The Man Behind the Scars. CAITLIN CREWS

him. And in any case, it was only Tuesday morning now. Monday was a long way away. It was going to be difficult, she thought, to have a savior in hand yet still out of reach. To be still smack in the middle of her life, with her problems, while the new and far better, far easier life dangled just beyond her fingertips.

      She might very well go mad.

      “You seem remarkably adept at leaving extraordinarily long voice-mail messages,” he replied silkily, and she felt it like the sharp reprimand it was. “I imagine you will have no trouble whatsoever leaving more if you feel it necessary.”

      She stood there near the front window of her flat, the phone in her hand, for a long time after he ended the call. She stared out toward the street, her heart beating hard and too fast, seeing nothing at all but the future she’d conjured up out of sheer bloody-mindedness, pure shamelessness … and her big mouth.

      Maybe she’d taken this whole make-your-own-fairy-tale thing a bit too far.

      She imagined that was a common enough reaction when you suddenly found yourself in an actual palace, stepsister to a real, live Cinderella. And when faced with Allegra’s happily ever after, complete with an island kingdom and a handsome Prince Charming, it was perhaps understandable that Angel had conjured up fantasies of modern-day princes who would dance off into bliss and happiness with a common girl like her, all choirs of tweeting budgies and swelling, rapturous soundtracks. But that was the shiny, happy Disney version, wasn’t it?