Chapter 1

one

Emma Bordeaux yawned widely as she blinked her eyes open, staring up at her bedroom ceiling.

For the briefest of moments, her morning awakening was peaceful.

Waking up without the assistance of her alarm was incredibly rare. So rare, actually, that it was unheard of for her. Typically, her first alarm went off at six-thirty. Followed by her alarm at six-forty-five. Followed again by the alarm at six-fifty. And finally, the alarm that annoyed her enough to rouse her was her seven o'clock.

With that thought in mind, she rolled onto her side to tap the screen of her phone to check the time.

Only to frown, sitting up straighter in bed as her stomach sank.

Because her phone screen remained dark, even as she continued to tap on it, each touch more compulsive than the last.

"No. Nooo, no, no. Come on ," she hissed, all semblance of her calm welcome into the world washed away in panic.

Was her phone broken?! It wasn't the newest model… all right, it was far from the newest model. But it had been working perfectly fucking fine last night! It had been at ten percent battery when she'd plugged in to charge before going to sleep.

She cut her gaze to the window as she threw the sheet away from her body, hopping out of bed. The sun was high in the sky, brightly shining into her room, and she could hear the sounds of the city, very much awake, muffled from the street below.

It didn't look or sound like it should when she rolled out of bed at seven.

Adrenaline-fueled panic coursed through her veins as she threw open her bedroom door and ran into the kitchen to check the clock over the stove.

Which did nothing to help, as the digital clock flashed the time back at her in blinking numbers that read 12:13.

She rushed back down the hallway to her bedroom, where the artful yet functional – and battery-operated – clock hung on the wall, and informed her that it was currently 8:02.

Even though she'd already been stressed, her stomach now tied in knots so tight, she thought she might be sick from them.

"Fuck," she swore under her breath, wheeling around so quickly she needed to brace her hand on the opposite wall to keep from falling in her haste.

Bathroom. She needed to get into the bathroom, brush her teeth and hair, and make herself as presentable as possible. She'd have to skip her morning shower, but that was… fine. What wouldn't be fine would be arriving even later to work than she already would be.

She'd only started at Olly three weeks ago, and she was pretty certain that Allegra Pantone, her boss, hadn't taken a special liking to her in that short time. Emma wasn't really sure if Allegra had ever taken a liking to anyone.

Reaching out, she tried to open the bathroom door, only to find that it was locked.

Which – locked ? What the –?

"Regan? Are you in there?" She called out, hearing the desperation in her own voice.

Showing a vulnerability to anyone at any point in time made her feel uncomfortable, but she absolutely loathed displaying it to Regan even more.

However, desperate times called for desperate measures, and she banged on the door with her palm. "Hello? Regan?"

"This is she," Regan's smart-aleck voice replied from the other side of the door. "Who's asking?"

Ah. There it was, that sharp feeling of annoyance at Regan. Honestly, this was such a terrible morning she welcomed that feeling right about now.

She narrowed her eyes at the door, huffing out a breath. "Obviously Emma."

"I thought so. But since you asked if I was occupying the bathroom in our two-person apartment, I figured I would make sure that you were the person doing the asking."

Emma's foot started to tap against the hardwood floor as agitation, impatience, and anxiety twisted together inside of her. She took a deep breath before setting her jaw and letting go of the retort she normally would have said.

Instead, she asked, "Are you almost done in there?"

There was a beat before Regan responded, "Um… I guess I could be. Why?"

"Because I need to use the bathroom!" Really, she tried for patience.

But, jesus , she swore Regan Gallagher made it a point to be as irritating as possible. She couldn't say yes or no to a simple question, couldn't make anything easier.

Typical.

"Like, a pee-emergency?"

"Oh my god." Emma strove for control, dropping her forehead to the door jamb and closing her eyes. "No."

Though, now that Regan mentioned it, Emma was due for her morning pee.

"A little," she amended. "But I overslept, and I need to get ready for work literally as fast as humanly possible, okay?"

She jumped as the door, only inches from her face, suddenly swung open.

"Why didn't you just say that?" Regan asked, stepping out from where she stood in the doorway.

