As a photojournalist, my comfort zone is behind the lens. A disengaged observer. That goes out the window when I’m forced to work with a man who makes my haven feel like a cage.

Garrett Casey is the intoxicating lead of the provocative, new Broadway production I’ve been assigned to cover. As a recovering alcoholic who battles demons even darker than mine, his intensity is a danger to the shell I’ve built around the empty woman inside me. I vow to keep the brutally gorgeous actor at arm’s length, but he immediately pulls me into his orbit. I see myself every time I look into his haunted eyes. The pain he tries so hard to hide draws me closer, making me crave the surrender I shouldn’t want.

Garrett takes a wrecking ball to my fortress, and I lack the power—or the will—to stop him. As my walls crumble around me, I realize he just might be the only man strong enough to put me back together.

When my past threatens to shatter everything we’ve built, the smoke and mirrors I’ve hidden behind are what could finally break me. A lie of omission is still a lie. It will take more than the truth to prove our love is not a masquerade.