Chapter 7: Realizations

Maya

We got back to Kiki’s apartment building just as the streetlights were flickering on against the heavy twilight fog.

My left ankle was so swollen by the time we climbed the two flights of wooden stairs that I had to drag my leg up step by step, gripping the smooth, greasy handrail for support. The hallway smelled of fried onions and old carpet.

Kiki unlocked the deadbolts, pushed the heavy door open, and dropped her tote bag straight onto the linoleum floor with a wet thud. She didn't turn on the main overhead light. She just walked into the small kitchen, flipped the switch on the electric kettle, and leaned her forearms against the counter with a long, shuddering sigh.

I kicked off Kiki’s muddy running shoes in the entryway, untied my hair, and stripped off the damp gray hoodie.

Underneath, the black silk dress was wrinkled, stained with mud along the hem, and completely ruined. I reached behind my neck, unzipped it, and let it drop to the floor. I pulled on a pair of faded sweatpants and an old t-shirt, collapsed onto the worn cushions of the sofa, and pulled my swollen left foot up onto my knee.

The joint was purple, puffy, and hot to the touch.

"You sprained it," Kiki observed, walking out of the kitchen with two mismatched mugs of steaming water and a box of chamomile tea bags. She set a mug on the small wooden coffee table, walked into her tiny bathroom, and returned with a ziplock bag filled with ice cubes wrapped in a dishtowel.

She tossed the ice pack onto my lap. "Put that on it before your foot turns into a balloon."

"Thanks," I muttered, pressing the frozen towel against the side of my ankle. The cold bit into my skin, sharp and numbing, but it cut through the dull ache.

Kiki pulled one of the wooden dining chairs over, set it across from the sofa, and sat down. She dipped her teabag into her mug, watching the water turn pale yellow.

"Do you know what his net worth is?" Kiki asked flatly.

I didn't open my eyes. "I don't care."

"Twenty-two billion dollars, Maya," Kiki said, ignoring my response. "My cousin sent me a text while we were on the bus. She was nearly crying because security called her department manager forty minutes after we left. They were running sweep protocols on the south gate."

My eyes snapped open. "Did she get fired?"

"No," Kiki said, taking a slow sip of her tea. "That's the weird part. She said security didn't even ask for employee names. They just asked if anyone recognized a girl in a black slip dress with dark hair and a limp."

A cold, heavy knot twisted in the pit of my stomach. "They're looking for me."

"Of course they're looking for you!" Kiki slammed her mug down onto the wooden table hard enough to splash tea over the rim. "You triggered an encrypted military-grade security network inside a private billionaire retreat! You caused a scene in front of thirty venture capitalists, and then you screamed at the owner of the company in a private hallway!"

"I didn't mean to trigger the network," I said, my voice defensive, though my throat felt dry. "I didn't know sending a text message would set off an alarm."

"Why did you send a text anyway?" Kiki asked, leaning forward, her dark eyes searching my face. "Who were you texting that was so important you couldn't wait until we got back to the bus stop?"

I looked down at my hands. My knuckles were red and scraped from where I’d braced myself when I tripped over the rug.

"Trevor," I said quietly.

Kiki stared at me for three full seconds before letting out a loud, harsh laugh. "Trevor? You risked getting arrested by private resort security to text Trevor?"

"I wanted him to know I wasn't broken," I said, my voice dropping into a hard, bitter register. "I wanted him to know that while he was sitting in Colette's spare room living off her couch, I was standing in a room full of people he could never dream of talking to. I was angry, Kiki. I was stupid, hot-headed, and angry."

"He doesn't care, Maya," Kiki said, her tone dropping into a quiet, brutal honesty that cut straight through my pride. "Trevor doesn't care if you're in a billionaire's ballroom or sitting on my couch. He moved his suit racks into your mother's place seventy-two hours after you left because he needed a bed. He is a parasite. And you almost got yourself thrown in jail just to prove a point to a guy who isn't even looking at you anymore."

The truth of her words hit me like a physical blow.

I leaned my head back against the sofa cushions, staring at the peeling strip of off-white paint on the ceiling. The ice pack on my ankle was turning numb, the cold seeping straight into the bone.

She was right. Trevor didn't care. Colette didn't care. I had ruined my ballet career for a boy who traded me for my mother, and I had spent three days sitting in a friend's apartment feeling sorry for myself while they moved on with my old life.

And then I thought about the man in the hallway.

Dominic Montgomery.

He hadn't looked at me like Trevor did. He hadn't smiled that fake, charming smile that pretty boys use when they want you to forgive them for being lazy. He had stood there—huge, scarred, and silent—looking at me like I was a strange, dangerous creature that had dropped out of the sky. He hadn't flinched when I yelled at him. He hadn't even raised his voice. He had just watched me with those unblinking, dark eyes, his scarred jaw set tight, holding all the power in the room without having to say a single word.

Ugly face, I had called him.

A man who owned half the coast, a man whose name was stamped on corporate towers and private shipping lines, and I had called him a scarred freak to his face.

"He's not going to call the police," I said out loud, my voice quiet in the dim room.

Kiki looked up from her tea. "How do you know?"

"A man like that doesn't call the police," I said, remembering the way his heavy hand had felt around my waist when he caught me before I hit the floor—solid, steady, and terrifyingly strong. "If he wanted us in jail, we would have been in handcuffs before we reached the bottom of the cliff trail. He let us go."

"That doesn't mean he's done with you," Kiki warned softly.

"I don't care if he's done or not," I replied, pulling the ice pack off my ankle and setting it on the table. I swung my legs off the sofa and stood up, testing my weight on my left foot. Pain shot up my calf, but I kept my spine straight, refusing to wince. "I'm done running. Tomorrow, I'm going back to the diner, I'm getting my old shifts back, and I'm going to start saving every single cent until I can afford my own deposit on an apartment."

"And your anti-handsome theory?" Kiki asked, a faint, skeptical smile touching her mouth. "You still looking for a rich, ugly man?"

I walked over to the small kitchen sink, turned on the tap, and washed the gray resort dirt off my hands under the cold running water.

"I don't need a theory," I said, looking at my reflection in the dark windowpane above the sink—pale skin, dark eyes, jaw set tight. "I just need ground under my feet."

I turned off the tap, dried my hands on a dish towel, and walked back to the sofa.

Neither of us knew that forty miles down the coast, inside a dark penthouse suite overlooking the Pacific Ocean, Dominic Montgomery was opening a five-page file with my name printed across the top line. And neither of us knew that in less than twelve hours, a black town car would pull up to the corner of 4th Street with a navy-blue leather folder that would change my life forever.