Chapter 1

The morning was cool and dewy, mingling with Hana’s sweat as she opened the back door. Her cat, Creamsicle, wound her way over to Hana, meowing for breakfast. “Yeah, yeah, hold on,” Hana said, unzipping her jacket. It was an old ‘80s windbreaker, colorblocked with teal and pink and white—a divorce present from her father. He had given it to her as he was leaving, said it was hers now and she’d better take damn good care of it. She hadn’t seen him since she turned eighteen.

Now, at twenty-two, the most they interacted was a happy birthday text. No cards, no presents, just a quick text to which the other would reply, thanks.

Hana didn’t like thinking about her dad, and every time she wore this stupid jacket, she ended up thinking about him. She hated it.

So, to push it out of her mind, she busied herself with scooping Creamsicle’s food into her bowl, washing and filling her water fountain, then stripping for a lava-hot shower.

She let the steam carry her thoughts away, her forehead pressed to the chilly tiled wall. She thought her run this morning would have cleansed her brain, but it seemed only to, irritatingly, make her more introspective.

Freshly washed, her hair dripping, she stepped out of the shower and patted her body dry with a towel. She stared at her legs when she reached them, stubbly hairs poking stubbornly out of her skin. “Shit,” she said. She had forgotten to shave.

Today was important. She needed to look presentable. She glanced at her phone. No time to jump back in the shower; the impromptu run to calm her nerves took up too much of her morning even though she had woken up at six AM. “Shit,” she said again.

She would just have to wear long pants, and she sighed. She didn’t have any dress pants that didn’t pinch, and she would have to wear them all day.

With another dramatic sigh, she dried off properly, hung her towel up, and then threw together an outfit. Black pants (that she lint-rolled) with a matching jacket (that she also lint-rolled) and a bright red dress shirt. Smart leather shoes. She attached a watch to her wrist and turned on music before placing her hair in a bun. She slapped on a bit of makeup: darkening her lashes, swiping on a smear of girlishly pink gloss, and patting some bubblegum blush on the apples of her cheeks.

Hana stared at herself hard in the mirror. Her hair was already frizzing in the Ohio humidity, and she attacked the strands with hairspray, slicking them down. It hardly made a difference, and she groaned.

She felt like a clown, ridiculous, performing only for the sake of a lukewarm crowd. The urge to wipe off all the makeup and change her outfit and chop off all her hair was compounding in her chest like lead had grown around her heart. She looked away. “Good enough,” she said aloud. She didn’t know who she was trying to convince more, her cat or herself.

The ride to the office was filled with loud angry music to calm her nerves, and it worked until she stepped out of the car. The air smelled of rain now, and the clouds above threatened with kettle-black bellies.

Hana hurried up the stairs to the doors, slipped inside, said hello to Manuel at the receptionist desk, and then skirted down the hallway to her mother’s office. The office building still held onto ‘90s decor with its landscape paintings and beige walls and steely-blue carpeting. It smelled of mildew and toner, an odor Hana remembered from her childhood when her parents were still married.

Hoa Nguyen’s office was at the end of the hall, her door cracked open. She was on the phone, probably speaking with one of the tech start-ups the pack had loaned money to.

Hana waited a moment before sliding inside and shutting the door behind her softly. Her mother glanced at her and held up a finger. “—someone else. No, you’ll just have to lower the salary. Yes, I understand. Cut their duties. No one needs to be doing all that anyway. Those are sixteen-hour days, and—yes, I realize that, Ryan.. I’m under no illusions of the work ethic one has to have to build a business from the ground up,” Hoa was saying. “I’ll check up on you in a week. See if you’ve hired someone. Okay, yes. Buh-bye.”

Hoa had a stern face, her light brown skin wrinkled around the eyes and the mouth. She was considerably older than other mothers who had children Hana’s age because she’d had Hana at the age of forty-two. She’d spent most of her life building wealth for the pack, spending stressful days on red-eye flights from New York to Los Angeles to Chicago to Dallas. She was a coding genius, able to learn and write programs in every language. She could convert Pascal to COBOL, Perl to Javascript. The start-ups she had coded for in the ‘80s, ‘90s, and early ‘00s had sold for millions of dollars, and she had started trading stocks for her 401k match and amassed a fortune she’d sent back to her father while he led the pack.

