The summer sun is still in the sky as I walk up from the subway to the exit two blocks from my midtown Manhattan apartment. It’s been almost six hours since I stormed out and left the Steele family mansion in the Hamptons.

And I don’t regret a single minute.

Sure, it took me close to three times longer than it would’ve if I’d borrow Mom’s car, but I’m glad I found my own way back. It would’ve been a bit less time if I’d taken a minute to plan my route. After I bummed a ride with that catering driver to the Hamptons Jitney bus, I got to the bus stop five minutes after the scheduled departure time. And as it’s a holiday weekend, the westbound buses aren’t leaving as often. I used the hour and a half of waiting time to find a public restroom, change out of the clothes that I’d slept in, wash my face, brush my teeth, and get my anger back in check. Because it was the westbound bus, it was half empty. I was able to close my eyes and stretch out for the entire ride home. I could’ve walked from Seventy-Ninth Street and Broadway, but with my not too modern suitcase—the kind you still have to angle toward you to roll—I opted against a thirty-block trek on foot and took the subway instead.

As my building comes into view in the distance, I reach a hand into my oversized bag to fish out my keys. I left the Hamptons in such a hurry that there are loose pieces of clothing and a few bathroom items stuffed inside. Tilting my suitcase to stand on its own, I stoop to the ground, moving items aside as I search. But my keys aren’t in here.

Shit. I pull out each piece of clothes and shake it out over the pavement, hoping the keys will fall out of one of them. That doesn’t happen, so I hang the material over my shoulder and try the next one. And the next. By now, I’m hungry as ever and hot from the heat radiating up from the sidewalk after such a hot day. I wipe my brow with one of the pieces of clothes hanging on my shoulder and swear under my breath. Maybe it’s in the suitcase?

I stand again and look at my suitcase, fingers on my temple, shaking my head. I’m going to have to unzip it and search through everything inside. Right here out on the public road. I hope to God that there’s no media people or the paps lurking around, because the next headline might read, Political Royalty Down and Out after Rubbing Shoulders with the Hamptons One Percenters.

Stuffing the things on my shoulder back into my bag, I try to think of where I can do this indoors. There’s a specialty coffee shop with a public restroom about four blocks from here. I can also take a chance and see if anyone is entering or leaving my building and will at least let me into the foyer.

Deciding to take the risk, I keep walking toward my building.

Then I freeze.

He’s here.

Dammit.

Knox is sitting out on the front steps with a broad, cocky look on his smug face. He stands and lifts my house keys, and dangles it between his thumb and index finger.

“Looking for these?” he asks, smirking like the arrogant bastard that he is.

“I kind of hate you right now.” I try to grab it from between his fingers but he wraps his damn big hand around mine, covering it and the keys inside, and trapping me. I crane my neck up to him. I want to slap that know-it-all look right off his face. “How did you get those?”

“No, the right response is, Thank you so much for not holding it against me that I ran off with some random guy in a catering van! I’m so happy you drove back from the Hamptons to bring me my keys, Knox!” he says, annoying me even more as he mimics my voice in falsetto.

“Shut up.”

“You left them in my car, pretty girl.”

“Oh. Shit.” I press my lips into a thin line. The last thing I want to do is stop being mad at him. Thanking him is right there on the list too. So is smiling, but a part of me is feeling somewhat flattered that he drove all this way for me. “Wait, why didn’t you just text me and let me know you found these?”

“Then I wouldn’t be standing here to see the look on your face right now,” he says, grinning. “Admit it. You had all that time to think, and you know you were wrong.”

“Um, nope… but thank you for driving all that way so I wouldn’t end up sleeping at a shelter or something.”

His face tenses and he lets go of my hand and the keys. “You’re welcome. Happy Fourth of July,” he says in a stiff, serious tone, and walks toward his car parked a few vehicles away.

I didn’t expect him to give up so easily. I also didn’t think my heart would feel like the bottom dropped out when he clicks his car remote and pulls the driver side door open.

“You don’t need to leave right away,” I shout.

He looks at me, one foot inside the car, his hand on the top of his door. “Do you still believe I lured you to the Hamptons just to fall in line with my grandfather or not?”

“I…well…”

“Bye Belle,” he grunts out and jumps into the car, slamming his door.

I hurry up the street and press my palms onto the passenger side window to get his attention. “Wait!”

He rolls down the window. “What?”

“Okay I apologize.”

“Do you believe it or not?”

“You said it was true, Knox. What am I supposed to think?”

His jaw ticks, and the vein at his temple is pronounced, pounding hard. “You’re supposed to trust your gut, and if you can’t do that, you’re supposed to trust me. Trust us.”

“I did! I trusted us. I believed in us. So hard. But you let ten years pass, Knox. That broke me. All that time, I didn’t know what to think.”

“No one can turn back time. I can’t change what I did.”

I pound against the spot over my heart. “But you’re asking me to change the broken pieces left in here. The pieces that never healed.”

“I don’t know… I’m sorry you feel that way. Look, I’ve got to get back to my grandfather now. He doesn’t have much time.”

“What?”

“You would’ve found out if you stuck around as planned. He’s terminal. We maybe have a few months with him. So, if you’re intent on believing I only took you there to follow his wishes or whatever, at least understand it was for a good reason. Even if it isn’t at all why.”

“I’m…I didn’t know…”

“I have to go now,” he mutters, and presses the button to roll up my window. His hand covers the gear shift, and without a parting glance, he drives away.

Shit.

What did I just do?