Content Warning: This section of the guide discusses domestic abuse and mental health conditions, including Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD), which feature in the source text.

“‘I hear you losing your mind,’ he muttered.”

This comment is made by Nate’s hallucination of Julian Torres. Its placement in the first chapter is a brilliant stylistic choice and a masterful example of foreshadowing, for at first glance, it ostensibly appears to be an offhand comment from one friend to another, in which Julian criticizes Nate for taking a new assignment rather than going on a planned vacation. However, when this comment is viewed again after the end of the novel, it is clear that it is a direct reference to the fact that Nate is speaking to a man who has been dead for three years. Thus, Julian’s accusation that Nate is “losing [his] mind” is really a reflection of Nate’s own apprehension about his current mental state.

“He was…hot. Like, pull-the-fire-alarm, jaw-dropping levels of hotness. A fine layer of dark scruff covered a square jawline. Even the cut and the purplish bruise that split the right half of his lower lip didn’t detract from his face, because his eyes…wow. Just…wow. Those crystalline baby blues stole every word out of my head.”

This description of Nate fulfills the requisite characterization of the typical romantic hero. However, Izzy takes a moment to focus on the cut and bruise on Nate’s lower lip, and while the source of these injuries will remain a mystery for the moment, she will later realize that they are the result of domestic violence at the hands of Nate’s own father. This description not only highlights Nate as the romantic hero, but it also opens the door to exploring his troubled past and his childhood trauma, both of which make him determined to protect those he loves.