Hana’s mom had never been one to frivolously spend, so the office had stayed the same. Hoa did not have any plans to upgrade it, no matter how many of her friends from college—now all CEOs and CFOs—practically lived in highrise mirrored skyscrapers featured on cityscape postcards. Hana wished they would at least replace the carpet because the baseboards were probably molded to the foundation at this point.

“Hi, Mom,” Hana said, stuffing her hands in her pockets.

“Hi, baby,” Hoa said. She hung up the phone and rubbed her temples before looking up at Hana and frowning. “Your hair’s frizzy. Must be a storm coming.”

Hana blushed, running a hand over the crown of her head. “Mom,” she protested, but her mother was already typing on her computer. Hana sat in one of the chairs across from her mother’s desk, wiping a hand down her shirt as if to press out any wrinkles. “When will they be here? I mean, I know you said eleven-thirty, but they’re not running late, right?”

“How should I know? No one’s called,” Hoa said. She was already tapping out another number on her phone. She gazed at Hana, looked her up and down with a mother’s discerning eye. “Go make yourself some coffee. You look tired.”

Hana did as she was told. She wandered out of the office and to the breakroom, grateful the coffee was already made. She poured some into a foam cup and decided against powdered creamer and sugar. The coffee was weak and burnt anyways; nothing would really help it.

Sitting and waiting for the other pack to arrive felt like a death sentence. Hana’s heart skipped against her chest, pushing its way up into her throat. She swallowed it back with a sip of too-hot coffee. “Shit,” she muttered, pressing her thumb against her scalded tongue.

That was all that came to her, and it was the perfect word to describe today. Shit.

She padded back to the entrance where Manuel sat with his feet up on the desk, one earbud sticking out from his dark curls. “Mom wouldn’t want you doing that. Not professional,” Hana teased, smirking when Manuel startled.

“Jesus, Hana, you scared me,” he said.

Hana laughed. “Can’t say I’m sorry,” she said. She and Manuel had grown up together, not just within the pack but within each other’s homes since their mothers were childhood friends. He was two years younger than her, but that hadn’t stopped them from becoming good friends.

Hoa had hired him two years ago to file paperwork for the summer and kept him because he was a hard worker even if his professionalism needed some work. He still called Hana’s mom Ms. Nguyen or “boss” despite how much it annoyed Hoa. Or maybe because it annoyed her.

“Heard today’s the big day,” Manuel said, pulling out his earbud and snapping it into its case. He stood and peeked out the front doors. “Can’t believe your mom went with her though.”

“Oh, God,” said Hana, rubbing her face. “Don’t remind me. Of all people, right? I know it’s for the good of the pack or whatever, but shit, of all people. Of all people.”

“Say a prayer, Han Solo, ‘cause it’s happening.”

“Jesus,” Hana said with an incredulous laugh. The childhood nickname felt like a slap in the face. Hana’s childhood was ending. Her youth was ending. She had just graduated from college a month ago with a BA in accounting, and now, she was supposed to be courting someone. Marrying them, if all went well. Which it wouldn’t. Of that, Hana was certain.

Despite being the only two out lesbians at Grady Academy, Hana and Natasha were on opposite sides of the spectrum. Hana was often quiet, studious, but always running late or having one crisis or another like lost homework, lost lunchbox, or lost car keys. Natasha had always been put together, wearing on-trend leggings and crop tops she never was dress-coded for (except by one jealous English teacher who saw Natasha and, deceived by her hot pink bag and blind to the lesbian flag keychain hanging off of it, assumed Natasha was straight and flirting with the male history teacher across the hallway.) Natasha had never given Hana the time of day, and while Hana had never really developed a crush on Natasha because she was so uppity and—to top it all off—captain of the cheer squad, Hana couldn’t deny that Natasha was gorgeous: long-legged with a miniscule waist and curled blond hair that dripped down to the middle of her back. She was what Hana wasn’t, the all-American bombshell with the tits and ass to prove it. And now, Hana was supposed to marry her to secure an allegiance for their packs.

“Holy fuck, there they are,” said Manuel suddenly, breaking Hana out of her panic-induced reverie.

Hana spun around as a bodyguard—a bodyguard?—opened the door to the office, letting in Natasha Hemmings who wore a frown that would have shrunk the Grinch’s heart two sizes smaller.