Emma wasted no time as she stepped past Regan, not even bothering to snap the door closed as she jammed her phone charger into the bathroom outlet, hoping it would work.

Relief rushed through her when her phone buzzed with a sign of life, even if the battery was completely dead.

Without wasting time, she immediately started brushing her teeth with one hand, using the other to open her side of the mirror to rifle through her toiletries.

If she got herself together in the next fifteen minutes, skipped her morning coffee, and arrived at her subway stop in record time – and if the subway didn't experience any delays – she could make it to work less than ten minutes late.

"You know, I don't think I've ever seen you so panicky." Regan's voice cut into her rushing thoughts.

Emma slid her gaze toward the doorway that Regan stood in, having not realized she was still there.

She ran her eyes over Regan, actually taking her in for the first time. Regan was wearing only a towel, wrapped snugly around her lithe body, knotted between her breasts, and her shoulder-length dark hair was thrown casually into a knot on the top of her head.

"Because I'm not," she muttered back around her toothbrush, turning away from Regan to spit into the sink and wash her mouth out.

"What's going on this morning, then?" Regan asked, making herself comfortable in the doorway. Instead of doing what Emma would classify as the normal thing, and going away .

It was what every other roommate Emma had lived with in her adult life would have done, anyway. And it was most definitely what Emma would prefer.

"My alarm didn't go off," she answered curtly as she quickly started tugging a brush through her hair. Typically, she kept it just below her shoulders, but it was several inches longer now; she'd been so busy in the last month that she hadn't had the time to get it cut. "Do you know why the stovetop clock isn't working?"

"Ohhhhh," Regan drew out, snapping her fingers. "Yes. I do."

Emma huffed impatiently, snapping her eyes up to meet Regan's in the mirror. As she could have predicted, Regan was wearing a shit-eating smile on her irritatingly perfectly full lips.

"And?" She grit out.

"And there was a power outage just after midnight. It's this crazy freaking heat wave; I can't believe you didn't wake up!" Regan tossed her hands in the air dramatically as if unable to even fathom it.

Emma continued staring at her in the mirror, wondering if Regan even understood the absurdity of her comment. "Why would I have woken up from a power outage?"

"Because! It was so hot," Regan explained, her eyebrows flying up high on her forehead as she stared at Emma like Emma was the insane one here. "The air conditioning shut off, obviously. I was laying on the kitchen floor with ice packs all over my body."

"Of course you were," she murmured, shaking her head.

The dramatics .

"It was, like, ninety degrees in here. Literally. For at least an hour before the power came back on, and then I could finally go to sleep."

"And yet, you didn't set the clock on the stove," she pointed out, unable to stop herself from rolling her eyes.

Because, of course, Regan had been awake and in the kitchen and hadn't taken it upon herself to set the clock again.

Regan looked uncharacteristically sheepish, then. "… that's a fair comment. Sorry. I forgot."

The apology sounded sincere, but it was the fact that Regan hadn't set the damn clock that was the root of Emma's perpetual irritation with her. Therefore, she ignored it.

"My phone was plugged in all night," she commented, gesturing down at her charging phone with her elbow as she quickly started braiding her hair over her shoulder. "Do you know why it didn't start charging again after the power came back on?"

Regan seemed to perk up, previous sheepishness forgotten, as she nodded. "Yeah, actually! So, obviously, the apartment is in good shape, even though the building is, like, a hundred years old." She fondly patted the wall next to her. " But , there's a little snag when the power goes out – everything we have plugged into the outlets in our bedrooms needs to be unplugged and then plugged in again before it starts working."

Emma could only stare at Regan with a confused, narrowed look.

Regan held up her hands as if anticipating Emma's bafflement. "I'm not an electrician, so I don't know how it works! But everything in the kitchen and living room turns back on like normal. It's just our bedroom outlets that are weird."

"This might have been useful information to have been told when I moved in," she pointedly said, arching an eyebrow as she snapped her hair tie to secure her braid.

This time, it was Regan who shot her an incredulous look. "First – like, yeah, I guess so. But secondly and most relevantly – you would have still been sleeping when the power came back on, and I'm not allowed in your room except in case of emergencies, in your own passionate words. So… how would you have charged your phone, even if you knew about the outlets?"

