Page 5 of Meet Me in Paris

He lowered his voice even more. “This is because Claudia got chosen for partner over you, isn’t it?”

Claudia, the bombshell-gorgeous Brazilian woman down the hall. Rumor said my boss, Kevin, had harbored a secret crush on her for years.

“Claudia deserved that promotion,” I told him honestly. “She’s worked hard.” And thankfully, she kept our boss in his place. Good for her. “Joseph, I promise it has nothing to do with anything you’ve heard. It’s just time to go.”

“Time to go where, exactly? Did you get a better offer at another agency?” His eager expression froze when he turned to find my sister standing there, looking impatient. “Why, hello. And you are?”

“Jillian, Kennedy’s sister,” she said, holding out a hand.

Joseph clasped it and shook it so vigorously, her teeth probably chattered. “How very nice to meet you, Jillian.”

The sound of my little sister’s name on his tongue made me want to puke. “And I’m ready to go. We have a plane to catch, so if you’ll excuse us . . . ”

“A plane!” Joseph clapped his hands together. “You found a job far from this icky little town. Good for you. Where are you going?”

I grabbed my sister’s hand as she opened her mouth to answer. I refused to give Joseph the gossip he wanted, especially if it threatened our inheritance. He and my coworkers could stew over it all they wanted. “We’re going on a family vacation before I settle into my new job.” The job of finding somewhere to live that wasn’t here, that is, surrounded by memories of those who’d left me behind.

I sent him a wave, turned, and headed for the doors that meant my freedom. Jillian’s footsteps behind me meant she followed close behind, completely unaware that turning my back on this part of my life meant more than she could possibly know.

In saying goodbye to the travel agency, I said goodbye to a life that centered around providing for my little sister. Goodbye to the tiny farmhouse with more ghosts than people. Goodbye to the house next door, with its bird poop-encrusted windowsills and potato gun damage to the bricks and an empty bedroom where my best friend had once lived. Goodbye to the woman I’d been my entire life. Hello to a future full of possibility rather than the tiny prison where I’d watched my mother die.

We emerged into the sunlight and strode toward the car. I didn’t look back. Grandfather had retrieved my dreams from the darkest, furthest recesses of my soul and dumpedthem in my lap. Four years of booking dream vacations for clients, and today, I would finally board the plane myself.

Only one problem remained, and it made my heart pound like nothing else.

Hunter still lived in Paris . . . and he was the last person I wanted to see.

I quickly changed my clothes,then carefully picked my way across the bedroom, trying to avoid any rogue pieces of glass embedded in the carpet. I hurried downstairs, grateful Mom still slept. Thank goodness for my room’s location above the kitchen.

Upon reaching the bottom of the stairs, I grabbed a pad of sticky notes and a pen from the entryway desk. I didn’t dare turn on any lights, and my phone was still dead, so I tilted the pad toward the moonlight streaming through the window and scribbled a quick note in case Mom did wake up and find me gone.

“What are you doing?”

I whirled with a squeak to find Jillian standing there, arms folded. She wore a dark tank top and light-gray shorts that almost glowed in the shadows.

“I, um,” I began, not sure how to explain this to my thirteen-year-old sister. I should have known the glass would wake Jillian. Sometimes I wondered if she ever slept, considering she scrolled social media all hours of the night.

“Let me guess,” Jillian said. “You tried to sneak out your window but broke it, so now you’re using the front door.”

“Every word of that was wrong.” I was too dignified tosneak out a window and climb down a tree, and I intended to sneak out the back door, not the front. “Go back to bed.”

“You don’t want me to do that.”

I groaned inwardly. Would she wake Mom? “Jillie . . .”

“If I go back to bed, you’ll trigger the alarm system on the doors and wake Mom up. Then she’ll make me help you clean up all that glass, which, by the way, I’m not doing. But Iwilldisable the alarm if you ask nicely.”

Ask nicelymeant her services required the right bribe. Sometimes she scared me with how smart she was. “You do this often, don’t you?”

“Only when I can’t sleep. I go into the yard sometimes and look at the stars.”

My sister looked exhausted enough that I believed her. She did have a history of insomnia. “I’m sorry for waking you. Hunter promised to clean up all the glass and replace the window.”

“He better. Don’t worry, I was still awake. I couldn’t fall asleep with everything . . .” She waved as if gesturing to the entire room.

I didn’t get it. “Everything what?”

“You graduating, going to Europe with Mom for your senior trip. Me having to go live with Grandpa for nine days while you’re gone.” She sighed. “He’s so clueless when it comes to fashion, I don’t know what to say.”

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