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Chapter One

“Christ, I’ruet anywhere on ti one of these days He’d been late for the boardtoo; emphasis on the word bored Now, he was headed to lunch to ues and he was already tenthe daily stock quotes to pay any attention to details like time

Hell, once upon a ti he enjoyed; now it barely held his interest In fact, boredom seemed to be his constant companion of late He had no idea how that had happened It wasn’t all that long ago everything see the day and a few stihts Suddenly, he’d becoe; that was the proble Even his dates weren’t all that remarkable It was a sad day when the wouely wondered if he’d hit some sort ofhe was only thirty-five

Jensen continued to conte the sidewalk of the busy don street of Innocence, Ohio It was noon on Friday, and the sun beat down hard A trickle of sweat ran the length of his spine, one without the jacket and tie When his cell phone beeped, signaling a text e, he pulled it out of the pocket of his white dress shirt and glanced at the screen Canized the name immediately

He’d dated the pretty brunette a few times, but they had so little in common that the relationship just sort of died before it really had a chance to get off the ground Herto meet for drinks surprised Jensen He hadn’t heard frohts on the proper makeup foundation held little interest for him? He started to tap out a polite no thanks as he stepped off the curb to cross the street to his favorite deli when out of nowhere sorabbed him from behind and yanked Hard Jensen tripped backward over the curb and landed hard the sidewalk

“What the—” The blaring horn of a semitruck cut him off midcurse as it barreled down the street directly past where Jensen had been standing only seconds before “Shit” He had the wind knocked out of him, but at least he was alive

He rose froe to his navy blue suit, and decided it would be retired to suit heaven That wasn’t altogether a bad idea He hated the dah the shoulders, and he’d beento replace it anyway

“Dude, you ale boy said, his eyes round as quarters

“Yeah, no kidding” Jensen rubbed a hand over his face “Did you see the person—”

“There” An older wo into the SUV She pulled you back just in ti man”

Jensen glanced around and spotted a s into a red Jeep Cherokee He quickly memorized the license number It was part of his job to reood at it Jensen made a mental note to call Janice, his cousin at the BMV, as soon as he arrived at the office With some persuasion, ht, I do owe her,” he replied as he wondered at the woman’s quick reaction His distracted dumb ass could’ve been splattered all over the blacktop if not for her

Jensen smiled Maybe this was the wake-up call he’d needed to kick his butt in gear and liven up his life A shaet hih

“So, tell ain what happened?”

Jensen sighed as he lined up his cue stick for the shot After work, he’d stopped off at his apart to his brother Jason’s house They’d been drinking beer and playing pool for a good hour when he’d decided to tell Jason about the woman who’d yanked hio How o over it? “Look, I walked out in front of a semi and lived to talk about it Period”