“Hold the elevator, please!”

I waved a hand and called out as I dashed down the hall, trying to text Serena at the same time. On my way. I’ll meet you inside? I sent to her, just managing to squeeze into the elevator at the last second. I was meeting her for brunch downtown to talk about how her latest audition went.

“Thanks,” I said to the maid who’d held the door for me. She was one of the new girls who’d just started here yesterday—Bianca.

“Cute shoes,” she remarked. “Valentino Rockstuds?”

I nodded and smiled. “Yeah. They send them to me sometimes to help promo them.”

I saw a slight glint of envy flash in her eyes, and I didn’t miss the way she pursed her lips ever so slightly. “That’s cool,” she said with a brisk nod.

I immediately felt terrible. I hadn’t meant it that way, but it almost sounded as if I was bragging about all the free stuff I got courtesy of my status in society.

“Hey, we look like we’re about the same size,” I said hastily. “You should come by my suite one day. I always get sent way too many shoes. You could totally borrow some.”

The look in her eyes was replaced by surprise. Then she smiled. “Wow, thanks. That’d actually be really cool.”

“Awesome. I’ll come find you another time? I’m just about to have brunch with a friend.”

She nodded. “Sure. See you later.”

The doors pinged and opened, and I gave her a wave as we stepped out to the lobby and went off in separate directions. I was halfway across it on my way to the main doors when Serena replied to my text. I’m sooo sorry! I just got a call-back and they want me to go in now. So I have to cancel brunch. Please don’t be mad – it’s a huge movie! I promise I’ll make it up to you. Xox.

I smiled and shot back a quick text saying it was fine, and then I turned to head back upstairs. I guess brunch today would have to be room service in my suite.

I was halfway back to the elevators when a voice stopped me in my tracks.

“Peyton Cadwell?”

I turned to see two well-dressed middle-aged men standing there looking at me. “Yes, that’s me,” I said, my brows scrunched together in confusion. “Can I help you gentlemen with something?”

The one who’d spoken nodded. “Yes, you can,” he said, pulling out a police badge. “I’m Detective Ramirez, and this is my partner, Detective Williams. Are your parents here?”

My mouth dried up. Shit. Had Mom and Dad done something wrong?

Ramirez seemed to detect my nervousness, because his face softened. “We just need to have a chat with them,” he said gently.

I nodded, my hands trembling slightly. He said it was just a chat, but I was still nervous about what exactly that chat might entail. “Dad’s in his office, and I think Mom is probably with him. I’ll take you there.”

I escorted them to the office in silence, my heart thumping. Finally we arrived at Dad’s door, and I knocked before opening it. Mom and Dad were in there, looking over some paperwork with the hotel’s head of accounting, Robert Silver, and one of the senior accountants, Callum Houston.

They all looked up in surprise at the sudden interruption.

“These two men are detectives,” I said, motioning to Ramirez and Williams, who were standing behind me. “They want to talk to you.”

Mom’s hazel eyes widened and her gaze flitted over to Dad. Robert and Callum quickly made themselves scarce, taking all the papers with them.

Dad looked pointedly at me and rolled his eyes. “If this is about her underage drinking, then you’re a little late.”

Ramirez’s lips turned up at the corners in a vaguely amused expression at that, and then he gestured to the chairs in front of us. “Mind if we sit?”

“Go ahead.”

He introduced himself and his partner again, and I made my way to the door to quietly slip out. Williams glanced over his shoulder at me. “Peyton, you should probably stay,” he said. Ramirez nodded to confirm this.

“Am I in trouble?” I said anxiously, twisting my hands in my lap as I took a seat as well.

“No. No one’s in any trouble.”

Mom breathed an audible sigh of relief. “What is this about, then?”

“Yesterday a new staff member here fainted and was taken to a local hospital. A young woman by the name of DeeDee Brown.”

Dad frowned. “That’s right. Christ, she isn’t suing us, is she?”

