Prologue.

Honesty is a gift and a curse. Gabriel got both, to a point that he lost the one thing he held closest.
But how close?
The past comes to follow him when he thought he ran away from it. And just when he thought it only brought thorns of an unpayable debt, it brought rose petals as well, and for the first time, he didn't need to pay the debt.
A debt of a little game way back when.
But how do you pick up a rose when your hands are bound by another thorny vine that you can't cut?

All thanks to my classmates, who pressured me to write this book here. I don't regret it. Especially Stacy, my ideas-guy and editor. Her encouragement made this possible.