Being dead sucked.

It meant remembering a new last name—and accidentally signing her old one a few times. It involved memorizing a new year of birth. Back to her original one that made her forty-four instead of forty-one with a birthday in March instead of October.

A new life and identity meant learning a new neighborhood, finding a job, replacing all her shit.

Most of all, though, it involved missing the hell out of Charming Reaper Montgomery.

Realtor. Lover. Assassin.

She’d had time in the weeks—fifty-one days to be exact—since their breakup—the avalanche the perfect cover for her disappearance according to Jazzy—to get herself accustomed to his job.

Plenty of time to come to grips with the fact that the man who’d touched her so tenderly was a killer. She’d watched movie after movie about it, the fictionalized stories reinforcing the fact that he was a killer, but one with feelings. One who could love. Being an assassin didn’t automatically make him a bad person.

Because, if it did, then what did that make Jazzy? A shitty sister at times, who seemed to think Annique was better off lonely than hooking up with a has-been silver fox.

“You can do better.” Annique could still hear her sister’s argument.

Jazzy didn’t understand. Annique didn’t want better. She wanted Reaper.

Even if he was a killer.

He did say he was retired.

But could a killer ever walk away from his job?

What of his enemies?

What of her enemy?

Joel was dead. Or so a news report seemed to indicate, but a part of her wondered if she’d ever feel safe. She’d thought the bastard dead once before.

Music, the slow-moving, romantic kind replaced the talk show on her television. She sighed as she saw yet another commercial for Valentine’s Day. Stupid holiday.

She hated it. Mostly because a part of her wished Reaper was spending it with her.

But no, she’d chosen to listen to her sister when she arrived in time to save her freezing ass. Chosen to flee and hide as she’d done before rather than deal with her problems.

Perhaps not her brightest decision.

A knock on the door had her frowning. Caution meant she peeked through the spyhole, only to see red cellophane wrapping, the kind used for flowers.

“Who is it?”

“Delivery for a Miss Annie.” Spoken with a heavy Asian accent.

Annie? Only one person ever called her that.

Heart suddenly racing, she flung open the door and would have reached greedily for the flowers, except when the foil dipped, she saw the white tops.

White roses. Her first shock. Then his face.

“Joel.” The word whispered from her as panic engulfed. She went to shut the door.

Only he shoved into it, used his weight against her, and pushed it open.

Joel stalked in and kicked the door shut before tossing the flowers to the floor.

“And here we are again,” Joel said.

“You’re supposed to be dead.” She’d seen the reports that found the body. A body mangled, but who else could it be?

“I guess you didn’t hear. They finally matched the DNA to a forest ranger that went missing. Odd how he ended up so far from his station.” Joel sneered.

“Go away.” A futile request judging by the manic gleam in his eyes.

“In a minute. First, you’re going to be a good girl as I strangle you.”

“You’re a psycho.”

“And whose fault is that?”

If he thought she would just let him kill her, he was sadly mistaken. She grabbed the nearest thing within reach, a candy bowl, and threw it at him. He batted it aside as she tried to run past him to the door.

She failed.

He grabbed her, fisting her by the hair and yanking her painfully back. She fought, straining and kicking at him. Frantic in her movements. Panicked in her attempts to get free. She landed quite a few shots. However, self-defense, while all well and good, wasn’t worth shit against someone bigger who could fight.

Joel swept a foot past her ankles, dumping her on her ass.

The impact only stunned her for half a second. She whipped over onto her knees and scrabbled, digging her nails into the worn parquet flooring, bucking as he tried to pin her.

“Why can’t you just go away or die?” she yelled, struggling underneath him.

“Because I’m invincible, bitch.”

Scary but true, it seemed. How many times had she thought him dead?

That day on the mountain, when Joel had dragged her to the top, she’d almost died. When he pushed her off that cliff, she’d thought for sure he would succeed, but a branch slowed her fall while stealing her robe. Then the plateau kept her from tumbling to certain death.

Joel had stood at the top and aimed his gun. She still had the scar from the searing bullet. She had nowhere to run.

Then a snowmobile came soaring over the edge, tipping down the steep embankment, almost crashing into her.

Jazzy had arrived to save the day.

But her sister wasn’t here this time. Off on some secret mission again.

There was no one to save Annique as Joel’s fingers dug into her throat, cutting off her air.

She grabbed at his wrists and pulled, the strength needed to free herself lacking. She scratched. She thrashed as black spots danced in front of her eyes.

Regret, not her past, flashed in her mind.

I wish I’d never run.

She should never have left Reaper that day on the mountain. Never climbed onto the back of that snowmobile.

Why didn’t I stay with him? She’d kept the necklace, refusing to give it up, even if it was a tie to her past.

She’d hidden it despite her sister’s sigh.

Now that very chain dug into her neck, imprinting onto her skin as the hands squeezed tighter.

Her vision dimmed.

Her eyes fluttered shut.

She thought she heard pounding. “Annie, let me in.”

Crashing and splintering.

There goes my deposit.

Then cursing. “Son of a bitch. I’ve fucking had it with you.”

Then she was gasping for air, pulling in painful breaths as two bodies grappled over her.

Reaper, big and beautiful, wrestled Joel. He wrapped his arms around the menace in her life and put him in a headlock, one Joel couldn’t escape from.

He then gave her a look and said, in a tight voice, “What do you want me to do?”

Giving her a choice?

“What do you mean?”

“I mean, we can call the cops and take the chance he gets out on bail, or I end this, right here, right now.”

Kill Joel?

“She won’t kill me. She’s weak. I’ll be back,” Joel managed to sputter, despite the hold on his neck.

“I am not weak.” She stood and faced the man who’d terrorized her for so long. “And I won’t let you do this to anyone else.” She met Reaper’s gaze. “Do it.”

The crack of a neck breaking wasn’t as loud as the movies made it out to be. The body hung limply in Reaper’s grasp.

Only for a moment. He dumped it on the floor and, a second later, swept her into his arms.

Only to hold her out from him a heartbeat later and shake her. “Don’t you ever fucking scare me like that again!”