Sloan is still in bed at six in the morning. She wakes up to find her boyfriend, Asa, having sex with her. She compares him to a warden and her body to a prisoner. Asa’s needs are usually inconvenient for her: She has her first class of the college semester in two hours, and he hasn’t been to bed yet after a party.

Asa is attractive but cocky and volatile. They love each other, and Sloan believes that he helped her during a difficult time when no one else would. However, he rarely goes to class anymore, and she is sick of the constant parties at their house. In one year, she thinks she can free herself and get her own place.

She finds a man named Dalton unconscious in her bathtub. When she shouts, Asa pulls him out after Dalton hits his head on the faucet.

Note: Carter’s real name is Luke, but Carter is his undercover name. For ease of reading, he will be referred to as Carter until Sloan learns his identity and begins referring to him as Luke. The same arrangement will be used for his partner, Ryan, whose undercover name is Dalton.