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Chapter 1

For the last two years, my life had not been my own Every minute, every phone call, every holiday and party had all been in the service of someone else I’d learned to eat quicker, so I’d be ready to pick up the phone at a moment’s notice I carried ency contact was Louise-the-Bavarian-housekeeper

The very essence of rowth and development put on hold so I could make someone else my focus A person whose quirks and dreams I knew even better than my own The sa around the globe as he indulged whim after whim

But soht in Spain An irrevocable and permanent shift One with so many rippled implications, it would take a lifetime to sort them all out All I knew at the time, was that for the first time in two years, the tables had suddenly turned

For the first ti after me

“Abby!”

The two of us careened out into the night, one after the other Dodging cars, tripping on cobblestones, blurring past a ht portrait of Barcelona For the first time since we’d arrived, the exquisiteas the city was, I was teht was to escape I had to get to the airport

“Abby—please! Wait!”

He was catching up Although I didn’t dare turn around as I sprinted down the cold streets toward the hfare that led back to the airstrip, his footfalls were getting steadily louder It was only a ht in front of me, and then what? What the hell was I supposed to do once the two of us were standing face to face?

Thinking fast, I slipped through a tiny gap between two cars stuck in traffic—a gap too s of lanced back to see hi across it like so his stride

What the hell do they teach those kids at boarding school?!

I picked up the pace again, but even as I rounded a corner and saw the bright lights of the airport flickering in the distance, I kneas too late A sudden paralysis ca numbly out toward the horizon

A second later, Nick skidded to a stop at my side

Unlike , the i his hair and flushing his cheeks with fresh color

He was, however, looking uncharacteristically cautious His muscles tensed and his eyes were alert As if at any ht sprint back out into traffic and the chase would be on

“Abby?”

I stayed put, but I refused to look up into those eyes Not even for a ument I could not afford to lose