"Okay. That stairway leads to the luxury hotel next door—we're adjoining buildings. Use this card key to buzz yourself inside.”
Minutes later, I'm inside the hotel's lavish ladies' room near the lobby.
When I emerge from the stall to wash my hands, I catch my image reflected in the glamorous gilt glass. In my Prosecco induced haze, it seems to transform into a magic mirror before my eyes.
As if to signal my life will take an exciting new turn.
An appropriate omen for my 21st, birthday, I think to myself.
When I swing open the door to enter the lobby, I crash directly into a tall, solid male figure. I stumble back, an electric jolt running through me from the unexpected impact.
He smells of cedar aftershave and clean male skin. I pull back, looking up at a man with dark hair and piercing blue eyes.
"I'm sorry," we both say simultaneously.
"Cameron Crow," I breathe, blinking hard.
My mind races, trying to process whether the Prosecco, the collision, or the sheer impossibility of it all is making me hallucinate.
"You're the girl who found my ring. We meet again."
I try to nod but feel a wave of dizziness sweep over me.
"I just need to sit down for a moment," I manage, leaning against a nearby pillar.
"Here, let me help you."
He guides me to a plush sofa in the lobby's seating area.
"Are you sure you're okay?"
"I'm fine. I was just celebrating my birthday with friends. Guess I had one too many.”
"How old?" he asks, a faint smile playing on his lips.
"21 tonight."
He settles beside me on the sofa, and I still can't quite believe this is happening. Cameron Crow. Here. With me.
"A tea leaf reader came to our table tonight," I say, realizing I’m ranting even as I speak. "When she heard it was my 21st birthday, she made a prediction.”
"Oh yeah? What kind of prediction?" he asks, leaning back slightly.
"She said my Prince Charming would come for me. And that he’d be tall, dark, and handsome."
I look directly at him, with a mischievous glint in my eye. "And here you are.”
Grinning, he glances at the hotel's ornate wall mirror across from us, a touch of self-aware amusement in his expression. "Well, thetabloidscertainly describe me that way," he adds, a curious note of disdain in his voice.
"You don't like the tabloids?" I ask, surprised by his sudden mood shift.
"It's complicated. When you're famous, you need them—at least I did when I was starting out. They made me who I am today. But now they're trying to break me."
Cameron's jaw tightens, the easy smile gone. "And the truth is, all the attention in the world still feels empty when you go home alone.”
The honesty in his voice stuns me, cutting through the Prosecco haze with sharp clarity.
For a second he doesn’t seem like Cameron Crow, the rockstar, the larger-than-life figure plastered on magazines. Just a man, vulnerable and human.
