Or another problem I hadn’t seen coming.
“Maya, please, I need to talk to you.”
His voice wasn’t coaxing. This wasn’t a date follow-up or some casual check-in. There was a weight in his tone, as if exerting authority.
I cracked the door open just enough to block his view inside, but Noah was tall, and his gaze cut past me in an instant.
His expression turned to stone. “You’re leaving?”
“I am.”
Disbelief flashed hot in his eyes. “We just—” His breath came rough. “I just had the best night of my life, and now you want me to pretend it never happened?”
The truth snapped between us.
“Noah,” I warned.
“I saw you, Maya.”
My pulse froze. My mouth clamped shut.
His temper frayed as he said, “Behind the oak tree. I saw you.”
20
NOAH
She stepped away from the door and into the room, brushing the edge of the bed as she moved. Her hand gripped the strap of her bag.
“What did you do?” I asked.
“I had to get it back.” She unzipped the duffel and pulled something out. Something shiny, old, and incomplete, but still stunning. “I’d stashed it at The Lazy Moose.”
“Wait…is that the necklace you stole?”
She nodded. “Yeah. I buried it under the oak tree by the barn. The night of the dance rehearsal.”
I groaned. I thought she’d said honesty mattered. She was so different from anyone I’d known that diving into the deep end had felt right. I’d told myself the fine print didn’t matter, that it’d sort itself out because that’s what it usually did. But was I really that naïve?
“You said you went to prison because you tried to reclaim it. That it belonged to your mother.”
“Yeah.”
“If it were yours, why hide it?” I probed.
“Because I stole it again.”
“Maya? You stole from your own mother?”
“No! When I was convicted, the necklace went back to my uncle’s family. But I stole it again. Fromthem.”
The weight of her confession crashed over me. “Shit. When?”
“Stop asking, Noah.” She turned, shoving the necklace back into her bag.
“Has this got to do with that man Napoleon?” I asked.
She ignored me, clearly plotting her way out of this.
