AllFreeNovel
Share Us
It didn’t make up for the fact that his father had never been there for him—even if he had been there at the IPO launch. It didn’t make up for the fact that his mother had been devastated by his absence, it didn’t make up for the years of feeling second best to a myth, a legend only his father believed in. But...if it was real, if those co-ordinates, or whatever lay at the end of them, proved that his father had been right, thatEvelynhad been right, then maybe he could at least see his father’s search through to the end. It was all that was left of their relationship and he owed it to them both to see it through. He could work with Evie, they could take some time to make a plan. He could still see Léi Chen tomorrow and then—he nearly laughed at himself—they could go on a treasure hunt?
Mateo had looked up the coordinates on his phone while Evelyn had called the person she had been acting on behalf of. Mateo was half-sure it was the Iondorran palace, but he doubted she’d tell him even if she was allowed to. The coordinates had pinpointed an island in Indonesia and he knew that she would want to go there.
Cristo,hewanted to go there. It became an urgent refrain in his mind, needing to know if his father really had been right. Maybe knowing one way or another would finally bring him and his mother some peace.
He stared at himself in the mirror.
And instead, he saw Evelyn looking up at him, her entire body throbbing with want so clear he felt it beat against his skin in tidal waves that pulled him closer and closer. And he’d wanted her with a kind of feral insanity—the strength of which he had never experienced before. But he couldn’t. She was innocent. If he hadn’t known it before, when he had first met her in Spain, he knew it now for sure. It was written in every single part of her body and, although he’d hated himself for crushing the desire he so easily read, it was far better than for him to have toyed with her knowing it would and could not go any further.
But she was as dangerous to him as he was to her. She wreaked havoc with his focus and was far too tangled up in things with his father. No. He needed to keep her at a safe distance.
He splashed water over his face again, hoping it would take a bite out of the desire he felt simmering just beneath the surface of his skin and his civility.
Reaching for a towel, he swiped angrily at his face and threw it aside. He might want to keep a safe distance from her, but he also knew that she would get herself into trouble if she ran off to Indonesia on her own. They just needed to make a plan, he decided as he left the bathroom and made his way back to the suite. He would speak to Evelyn about this and perhaps—
He came to a halt, knowing immediately that she was gone.
Evelyn exited the cab and thanked the driver, turning to gaze up at a train station that looked far more like an airport. Yes, she could have waited until tomorrow for the quicker train. She could even have taken a flight. But she’d needed to gonow. And not just because she’d stolen from Mateoagain.Her hands shook as she reached for the strap of her briefcase. She had left with both the octantandthe notebook, knowing that she would need the notebook when she reached the coordinates and unable to trust Mateo that he would let her have it until then.
She felt faintly sick, but it wasn’t because of yet another instance of morally ambiguous behaviour she seemed to engage in since meeting the Spaniard. No. In her mind, she watched as Mateo released his grasp on her chin and stepped back, the apology clear in his gaze. He didn’t want her. It was that simple and Evie decided then and there that she’d take disdain over pity any day and she hoped beyond all hope that he’d have the decency to at least let her go.
She made her way into the sprawling international train hub and was thankful that there were signs in English to point her way. She ignored the looks she drew as she rushed through the station, having only had time to grab a handful of clothes and her wash bag before leaving the hotel. She’d not even had time to change.
She found her way to the platform, urgency nipping at her heels. Her heartbeat raced as she boarded the train and found her cabin, an instinct telling her she needed to hurry, while a voice whispered that she was running away.
Of course she was running away, she wanted to cry.
Shame and embarrassment were one thing, but to be rejected like that again... It was too much. Ithurttoo much. She’d tried to pass her encounter off with Jeremy, the boy from Cambridge, as a universal childhood experience. And she’d hoped that the derision and near-exile from her colleagues because of her association with Professor Marin’s research would peter out. But it hadn’t. Instead, all that rejection and all that hurt had snowballed, accumulating the weight of an avalanche, and she just...she just wanted to breathe.
She put her bags down and sank onto the bottom bunk of the small cabin. It was just big enough for her, with a little table between a small seat on one side and the bunk on the other. A minuscule bathroom was wedged next to the seat and she vowed to change out of her sequinned dress the moment the train left the station. But until then she let the wave of hurt washing over her bring tears to her eyes. Here, alone in the small cabin, she let a few of them go, sweeping them aside with shaking hands before they could fall. She was about to give in completely when a knock pounded against the door. She reached for her ticket and opened the door, only to step back in shock.
‘What the hell do you think you’re doing?’
Mateo Marin loomed impossibly large in the small doorway, still wearing the tuxedo from the auction earlier that evening. An announcement sounded over the speaker, buzzing in the background, but she couldn’t understand it. Her sadness morphed into anger and frustration in a heartbeat. He’d come to stop her because just like everyone else he underestimated her. And she couldn’t take it any more.
‘I’m following the coordinates. Are you here to stop me? To tell me that you won’t “let” me? Please. Tell me that I’m going to “thank you one day”,’ she challenged him,daredhim. Something hot and fiery twisted in his gaze.
‘You rush off in the middle of the night—’
‘It’s not even ten p.m.,’ she cut in.
‘Without even letting me know—’
‘I don’thaveto let you know!’ she yelled, her anger rising to unprecedented levels.
‘Without a single care for your own safety—’
She huffed out an incredulous laugh. ‘Trains are far safer than planes.’
‘I wasn’t talking about your preferred mode of transport,’ he growled and walked her backwards into the small cabin. ‘You can’t just rush out without a plan, having stolen from meagain. The octant is mine. Thenotebookis mine. I’m now in this as much as, if not more than, you. Now, we’re getting off this train and returning to the hotel to figure out how best to get to these damn coordinates.’
‘You want to follow the coordinates?’ Evie asked in surprise.
‘Of course I—’
This time it wasn’t Evie that interrupted him but the jerk of the train leaving the station, shoving her forward and throwing her against his chest. He reached out a hand to brace it against the overhead bunk, his other arm wrapping around her, holding her to him before she could hurt herself.
Instinctively she clung to his waist, her fingers fisting the black tuxedo jacket, and she could hear the strong pounding of his heart where her cheek had landed on his chest. For just a second the wind lodged in her lungs before coming out on a whoosh.