Ramirez shook his head. “No. Like I said, no one is in any trouble. This is actually a very strange situation. I’m not even quite sure where to begin.” He rubbed his chin, glanced at his partner, then went on. “The doctors initially diagnosed her as suffering from anxiety brought on from the stress of starting a new job. But it soon became clear to them that something else was going on. They thought she may have some mental issues after hearing things she said during her second major panic attack, and they called in a psychiatrist.”

“What was she saying?” Mom asked, her hand fluttering nervously to her throat.

“Apparently she kept claiming that she’d been here before. To the Mirabella. She said that she’d once lived here, when she was very young. And she claimed she knew you, Mrs. Cadwell, only you didn’t seem to remember her.”

Mom frowned with confusion, but Dad’s eyes widened, and he leaned back in his chair, his face turning pale. He could obviously tell where this was going already.

“Like I said, the ER doctors thought she was suffering from a mental problem, but when they called the psychiatrist in, he asked for all the details of the case. When he heard what she’d been saying, he remembered something. He recalled that the owners of the Mirabella—you two—lost a daughter fifteen years ago. She went missing and was never found. Is that correct?”

Mom swallowed thickly. “Yes. Allegra.”

“We have reason to suspect that DeeDee Brown might in fact be Allegra.”

My eyebrows shot up. “What?”

Ramirez held up a hand. “Obviously we aren’t sure, so we’ll need to collect some information and DNA samples from you. But here’s what we know so far. DeeDee Brown grew up in Kentucky. It seems she was raised in a series of foster homes. She was abandoned on the edge of a road when she was around five years old, and that’s how she ended up in the foster care system. No one has ever been sure who her parents are or what her true birthdate is. She was named by the first family who took her in, because at the time, the girl refused to speak, let alone tell anyone what her name was.”

“Why do you think she could be Allegra?” Dad asked, his face even whiter now.

“Your daughter was never found despite a nationwide search, which was called off after six months. We think it could be possible that the kidnappers gave up on trying to get a ransom, because they began to worry about getting caught. But they couldn’t kill or abandon Allegra anywhere at the time either, because that might also get them caught. So we think they might’ve kept her somewhere for a year, in a faraway state like Kentucky. And when enough time had passed and most people had given up on the search and no longer had Allegra’s name and face in mind, they finally ditched her on the edge of a road. It would make a horrible kind of sense—DeeDee was slightly malnourished when she was found, and the fact that she wouldn’t speak for quite some time suggested some sort of trauma. That could’ve been because she was kept by kidnappers who had no idea how to take care of a child.”

I turned my eyes away from the detectives as the full horror of the situation began to sink in. If that girl was really my sister, then that meant I’d grown up being pampered in the lap of luxury while my flesh and blood was kidnapped, mistreated, and then shunted from home to home, always feeling alone and abandoned.

It was too awful to even imagine.

A sudden bout of nausea hit me, and I tried to take a deep breath to rid myself of the feeling. It was hard, though. It felt like the walls were caving in on me, and I could barely pull any air into my lungs.

“So when she met us yesterday… she recognized me as her mother?” Mom said, her eyes wide. “And that’s what set off the panic attacks?”

Ramirez nodded. “Sort of. It seems that she’d been experiencing little flashes of déjà-vu all morning, just from being in the hotel, and meeting you made her have a much bigger flashback. It looked like a panic attack, when really it was something else.”

Dad shook his head and rubbed his jawline. “My god….”

I spoke up haltingly. “I don’t understand something. If she’s Allegra, why didn’t she say anything while she was growing up in these foster homes? Why didn’t she go to an adult and tell them who she was?”

“Ms. Cadwell, you must remember your sister was only three when she was taken. Memories from that age can easily be forgotten or pushed deep down, especially when coupled with the trauma of a kidnapping and being held for over a year. If this girl is Allegra, it’s possible that she genuinely forgot everything about her early childhood. It was only when she saw it all again that the repressed memories began to flood back. At least that’s what the doctors have told us.”

“Oh,” I said softly, casting my eyes downward.

