Never meet your hero, because they’ll probably turn out to be a villain.

That thought didn’t even cross my mind when the magazine I work for assigned me to do a feature article on Dane, the greatest country singer of our generation. You know, the kind of celebrity who doesn’t require a last name because they’re that prolific.

Along with being one of my favorite artists, the notoriously private man has never given an interview in his twenty-year career, so this piece could make mine. Unfortunately, from the minute I step foot on his massive Texas compound, Dane is determined to break it.

Between his icy stares, lewd gestures, and mocking comments, the one week time table to ask him my questions comes and goes with zero answers. But for some reason, he won’t pull out of the article. And when he insists I move into his guest house in order to observe him, since he refuses to sit down one-on-one, I have no choice but to suck it up for my job.

After the year I’ve had, and the outside world I no longer want any part of, the seclusion is almost welcome. That is, if it didn’t include a sexy recluse who seems hellbent on messing with me. Working with someone I despise wouldn’t be so hard if it meant going home at the end of the day.

From his checkered past, to the rumors about his love life, to the fact that he vanished from the music scene five years ago, to the teenage daughter he’s raised as a single father her entire life … there is so much to unpack in order to learn the truth about the man buried beneath the ink covering his skin.

But the real danger comes when Dane drops the curtain completely, allowing me to see every side of him. Because it makes me want to show him every damaged part of myself.

Except two such opposite, but equally broken, people can never find a happily ever after. Especially since a villain has no heart. So what do I do when the fallen hero I can’t have wants to give me his?