Emma pursed her lips, hating that she couldn't think of anything to say to counter that point.

She hated even more that Regan's dark eyes lit up with an obvious gotcha .

"Fine." Maybe Regan had a point; she supposed even a broken clock was right twice a day. Much like the clock over the stove right now. "Regardless, I have to go."

She unplugged her phone and started toward the door.

Regan didn't really move out of her way, only turning her body slightly so Emma couldn't avoid brushing by her. This was something Regan did frequently when they ran into each other in the hallway, and Emma always wondered what compelled her to not do the polite thing and scoot out of the way.

Emma did her best to give Regan her space whenever they passed one another, but the simple reality was that Manhattan apartments were not spacious, and Regan was, like, half Emma's size. Emma was at least five inches taller than Regan at five-foot-ten, and outweighed Regan by at least forty pounds. She didn't know if Regan was simply used to living with Sutton – a waif – or what, but it was yet another thing that irked her.

"Anyway, you're welcome. I paused as I was literally about to step into the shower," Regan called as Emma rushed back to her room.

This gave her pause, and Emma tossed Regan a look, once again taking in the whole towel situation. "Thank you. I appreciate it."

A bright, annoyingly luminescent smile slid over Regan's face. "Was that so hard?"

Emma stepped into her room without a verbal response and sharply shut the door.

"You're late," Brynn, Allegra's other assistant, commented as soon as Emma entered the open space their desks shared.

Emma dumped her bag onto her desk, immediately searching for Allegra in the glass-walled office next to them. "Is she here yet?"

"Today's your lucky day," Brynn informed her. "She texted early and said she was going to be taking a last-minute meeting over coffee."

Even though Emma had felt far from lucky this morning, the relief that flooded her veins was so heady that she could have passed out. "Thank god."

"Seems unlike you to be late," Brynn observed, arching her a sharp look. "Or have you just been on your best behavior for the last month?"

"The former," she was quick to answer. "Definitely the former."

She all but collapsed in her desk chair, feeling like she could finally breathe. She reveled in that for a few seconds before looking up and catching Brynn's amused look.

"Apparently, the outlets in my new apartment are tricky when there's a power outage, and my alarm didn't go off," she explained as she started unpacking her bag.

Brynn hummed in acknowledgment. "I guess you're lucky it was my day for Allegra's morning coffee, too. I know she ended up taking a meeting, but imagine if she'd texted you at seven-thirty to inform you, and you didn't answer!"

"Honestly? Yeah." Because Emma hadn't even thought about that and shuddered at the very idea.

She and Brynn were on a rotating schedule to fetch Allegra's food and drinks, and fortunately, Emma had been on duty yesterday.

Brynn was two years younger than Emma's twenty-nine and had already been Allegra's assistant for nearly a year. She'd gotten her foot in the door at Olly , the digital magazine they worked for, before she'd even finished her bachelor's degree because her aunt worked in the fashion department.

Emma had long accepted that there would be people like Brynn or Sutton who were able to have easier access in the world because of their connections. She could still appreciate that Brynn was good at the job – always prompt, polished, and organized, and she'd been very magnanimous in showing Emma the ropes, giving her insider information on Allegra and everyone else at Olly .

After Emma organized her desk for the morning, she blew her hair out of her eyes and looked across the small reception area to find that Brynn was watching her with an amused smile.

"Look, Allegra should be out for another twenty minutes. Why don't you go down to the cafeteria and grab a coffee? Gather your bearings a bit. We have an all-hands meeting for two hours this afternoon, so…" She trailed off forebodingly.

Emma winced, not needing Brynn to say anymore. Allegra was the editor of the human interest department – the fastest-growing area at Olly . And while Emma admired her boss for being an amazing writer, editor, and a woman who'd carved her place out in journalism for decades, Allegra did not take kindly to the writers she handpicked turning in sub-par work. And it was no secret Allegra had not been pleased with several pieces as of late.

This meeting was going to be a long one.

"Thanks. Want anything?" She asked, standing from her desk.

