Page 113 of How to Walk Away

Everything about him felt solid and sturdy and like something I wanted to cling to. There he was, so close up, then closer—and then, impossibly, he lowered his mouth to mine.

Maybe he shouldn’t have done it. But oh, God, I was so unspeakably glad he did.

And there was his mouth again, the same but better, like something lost forever and then found again, and everything suddenly swirled too much for me to see anything at all. I sank into the warmth and comfort and electricity of that moment, knowing it couldn’t last long, but wishing it could go on forever.

Until the music suddenly stopped.

And the lights flipped on, bright as searchlights.

The room froze. The karaoke machine even went dead. We turned to figure out what was going on, and we both saw the same thing at the same time: Myles.

Myles had walked in.

He was halfway across the room, staring straight at us. “What the frick is going on here?”

“It’s a party,” Kit said, no idea who she was dealing with.

But Myles didn’t look over. “Did I just walk in here to see one of my PTskissingone of my patients?”

“You sure did,” Kit volunteered. “I just Instagrammed it!”

“Congratulations,” Myles said to Ian then. “You just got fired.”

The crowd gasped.

“Say good-bye to your job,” Myles went on, enjoying this moment far too much. “Say good-bye to your PT license. And I’ll have to brush up on my immigration law, but I’m pretty sure you can say good-bye to this entire country, as well.” Myles took a step closer and waved his fingers tauntingly at Ian. “Bye-bye, work visa.”

But Ian had turned away from him. He was looking at me now, running his gaze over my face, studying the details. I could tell from Ian’s expression that Myles wasn’t wrong. Ian had just lost his job, and possibly much more.

My knees chose that moment to start to quiver—though Iananticipated that, somehow, and he was already setting me back down in my chair. As he got me settled and moved to stand back up, he squeezed my hand, and it felt like good-bye.

“Do you think I’m fricking joking, man?” Myles walked closer. “Because I am dead serious. You just lost everything.”

Myles’s beady little face was red and sweaty, but Ian seemed to go the other way and get calmer and cooler.

Ian turned to face him. “Actually,” he said, “I know what it’s like to lose everything—and getting sabotaged by a weasel like you doesn’t even come close.”

“You sabotaged yourself, friend.”

Ian seemed to consider that. “Maybe I did.” Then he looked up. “But don’t call me friend.”

“Who is this guy?” Kit asked the room. Then, to Myles, “It’s a Valentine’s party. Chill the hell out, dude. Have a cookie.”

Myles looked over and noticed her for the first time. “It’s not even Valentine’s Day.”

“Why is everybody so fixated on that?”

“Ian—” I started.

But Ian had not even turned his head before Myles barked, “Do not approach the patient!”

Ian gave him a look, like,Really? “I’m just going to walk her back to her room.”

“You arenot,” Myles declared, crossing over to us. “Take one step toward her and I will throw you out of this building.”

Ian turned to face him dead-on, and at this range we could all see that Ian was a good head taller. “You and what army, you bawfaced prick?”

At that, Myles decided to throw a punch. But Ian somehow blocked it, and then he grabbed Myles’s two wrists to hold them still in the air. “You don’t want to do that,” Ian said calmly. “I’d hate to kill you by accident. For my sake more than yours.”

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