Anonymous money. Paradise destination. Man who takes care of everything.
She's realizing that she's living Olive's story.
Panic claws at my throat. She's going to leave. She's going to pack her bags and get on a plane and I'll never see her again. She'll go back to her mother and Sydney will hold her and tell herI warned you, I told you, they're all the same?—
No.
I force myself to breathe. To think.
She knows about my parents. She knows their story mirrors ours. But she doesn't knoweverything.
She doesn't know about the blog. About how I've been reading her words for twelve years, tracking her life through carefully curated posts, falling in love with someone who didn't know I existed.
She doesn't know about the business deal. About Marcus and the investors and how bringing her here wasn't just about wanting her—it was about needing her to play a role.
She just knows the surface stuff. The stuff that looks bad but can be explained.
I can work with this.
I can tell her that yes, my father sent Olive a check, but that doesn't mean I'm doing the same thing for the same reasons. I can tell her it's coincidence, not strategy. I can tell her I love her, and that love isn't about control, isn't about ownership, isn't about repeating toxic patterns.
I can make her believe it.
Can't I?
I close the laptop carefully, leaving it exactly as I found it. My hands are shaking.
I need to find her. Before she spirals too far into Sydney's paranoid worldview. Before she convinces herself that everything between us has been manipulation from the start.
I need to find her and tell her... what?
The truth?
Part of it, anyway. The parts that don't destroy everything.
I step out of the guest house and scan the property. The beach. The pool. The gardens. She could be anywhere, walking off her thoughts, building walls against me higher with every step.
I'm going to find her.
And I'm going to fix this.
Whatever it takes.
18
PHOENIX
Something's off with Jade.
She came back to bed last night, but she was different. Stiff when I pulled her close. Too quiet. I could practically hear her thinking, her mind spinning somewhere far away from me.
This morning she barely looked at me. Made some excuse about needing to write, needing space. Slipped out of bed and practically ran to the guest house before I could ask what was wrong.
I let her go. Gave her an hour. Two.
But now it's past noon and the distance is making my skin itch.
My phone buzzes. It’s Marcus.