Brynn shook her head and gestured to her half-full iced coffee as she turned back to her computer.

As she made her way down to the third-floor café, Emma felt like she could breathe normally for the first time all day.

Having wanted to preserve the small amount of battery she'd accumulated before leaving the apartment, she hadn't really checked her phone on her commute other than scanning to see if Allegra had called or emailed.

But, as she started to take in all the notifications that had popped up since she'd turned her phone on, that easy feeling fled yet again.

By all accounts, Emma's life should have been in a great place right now.

Her grandmother had settled into Primrose Grove, an assisted living community in Astoria that she actually seemed to enjoy. Not a lot, but a little bit, and for now, a little bit was enough.

She'd finally graduated with her master's degree last month. She had landed a more-than-decently paying job at Olly . Assisting Doctor Magda Woods for the last two years while getting her graduate degree had been hard as hell, given that Woods loved to bust her ass, granting no favors and giving no slack. Ever. Not even when Emma had the flu.

But it had paid off when Woods met with Emma as graduation approached and granted Emma her stamp of approval. In the literary world in this city, Magda Woods's professional recommendation held a lot of weight. That referential phone call she'd made to Allegra had made all the difference to Emma getting this job.

She finally – finally – wasn't living with her three vampiric roommates in the apartment right next to the fucking subway in Jackson Heights anymore. No, she was living in Greenwich Village, in a cozy two-bedroom. It was, undoubtedly, the nicest place she'd ever lived in, quirky bedroom outlets or not.

Unfortunately, that apartment was shared with Regan Gallagher, so that really put a damper on things.

Forgetting to set the time after the power had gone out was so typical of Regan. Emma should have expected it.

While Emma hadn't loved her previous roommates and how they'd been jammed into their small apartment like sardines, she had appreciated that they all seemed to want to have the same level of involvement with her that she wanted with them – very, very little. They'd stayed out of her business and all adhered to their roommate agreement to a T.

Living with Regan couldn't be more different.

When Regan had approached her with the offer to move in, Emma had been baffled before she'd found herself laughing, certain that Regan was telling her a ridiculous, nonsensical joke.

But, no. She'd been serious.

Regan was near the very bottom of the list of people Emma would choose to live with, wedged firmly between the friendly-yet-unhygienic girl who sat next to Emma in their Shakespeare course and the smarmy know-it-all guy who worked at her favorite bookstore.

But when she was offered Sutton's bedroom, in a much safer, nicer, and more convenient neighborhood, for the same monthly price that she was paying for her last lease… well, Emma figured she could manage any roommate for that.

She debated daily if that was the truth.

The day Emma moved in, Regan overzealously knocked a box out of Emma's arms, resulting in it crashing to the floor. The box that had, naturally, contained one of her grandmother's porcelain hummingbird figurines that she'd given Emma when Emma had moved out. The figurine had, of course, shattered.

And things hadn't really improved since then.

Regan loved to sing loudly to herself while she cooked and cleaned. Hell, while she tied her shoes. She questioned Emma incessantly whenever they ran into one another, and if she wasn't peppering her with inane questions, she rambled about her own day with stories Emma didn't ask for. She was consistently banging around in the kitchen at all hours of the night.

She didn't stick to a bathroom schedule of any kind. In fact, her entire schedule was unpredictable to Emma. She knew Regan managed Topped Off, a coffeehouse, but there was no semblance of regularity or consistency in how she flitted about her days. It was highly disconcerting.

Like a lot of Regan's behaviors were.

Once, less than a week into Emma moving in, Regan had exuberantly thrown Emma's door open when she'd returned home from work at ten in the evening. Emma had startled, and barely managed to pull up the shorts she'd been changing into before bed to cover her ass before she'd whirled around to demand, "Is there an emergency or something?"

To which Regan had given Emma an absurdly confused look before answering, "… not that I know of? Why?"

"Because that is the only reason you should ever be opening my door without knocking," she'd snapped back, incredulously, before gesturing for Regan to get the fuck out.

So, while things on the home front were geographically the best they'd ever been, logistically, it was a nightmare.

