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A bundle of pretty-coloured notes folded in half and secured with a paperclip waited in the bottom of the duffel.
My sorrow chose that exact moment to crush me.
Tears burned, and despair choked.
I’d lost my family, yet another had been so incredibly kind to me.
Kind enough to fix me, feed me, clothe me, pay me.
They deserved to be left alone.
They owed me absolutely nothing.
I owed them absolutely everything.
Yet I had nowhere else to go.
Snatching the money, I crept to the window and yanked off the insect screen. With my heart in my mouth, I eased it open.
It stopped halfway, as if rigged to prevent people from using it as an unofficial exit.
In another life, the crack wouldn’t be big enough.
But in this one, where I was malnourished from living on the run and desperation made me determined, I shimmied my shoulders through, sucked in my belly, and slithered like a snake into the wilting flowers below.
Chapter Six
*
Nerida
*
(Sea in Turkish : Deniz)
“SO, YOU SAVED A BOY’S LIFE WHEN you were just twelve. You fell in love with that boy without knowing a single thing about him, and when you confessed it felt different when you touched him, he merely said it was because his life was now yours?” Margot clutched her notebook to her chest. “I mean...wow.”
She blinked back the stars in her gaze. “That is so crazily romantic and—”
“Stupid,” Dylan muttered.
“Dylan!” Margot whacked him with her notebook. “It’s not stupid. It’s fate. It’s love at first sight—”
“Forgive me,” Dylan said, catching my eyes with a wince. “But...I’m not one for destiny. Surely, you look back now and admit that what you felt back then was just an...infatuation? A strong one but nothing more than that.”
I laughed under my breath, not offended by his lack of belief. After all, until it happened to you, it seemed as far-fetched as a fairy-tale. “It was the biggest infatuation of my life.” I stroked my wedding ring. “My only infatuation.”
“No one else?” Margot asked, her eyes crinkling with eagerness. “You mean, he was your first and your last? Oh God, could this tale get any sweeter?”
I didn’t catch her misty gaze.
I couldn’t answer that question without reliving the two worst moments of my life.
So I didn’t.
“I’m never going to live this down.” Dylan groaned under his breath. “Not only did I brag to everyone I know that I was chosen to interview the Nerida Avci, but now I’m going to have to sign my name to an article full of taboo romance and pubescent angst.”
I chuckled softly and shook my head, dispelling the future and what I’d have to share. “I promise our tale has more than just longing, Mr. Collins.” My laughter drifted away as my thoughts nudged at the wound that would never truly heal. “There is darkness. A lot of darkness. There are bad guys and murderous plots. There’s torture and—”
