Maybe it was time to phone a friend.
Holly was slumped over in her stool at the bar in the lobby of a hotel. The fifth hotel she’d been to that day, to be exact. Jet lagged and exhausted from trekking all over the city, she was ready to call it quits.
Maybe tomorrow she’d call her mom and ask her to find out where Benjamin and his IT buddies were hiding out. The thought of explaining herself to her mother was not at all appealing. Maybe she would call around to some other hotels tonight. Her sluggish brain refused to even contemplate next steps without a glass of wine in her hand.
Flagging down the bartender at the other end of the bar, she opted for choice number three—declare temporary defeat and enjoy the best city in the world while she could. After all, once she and Benjamin started a family she couldn’t traipse off across the world on a whim anymore.
Pushing aside a sudden tightness in her chest, Holly reminded herself that having a family would be worth the sacrifice.
She longed for a husband and a family and the white picket fence. She just hadn’t realized it until a year ago—until the miscarriage. It took having a family and losing it to make her see what was important in life.
The father had been another casual fling—one in a long line of infatuations and exciting, passionate romances that ultimately led nowhere. Before she could say “baby” he was out the door and out of her life with no more than a “ciao, babe.”
The miscarriage had hit her hard. Harder than she would have expected. She’d freaked when the strip turned blue but there had been excitement there alongside fear. She hadn’t realized how attached she’d gotten until it was gone.
She’d cried for weeks.
And then she’d booked a flight home. Back to her family, her hometown, and her first love—Benjamin. He was the obvious choice. If she was going to settle down, why not be with her best friend—a man who was stable and reliable and responsible and…basically, everything she was not. He would make an amazing father someday. The now-familiar mental image of Benjamin standing at her side as they gazed in adoration at their little bundle of joy was enough to make her heart squeeze painfully.
Yes, it would all be worth it once she had her family.
The waiter poured her a glass of red and she swirled it for a moment before raising it in salute. “Goodbye adventures, I’ll miss you most of all.”
Surrounded by happy couples and loudly chatting friends, Holly scrounged in her bag for something to read. She was sure her e-reader was hiding somewhere in the depths of her oversized purse—her Mary Poppins bag, as Benjamin liked to call it. Her fingers curled around a magazine and she pulled it out with a sigh.
It was that damn magazine with her stupid picture in it. She’d picked up a copy at the airport, despite her best intentions to ignore it on the stands. She couldn’t help taking one more look. And then another once she was on the plane. And now it was there in her hands and she found her traitorous fingers flipping it open to page thirteen.
It wasn’t because she wanted another glimpse of Jack, she told herself. Of course not. She just wanted to see it one more time with an objective eye; maybe it would help her figure out what to say to Benjamin once he saw it. Holly sighed; she had resigned herself to the fact that it was only a matter of time before he did.
If she found him quickly enough she planned on being the one to tell him so she could make sure he didn’t read anything into it.
Her heart skipped a beat as the pages fell open to the incriminating photo. She took a sip of wine to wet her suddenly dry mouth and forced herself to study the picture—she had to get over this ridiculous infatuation. And that’s what it was. It was just a harmless crush. Or at least it had been harmless when he was just tabloid eye candy and she was just another tabloid junkie.
But then he’d gone and become a real person. He’d come crashing into her sister’s life and then hers. She took another, larger gulp of wine as she studied the picture. She couldn’t believe this was happening again.
Few people knew the real story of how Jack came to know the Sinclair sisters and that’s the way they had to keep it. If anyone discovered the truth…well, no one looked good in the harsh light of the truth.
It had all started with an incriminating photo of Jack and Ivy that made it look like Jack was proposing. Taken totally out of context, of course, as the two had practically been strangers at the time. The photo became a tabloid sensation and everyone got the wrong impression.
Ivy was coerced into playing the part of Jack’s fiancée in order to save a business deal with Brunelli but when Ivy fell in love with Jack’s best friend, Daniel, the fake engagement came to an abrupt end, and Jack was cast as the rejected, heartbroken lover.
Until now.
There beneath the photo on page thirteen, the caption read: “Jack Everett shows he’s the bigger man by coming out to support the union of his ex-fiancée and his business partner at their wedding in Italy last month. Perhaps his ability to forgive and forget is thanks to the beautiful blonde who sources say never left his side.”
Holly drained the rest of her glass.
The wine was delicious and went directly to her head, enveloping her in a lovely warmth from her head down to her toes and taking the harsh edge off of her jangled nerves. She slipped the magazine back into her purse. That was a problem for another day. For tonight, she was going to enjoy herself.
She was in no rush to get back to her hostel, where she was sharing a room with three loud, college-age Polish girls who didn’t speak a word of English. One glass of wine led to two and then a lovely elderly gentleman offered to buy her a round and really, who was she to refuse a sweet old man?
It was in a state of giddy, lovely tipsiness that she sauntered back into her hostel. The ground floor had a bar area that was popular with expats—a sort of backpackers’ United Nations. She’d spent a lot of time at that bar the last time she’d stayed. Her boyfriend-of-the-hour, Lyon, had worked at a nightclub nearby and he’d meet her there for drinks before, during, and after his shift. Holly hesitated for a moment. But no, that was years ago, there was no way Lyon still haunted this bar.
She headed toward the bar area. Had it always smelled so strongly of smoke? Probably. Ooh, but that pool table was new. A group of young men were standing around it. Almost all looked to be too young for her. They had the straight-out-of-college look going on with their backward-facing baseball caps and faded T-shirts. For a brief moment, Holly had a stab of longing to be back in her early twenties; footloose and carefree. Back then she would take off to a new destination on a whim, never worrying about those pesky grownup things like health insurance or pension plans or declining fertility rates.
Granted, this trip to Paris had been a whim. But that was different. She was on a mission.
She sauntered over to the pack of English speaking young’uns and caught enough of the conversation to know that they were betting on the next game. One of the boys closest to her threw out a number that made her jaw drop.
No college grad had that kind of money unless they were tapping into a trust fund. Unless… She wandered closer to the group to get a better look. Yup. They were techies, the early twentysomethings who could be found in droves in Silicon Valley and who tended to travel together in packs. The famous website logos on their faded T-shirts were far better marketing than business cards. Whoever the poor sucker they were gambling against, he was in over his head.
The poor sucker was currently out of eyesight but a shockingly familiar voice said, “Bring it on, boys. Double or nothing.”
Holly’s saunter turned into a stumble. It sounded like—but no, it couldn’t be. But it really sounded exactly like—
A cheer went up from the group of boys and several of the boys started chanting their new hero’s name. “Jack, Jack, Jack….”
A wave of dizziness struck her as she froze in