It was late, probably too late for Wren to be walking through Piedmont Park. She wasn’t alone in the park, though. She could see the outline of a couple sitting together on a bench beneath the blue glare of a light post. A jogger in the distance made circles around the running track. Still, a woman shouldn’t be crossing the park alone at 10 PM, hours after the sunset closing. If something happened to her, people wouldn’t be able to talk about it without mentioning the role that her poor decision making played in her own demise. “It’s fine,” Wren thought. “If I

screamed, someone would hear me.”

At just that moment, Wren heard the sound footsteps behind her. She began to walk faster, but was certain that the footsteps were now matching her faster pace. Just as she thought she might break into a run, she heard the sound of her name coming from a familiar voice. She turned to see a man, poorly groomed and shabbily dressed. Though he was almost unrecognizable, his voice and posture identified him nevertheless. It had been ages since she had heard that voice. Yet something was different. Unmistakable darkness emanated from this man, in spite of the darkness surrounding them both.

Wren gasped as Liam took a step closer. The change in him since she last saw him, when he told her he had met someone else, was unbelievable. His hair was long and greasy. A bulge coming from the side of his dirty jeans poorly concealed the outline of a weapon. He peered at her with stormy, gray eyes. Though she had spent months wanting nothing but to be back in his arms, her only instincts now told her to run.