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PROLOGUE

brAN

I saw her across a crowded room.

Isn’t that how the cliché goes?

Nothing in my life had ever come close to resembling a story with a happy ending, never mind a fairy tale told to clueless kids to prolong their optimism and innocence, and yet, I’d be a fucking liar if I said that the music didn’t stop the second her dark eyes met mine.

I have been a lot of things in my life. A fighter, in and out of the ring, a criminal, a gangster, an executioner, a brother, and a disappointing son, but I’d never been a liar.

I saw her across a crowded room, and the world stood still. I won’t deny it.

I also wouldn’t deny, and I’d kill anyone who did, that when I saw her across that crowded room, and the world stopped and her eyes met my gaze, from that moment on…

She was mine.