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“Anything.” My voice suddenly sounds strangely raw, not like me. Tell me all your secrets, Ophelia.

Her chest rises as she takes a deep breath. She doesn’t look at me. “The breakup was really hard for me. Archie really pulled the rug out from under me. I thought we had a future. A real future together, I mean.”

I get a queasy feeling in my stomach, but I ask anyway. “But?” Because there has to be a but.

“What if it only hurts so much because everything has changed? Because my life will be different now than I always thought it would be? And not because I really loved him?”

“Did you love him?” I have no idea why I’m hoping for a certain answer.

Her gaze flickers. “I don’t know,” she replies, too hesitant. “I mean, how can you actually know?”

“You just know,” I reply too quickly and confidently. Suddenly there’s a familiar ache in my chest again. A pain that’s been there for years. Every day, every hour, every damn minute. It’s different than it used to be, not as sharp, not as urgent. But it’s still there.

“So you’ve been in love before?”

I exhale. It feels like an iron band is closing around my ribs and breaking them one by one. “Yes. Once.”

Chapter 10

Phoenix

I close my fist so tightly around the necklace that the little compass digs into my palm. It feels like it’s burning my skin, even though the metal is cool. It’s like punishment and redemption at the same time.

Did you get it from your girlfriend?

Lia’s words are still ringing in my ears. I just can’t shake them. It would have been so easy to tell her the truth. To say that there is no girlfriend who gave me the necklace and tell her who it really belongs to. But my mind checked out. I couldn’t think anymore because of the disappointment in her eyes and the way her lips were pressed together. Lips that I want to feel on mine again. Damn.

Letting her believe I had a girlfriend was a stupid knee-jerk reaction. Very stupid. But all I could think about was the damn necklace and the girl who gave it to me. I lost control, and now it’s too late to take my words back. Maybe that’s for the best. Let her be angry. Let her think what she wants to.

Unfortunately, that’s not what I want at all. It’s making me crazy. I can see Lia in the studio in my mind’s eye again, completely absorbed in dancing. I watched her longer than I’d like to admit, even though I shouldn’t have been there at all. But after the party, I needed to clear my head, just like she did, it seems. I was just leaving the practice building when I heard the music and followed it without thinking.

And then I saw her and just couldn’t look away. She was beautiful—she is—but in that moment, it was somehow . . . more than that.

She was the girl from that night again.

Ophelia.

Tonight with Pearson was different. She was different, as if she were wearing a mask. But when I watched her in the studio, she was herself again. Or at least the version of herself she showed me three months ago. I have no idea which one is real. And it shouldn’t matter to me, damn it.

My phone vibrates just as the elevator stops on the ground floor with a soft ping. I don’t even have to look to know it’s my mother wanting to know how my first day went. She’s called me seven times in the last few hours. I haven’t answered, and I don’t plan on calling her back today. Since I returned to Boston, she’s been calling every day, wanting to see me and talking too much. As if she wasn’t putting enough pressure on me already. I can’t deal with it.

I pull my phone out of my pocket and reject her call as I step into the elevator. Mom goes to voicemail, but now I see that Brooklyn has texted me. Damn. Not him too. I wish I could ignore his messages, but then he’d probably be at my apartment within an hour, and I really don’t want to talk in person.

My brother is two years older and, unlike me, has his life totally under control. He’s been working at one of Boston’s biggest law firms for over a year and just got engaged to his girlfriend, Daisy. The two of them have been together since high school. If I believed there were such a thing as true love, they’d probably be the perfect example of it.

Reluctantly, I tap our chat. Six unread messages.

Brooklyn:

How did it go?

Brooklyn:

Call me later when you get home.

Brooklyn:

How long is the event? Are you still not home?