Lucas had always been the bad boy — the one with the devil-may-care grin and a reputation that made people whisper. He was reckless, a player through and through. And she was the opposite. Sweet. Gentle. Shy. The kind of girl who blushed at compliments and stumbled over her words when the attention was on her. Maybe that’s why he was drawn to her. Maybe that’s why she said yes when he asked for something she wasn’t sure she could handle.

An open relationship.

She told herself it was fine. That she could be like him — carefree, unattached. But every time she tried, the idea of anyone else made her stomach churn. Lucas was her first real connection, the first person to see her, really see her. She didn’t want anyone else.

But tonight, she wished she did.

The club pulsed with music, bodies pressed together in the dim light. Lucas leaned against the bar, all easy charm, his hand resting lazily on the edge as a girl in a red dress laughed too loudly at something he said. He smirked, that signature tilt of his lips, and let his gaze linger on her. She should have looked away. Should have reminded herself this was what she agreed to.

Instead, the jealousy clawed at her.

She hated the way her chest tightened, hated the heat rising to her face. It wasn’t fair. She wasn’t supposed to feel like this. But as the girl reached out, her fingers brushing Lucas’s arm, it hit her — the gnawing ache she’d tried so hard to push down.

She wanted to be enough.

But maybe she never would be.