“It could really be her…oh my god....” Mom suddenly burst into tears, and Dad slid his arm around her, his jaw set in a stoic manner.

“We don’t want to get your hopes up too much just yet,” the detective said gently. “Sometimes people claim to be someone they’re not, if they think it will fetch them attention or money. So I’ll need the two of you to accompany me down to the hospital for the doctors to take swabs from your cheeks. They can be sent off to the lab to compare the DNA with the sample they took from Miss Brown.”

Mom sniffed, wiped her cheeks, and looked at him. “Yes, okay.”

“What about me?” I asked. “Do I need to give a sample?”

Ramirez shook his head and gave me a kind smile. “No. We only need your parents’ samples in order to prove whether there’s a familial match.” He turned his attention back to Mom and Dad. “If you’d like to go now, we can give you a ride. I’m sure you’d like this done as soon as possible.”

“Of course,” Dad said. He turned to me. It looked like he was about to say something, but then he shook his head and sighed. “We’ll be back soon, Peyton,” he finally said instead.

After they left, I stood up and went over to the other side of Dad’s desk. Then I stayed stock-still for a moment, staring at the old family portrait on the office wall. Hearing about this had well and truly dredged up all the old memories, and I couldn’t help but reach out to trace the outline of Allegra’s hair on the framed picture.

All this guilt I’d felt for so many years… all the times I wished I wasn’t sick that day she was snatched… it suddenly bubbled up from deep within me, and with faltering steps I finally turned and left the room as well, my grief and regret pouring out of me in heavy, racking sobs.

In my hysterical state, I didn’t even realize that I wasn’t the only person in the hall, and I ran smack-bang into another person.

I looked up to see that it was Cade.

“Shit. I… I’m sorry,” I said, my face flushing as I pulled back. “You always seem to be everywhere I go.”

He frowned, clearly noticing the tears on my cheeks and my reddened eyes. “Peyton, what’s wrong?” he asked.

I sniffed. “It doesn’t matter,” I said, wiping my cheeks. I hurriedly thought of a way to turn the subject away from me. “What are you even doing here? This wing is for all the hotel staff offices.”

He rubbed his nose. “Er… I was meant to collect a guest’s luggage. Elderly guy who’s staying on the ground floor.”

“Well, you’re in the wrong hall. The ground floor guest rooms are on the other side of the building. East wing.”

He shrugged. “It’s only my second day. Guess I got turned around.” His eyebrows pinched together. “Seriously, what’s wrong? You don’t look happy. Was your dad being a dick again?”

I let out a deep sigh. With all the stress of my current circumstances, I’d almost forgotten how we talked yesterday in the hospital. “No, he wasn’t. But don’t worry, I won’t bother you with this. You’re working.”

“Hey, now. It’s fine. No bother at all. We can talk; get it all off your chest. Just like yesterday. Matthew can take care of the old guy’s cases. I’ll just say I got the runs and had to vanish to the bathroom for fifteen minutes.”

I almost smiled at that. He was right. It would probably do me some good to talk about my inner turmoil, and telling someone who was still essentially a stranger might be cathartic. After all, it certainly seemed to help yesterday—he’d made me feel much better just by listening and saying a few choice words.

It was a bit like therapy, only my therapist was free, hot, and dressed in a bellboy uniform that only he could make appear sexy.

“I guess I could do with some company right now,” I said softly.

He nodded. “Let’s get out of this hallway first.”

I led him through the halls and found a ground-floor room which I knew was vacant. I used my keycard to open the door, and then I sat down on the bed with a heavy sigh. Cade followed, and the wonderful musky scent of his cologne filled my nostrils as he sat next to me. “So what’s going on?” he asked.

I outlined everything that’d just gone down in Dad’s office, and he listened, nodding here and there. I wasn’t sure why, but I felt like I could trust this man with anything, even though I barely knew him.

When I’d finished telling him everything, he pressed his lips into a thin line before finally speaking. “Do you think it’s actually her?” he asked.