And, as she stared dismally down at her phone, somehow, Regan didn't manage to be the most stressful thing in her life right now.

Not when she faced five texts and a missed call from Kimberly.

Hurricane Kimberly – 6:52 AM

Good morning, Emma Bo Bemma!

Hurricane Kimberly – 7:27 AM

Sorry for calling so early. I know you're probably getting ready for work at OLLY!!!

Hurricane Kimberly – 7:29 AM

I was just trying to nail you down for a dinner confirmation sometime in the next few weeks before your schedule fills up again.

Hurricane Kimberly – 7:31 AM

I'd just like really REALLY like to see you, soon. I miss you. And so do Everly and Eva!!

Hurricane Kimberly – 7:48 AM

But I know you're busy. I'll try again in a bit!

Mixed in with those messages, unsurprisingly, was one from her grandmother.

Gram – 8:18 AM

She's really trying, honey.

Emma rubbed intently at her temples upon reading her mother's texts. Miraculously, Kimberly always managed to give Emma the beginnings of a headache. It was like she was conditioned for it at this point. Pavlov's Migraine.

As if summoned by Emma's thoughts, her phone started buzzing in her hand – apparently, waiting for less than two hours was the "bit" of time Kimberly had meant.

She pursed her lips as she stood in line for her coffee, automatically hovering her thumb over the decline option.

One of the last things she wanted this morning was to talk to her mother, especially because upon the sight of her name, her stomach cramped with anxiety.

More than anything, Emma hated uncertainty and unfamiliarity, and Kimberly brought those feelings on in spades.

But the last thing she wanted to do in life was upset her grandmother. Whose latest text of encouragement was only the most recent in her attempts to help bridge the gap between Emma and her mother.

With that in mind, she sighed, pressing a hand to her stomach where that anxious flutter was, and hovered her thumb over the answer icon. When she reasoned that Kimberly wouldn't give her texting/calling a rest until Emma answered her, she finally did so.

"Um. Hi," she greeted, feeling uncomfortable, as she always did, when interacting with Kimberly.

Like, what was the proper greeting to your unreliable and unpredictable mom that had sporadically been around throughout your childhood before moving to Florida and starting a second family when she finally reached adult maturity levels, who was now – having moved back to New York – desperately trying to bond with you?

Emma would give anything for there to be a book about how to manage this situation. She'd yet to find one.

"Emma!" Her mother's voice shouted in her ear with both obvious delight and surprise. "Oh, wow! I finally got a hold of you! I'm so glad you're awake."

Emma gave the barista a flash of a polite smile and placed her coffee order before she stepped to the side to wait. "Yeah, well, you did call on a work morning."

"Oh, I know. And I know you're very busy and all. I just can't wait until you finally have some free time to come over for dinner and tell me all about your glamorous job?" There was an undeniable edge of hope in her mom's voice that tied Emma's stomach into knots for the second time before ten AM.

A few months ago, she'd agreed to have dinner with her mom, when Kimberly had reached out and said that she'd "be in town." Emma was used to having an uncomfortable meal with her mom once every year or two when she was in the city to visit.

When she'd made that agreement, she hadn't realized that her mom was going to be in town because she was literally moving here.

As soon as Emma had learned the whole picture, the anxiety was quick on its heels. Kimberly being here , attempting to try to actually be in Emma's life… that was not the same thing as a dinner every other year.

"It's not really glamorous," she said, side-stepping any comments about dinner, before she looked over her shoulder to make sure Allegra hadn't appeared in the café that she rarely ever stepped foot into. But, just in case.

When she confirmed the coast was clear, she continued, "I'm only an assistant. So. There's not much to tell."

That was a slight lie; Emma's days were incredibly busy, and something was always going on. Kimberly didn't need to know that, though.

"I'd love to hear the boring details, then," Kimberly readily responded as if anticipating Emma's not-so-subtle shut-down. "I figure things have been settling down enough for you to book a dinner, now that you've been there for almost a month?"

She rolled her lips together, holding in her sigh.

