no accident. They were on purpose. They always are.

Shut the fuck up, Caroline.

Use your brain for once, Caroline.

Don't come home, Caroline.

Bright side; he didn’t take my truck.

Bright side; I’ll be out of there soon.

Bright side; hip bruises are easy to hide. And it doesn’t hurt that much. Except for when I stoop to check my reflection in the wing mirror and the mottled purple skin aches in protest, but that’s okay. I’ll just remain vertical today.

Quickly fixing my hair, mussed from a particularly windy drive, I wipe my expression clean of any of the lingering ugliness this afternoon’s encounter left. It’s my problem, not anyone else’s.

Especially anyone with the last name Jackson.

A mild spring breeze tugs at the hem of my dress as I start down the dusty strip of dirt serving as a driveway. I fiddle with the pretty floral material, nervous in the same way I always am when on Serenity Ranch.Cautiousmight be a better word for it—like I half expect to be chased off the property at any moment.

That’s not likely, not anymore, but being unwanted is a hard thing to un-feel, to forget. Especially being unwanted here by the people scattered around the grassy yard that muddied many a dress, destroyed many a shoe, left grass stains on many a limb, for most of my teenage years.

Bright side—Serenity Ranch is definitely a bright side. A little cloudy sometimes, sure, but I can always see that silver lining, even if I have to squint.

Spotting Lux Jackson, on the other hand, requires zero concentrated effort. Not because the owner—in every way but technically—of Serenity is eye-catchingly beautiful in a way a younger me was pitifully envious of, but because that swollen belly of hers really draws the eye.

God, I love that bump. It’s the only reason I’m welcome here four years after a shockingly boring yet incredibly messy break-up. If not for the bump, Lux taking a tumble in my store a couple of months ago would’ve been no big deal. There would’ve been no ambulance ride to the hospital, no thirty minutes of silent panic with a woman I was pretty certain hated me to her very core yet clutched my hand hard enough to leave little half-moon imprints of her nails. There would’ve been no excuse for me to turn up at Serenity with the flowers she never got a chance to buy as a guise—and a peace offering—to make sure the all clear she got was really all clear. There would be no Lux welcoming me onto the property she single-handedly turned into a flourishing business—and a home too.

As she waves me over from the front porch of her family’s home, she alerts the man at her side to my presence. Like usual, I falter at the sight of Oscar Jackson. Like usual, Lux’s older brother's mere presence lodges an anxious knot behind my ribcage, born of awkward embarrassment and wrapped with thorny vines of insecurity. Like usual, I don’t let my gaze linger on my ex-boyfriend for too long—not because it hurts to look athim or anything, but because it makes me… I don’t know. Sad, I guess. Not the heartbroken, pining kind though. Just sad.

The moment Jackson’s—I can’t remember the last time anyone called him Oscar—gaze lands on me, mine swiftly averts itself. It lands on the unfamiliar truck parked in front of the huge red barn a stone’s throw from the house, and the two people lingering beside it. The youngest Jackson sibling, I recognize easily, if only because no one gesticulates quite as enthusiastically as Eliza.

The other, I don’t think I know. No, IknowI don’t know him. A man that big and imposing, who only gets bigger and more imposing the more my feet eat up the distance between us, I surely would remember. I definitely would’ve heard about him at the very least;smalldoesn’t quite encapsulate the size of Haven Ridge, and a newcomer always makes an impression. Especiallythiskind of newcomer.

The closer I get, the more I’m able to make out his solid, strong features, and an odd, unnerving feeling creeps up my spine.Attraction, I barely recognize it as, something I haven’t felt in a while, and it makes my stomach flutter nervously, a flustered blush creeping up my neck.

Pathetic, I chastise myself internally as I tuck the loose strands of my braided hair behind my ears, cranking out a smile as I approach the newest addition to the ranch. When I call out a greeting, Eliza’s head snaps my way. Expression tight enough to make me sigh, she offers a small wave.

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