My eyes widened slightly. He was so direct. He’d asked the one question that I’d been trying to push aside for the last few minutes.

“I don’t know,” I admitted. “I really don’t know. I always thought if I ever saw her again, I’d just know. And when I met her yesterday, I didn’t feel anything like that. She was just a stranger. And I feel so bad about it. So guilty.”

We sat in silence for a moment, and then Cade rubbed his chin. “I think all you can do right now is wait for the DNA results to come back. How long does that take?”

“A few days.”

“There’s no point torturing yourself until you know for sure,” he said gently.

“I know, but I still feel awful. Even if DeeDee isn’t my sister, then the real Allegra could still be out there somewhere, right? I mean, I know she’s been declared legally dead, but still. She might not be. Or maybe she is. I just feel like either way, it’s my….”

My voice trailed off, and I looked down at my lap as all sorts of horrors filled my mind—the same horrors that’d plagued me from time to time over the last decade and a half, in the dead of night when there was nothing else to distract from my memories.

Cade leaned closer. “I understand that this is bringing up all your old memories and guilt, but it’s not your fault. This world is filled with shitty people who do shitty things. Whoever took Allegra fifteen years ago… it’s their fault. Whatever happened to her is because of them.”

I nodded slowly. “You’re right. I just wish it was easier to convince myself of that.”

“Maybe hearing it from someone else will help with that,” he said. “And I’m telling you, Peyton—it’s not your fault. It was never your fault.”

He said this while firmly grasping my right hand, and my breath caught in my throat at his touch. It was powerful. Electric. Magical.

“Thank you,” I managed to get out, my voice barely above a murmur. “You know, this is the second time you’ve been here for me, and you don’t even know me. I owe you.”

I dared a glance at him, and he smiled. His hand was still on mine, and I was all too aware of that. “You don’t owe me anything. I like talking to you. And I kinda feel like I do know you, at least a little bit, after the things you’ve told me,” he said.

“Well, thank you anyway. I appreciate it.”

“Happy to help,” he replied. He slowly pulled his hand away from mine and let it rest on my arm, and goosebumps rippled across my skin in the wake of his touch.

When I first ran into Cade—quite literally—I never thought we’d end up like this, with me pouring my heart out to him in a vacant room. Especially so soon. Things like that rarely happened for me these days. Usually when I met new people, they wanted something from me to further their own agendas. They didn’t want to hear my problems or let me lean on them for support. They just wanted to take, take, take.

But all Cade had done in the short time I’d known him was give. He’d given me a friendly ear and a shoulder to cry on. He’d also given me support and advice. Good advice.

He was different.

I looked up at him again, almost losing myself in the ocean-blue of his eyes. He leaned even closer, and for one heated moment, I thought he might kiss me; take away all my pain with his lips. But then a keycard swiped in the door, and it swung open.

It was Bianca.

“Oh, sorry!” she said, standing at the threshold with wide eyes. “I was sent to clean the vacant rooms on this floor. I had no idea you two were in here.”

She could clearly see how close Cade and I were to each other, and I didn’t want her to get the wrong idea and report Cade for anything. After all, he was meant to be working, not sitting alone in a room with me with his hand on my arm and his mouth only inches from mine.

I sprang to my feet. “Bianca, I was actually just looking for you,” I said hastily. Looking for you in Cade’s mouth, apparently, I silently added. “I was asking Cade if he knew where you were. My brunch date got canceled, so I thought we could go up to my suite and look at shoes like we talked about earlier.”

Bianca’s face brightened. “Yeah, sure. I’m due for a break in half an hour, if you can wait a bit?”

“Sure thing.”

I could tell she didn’t entirely buy what I said (because why would I drag Cade into a vacant room just to ask him a question about where someone was?) but she seemed satisfied anyway, and I was glad. She seemed like a cool person.

Cade was on his feet now as well, and he nodded briskly at us before stepping toward the door. “Glad you finally found her, Peyton,” he said with a wink. I flashed him a grateful smile, and he nodded. “See you later, ladies.”

And then he was gone.