CHAPTER 1 — BEFORE THE LIE
1417 Words
Snow fell in slow, mocking flakes—too gentle for the kind of night Elara Hart was having.
Her phone was still warm in her palm.
A single message glowed on the cracked screen, the final words from the man she wasted three years on:
“Don’t wait up. It was never that serious.”
Never that serious.
He ended everything five days before Christmas, and he did it over text—like she was a subscription he forgot to cancel.
A hollow laugh escaped her throat.
Merry damn Christmas.
Elara pushed into the only bar still open near the station. Warm air—thick with leather, smoke, and holiday music that sounded drunk—hit her at once. She didn’t care what she ordered; she just needed something strong enough to burn her regret.
She slid onto the nearest stool. Her coat was still dusted with melting snow when the bartender approached.
“Rough night?” he asked.
“The roughest,” she muttered.
The drink arrived. It was red, dangerous, and not what she ordered, but she didn’t argue. The first sip burned exactly the way she needed.
Elara closed her eyes.
She wasn’t supposed to be here.
She was supposed to be celebrating her work appraisal. Her promotion.
Instead, the company put the position “on hold indefinitely,” and her boyfriend decided he preferred someone “less intense.”
Her jaw clenched.
Intense.
Right.
She was intense because she kept everything together.
Because she fixed problems before anyone asked.
Because she kept believing she needed to earn the love she wanted.
Not anymore.
Her fingers tightened around the glass.
“Bad drink?”
The voice behind her was low, rough—too calm for this chaotic bar. A voice that curled around her spine and made her pulse jolt before she even turned.
Elara glanced sideways.
And froze.
He sat one stool away, shadows clinging to him like they belonged there.
A tall man, broad shoulders in a black jacket, tattoos disappearing under his sleeves. Dark hair falling over eyes that shouldn’t have been real—blue-gray, sharp, unreadable.
Even sitting, he looked like he took up the entire bar.
He didn’t smile.
He barely moved.
He just watched her—quiet, uninvited, impossibly steady.
Her breath tangled in her chest.
“No,” she finally managed. “The drink’s fine.”
“It’s your face that says otherwise.”
Heat crept up her neck. “I wasn’t aware my face was talking.”
“It is,” he murmured. “Loudly.”
He turned his glass slowly, the movement silent but intentional.
A silver ring glinted on his finger.
Elara swallowed.
“Let me guess,” the stranger continued, eyes flicking lazily over her—coat, hands, expression, the tiny shake in her breath—“someone ruined your night.”
“Something like that.”
“Someone or something?”
She hesitated.
He raised a brow. “I don’t bite.”
Her chest tightened.
He absolutely looked like he did.
“…Someone,” she admitted.
“Ex?”
She blinked. “How—”
He motioned at her still-lit phone. “You keep checking it even though you know he’s done talking.”
Elara stared at him.
Direct.
Unapologetic.
Observant enough to be dangerous.
“Who are you?” she asked.
His gaze lowered to her lips for half a second—just enough to make her inhale too sharply.
“Someone with eyes,” he said softly.
Her stomach flipped.
He took a slow sip of his drink.
Elara forced herself to look away, but even the sound of the glass against the counter seemed too intimate coming from him.
“Forget him,” the stranger said without warning.
She blinked. “Excuse me?”
“That man you’re crying over in your head,” he added. “He doesn’t deserve the space you’re giving him.”
“I’m not crying.”
He looked at her again—calm, ruthless, like he could see through the smallest lie.
“…Fine,” she muttered. “Maybe a little.”
“A little looks like that?” His eyes lowered to her tightened grip on the glass. “Darling, you look like you’re trying not to shatter something.”
The word darling hit too fast, too smooth, like it had no right sounding that good from a man she didn’t know.
“I have a lot on my mind,” she whispered.
“Then stop carrying it alone.”
Her breath stilled.
She didn’t know this man.
Didn’t know his name.
Didn’t know why he spoke like he understood the weight on her shoulders better than she did.
But something in her—a tired, aching piece—leaned toward him anyway.
“What’s your name?” she asked.
His jaw flexed once, slow and deliberate.
“Jace,” he said.
Of course it was.
Of course he had a name that sounded like a warning and a promise.
“Elara,” she replied.
His gaze dipped—barely, but enough to notice.
“Elara,” he repeated, tasting her name like a slow drag of heat. “Pretty.”
Her pulse jumped so hard it was embarrassing.
The bartender passed by. Jace shifted closer—not touching her, not even brushing her coat, but the warmth of him seeped through the air like a hand closing around her waist.
“You shouldn’t drink alone tonight,” he murmured.
“I’m not supposed to be talking to strangers.”
“You’re not,” he said. “I’m talking to you.”
A sharp laugh escaped her. “You always bend rules like that?”
“I break worse ones.”
She inhaled.
Too fast.
He noticed. She could tell.
“Elara.” His voice dropped lower. “Let me guess the rest.”
“I doubt you can.”
He leaned an inch closer, and her world shrank around that single movement.
“You lost something today,” he said quietly. “Something you thought mattered.”
Her fingers stilled around the glass.
“You’re angry,” he continued, “but you’re pretending you’re not. And you’re exhausted. You’ve been holding yourself together all night because you don’t know what breaks first—your patience or your heart.”
Her chest tightened painfully.
How the hell did he see all that?
Jace didn’t blink.
“And deep down,” he added, “you want someone—just once—to say ‘Let me carry it instead.’”
The air disappeared.
Elara swallowed hard.
She hated how true it felt.
How seen.
How dangerously close he was to the part of her she never let anyone touch.
“…Why are you talking to me?” she asked, voice almost a whisper.
His fingers tapped his glass once.
“Because you look like you’re one breath away from falling apart,” he said, “and I don’t like watching people break alone.”
Her throat tightened.
And then—
The bar door slammed open behind them.
Cold wind whipped inside, lights flickered, and someone shouted her name.
“Elara Hart!”
She stiffened.
Jace’s gaze sharpened instantly—cold, assessing, protective in a way that made heat curl in her stomach.
A man in a red scarf stormed inside, scanning the room like he owned it.
Her ex.
Of course.
“Elara, we need to talk,” he demanded.
Jace didn’t move.
Didn’t even turn his head.
He just spoke softly, evenly, with a voice that vibrated down her spine:
“Do you want him to come near you?”
Elara shook her head—small, instinctive.
Jace’s hand brushed her lower back for the first time.
Barely a touch.
Just heat.
Just a claim.
“Then stay close to me,” he murmured.
Her breath shattered.
The ex stepped closer.
Jace finally looked up—slow, lethal, bored.
And Elara saw something in his eyes she hadn’t seen since the night began:
Danger.
Real danger.
The kind that didn’t threaten her…
…but promised to protect her.
“Say the word,” Jace whispered, voice grazing her ear like a sin, “and he won’t take another step toward you.”
Her heart thrashed.
The bar fell silent.
And the chapter closed on one brutal truth pulsing through her entire body:
She met this man ten minutes ago.
So why did she trust him more than the man she spent three years loving?
- Writer