Emma had found an easy way to finagle her way out of dinner at first – it was the end of the semester, and she had a ton of work to finish as she ended her master's program. And then, for the past month, she'd had the reasoning that she was extremely busy at work as she found her footing at Olly . Unpredictable late hours and whatnot, even though the truth was that Emma typically would be able to have dinner most nights by seven.

Again, Kimberly didn't need to know that. Not before Emma felt ready . And she still just… had no idea when that would be.

"Your gram said that you've been doing so well," Kimberly added enthusiastically. "She said you told her you even got an official nod of approval from your stern boss!"

Emma dropped her head back on a silent groan. She knew that Kimberly was her gram's daughter and all, but was nothing sacred between the two of them, anymore?

If she wasn't jam-packed at work, what could she say now? Short of, actually, I'm not ready to see you, and I don't exactly know why, but I also don't really want to put in the mental energy to figuring that out , anyway?

Which she couldn't say – first, because her gram had already had two heart attacks in the last three years, and Emma refused to be a cause of any additional stress in her life.

Secondly – and infinitely more complicated – Emma didn't want to hurt Kimberly's feelings, either. God. Yeah, she really wished she could find that book.

"Uh… yeah, I mean, work is settling down, I guess." And it was . Allegra gave her a considering, thoughtful nod last week, when she'd overheard Emma discuss an article with one of the staff writers, who'd been waiting to see her.

Emma had ridden that high for days.

"The thing is, I'm still kind of swamped. Now that work is calming down, I have to switch gears to focus on my new living situation," she lied through her teeth.

Regan was chaos personified, but that would never change, and Emma would never get used to it.

"Oh, yeah! I haven't heard just about anything about this new apartment, other than that it's in the Village, right?" Kimberly asked eagerly.

Emma smiled at the barista as she accepted her coffee, bringing it over to the fixing station. "Yeah," she confirmed, drawing out the word as she tried to figure out what to add on. "It is. And it's, you know, it's a really new circumstance for me, because I'm not living with my old roommates or anything. This isn't like I was just moving in with some random strangers I found online. Regan is… different…"

She trailed off, and this time, it had less to do with her mother and more to do with the fact that she had no idea how to summarize the entirety of Regan and still keep this conversation as brief as possible.

Her mom gasped, the sound so jarring in her ear that Emma fumbled with the lid of her iced coffee. "I didn't know your new roommate wasn't just a roommate! You never mention your romantic partners!"

Dumbfounded, Emma nearly dropped her phone as she wracked her brain to think over what she'd just said, trying to figure out if her words alluded to Regan being anything more than what she was – that was, Emma's pathologically irritating housemate.

She didn't think so, but it wasn't crazy that Kimberly had made that leap. After all, when her mother was Emma's age, her life was consumed by her various love interests.

"I remember the first time I moved in with Johnny. Do you remember him?"

The dreamy quality of her mother's voice did absolutely not align with Emma's memories of Johnny, whom she absolutely did remember. He'd been her mom's most long- lasting and prevalent on-and-off boyfriend throughout Emma's early childhood. He'd also been an abusive alcoholic, resulting in Kimberly moving back to Gram's in tears.

"Sure do," she confirmed grimly.

"The first time we moved in together, it was so… encompassing. We were so wrapped up in each other and in making the apartment our little home. It's a big thing, moving in with someone like that."

Emma remembered very well how wrapped up in Johnny her mother had been. So wrapped up that Emma didn't recall her mother coming back to see her and Gram for weeks.

"Yeah," was all she said.

"I understand, Em. I really do. You should take some time now to revel in living with your Regan for a little while. I'll just keep reaching out, and when you're ready, we'll confirm dinner plans? You can bring Regan, too!" Kimberly readily added. "I'd love to meet her."

Emma couldn't hold back her scoff as she walked back toward the elevators. "I'll keep that in mind." Before her mother could say anything else, she cut in, "All right, I have to get to work. Have a good one."

"Bye! I love you!" Her mother managed to get in before Emma disconnected the call.

She shook her head as she rode the elevator back up to the twentieth floor. If her mother believed Regan was her girlfriend rather than just her roommate, Emma would gladly take that excuse as far as it would take her from making any dinner plans.

At the very least, she supposed she'd found the silver lining to her new living situation.