Nancy's POV

The living room felt suffocatingly stuffy after Mom got back from the mall, her brown paper grocery bags still sitting unattended on the kitchen counter.

She had insisted on unwinding with some mindless reality TV, her feet tucked beneath her on the sofa as she flipped channels until landing on a chaotic cooking competition.

I sat beside her, my legs pulled tight to my chest, trying to focus on the screen where a red-faced chef was screaming about overcooked scallops. But my mind was a million miles away, drifting right back to the drive home, and the heavy, predatory way Jacob’s eyes had locked onto mine in the...