The thing is, his arm did feel good around me. It would be easy to let him kiss me, let him clean up the mess I’d made, and settle back in, all the loose ends tied up. Or is it tied down?

“Are you in love with me, Charles?” I asked.

“What kind of a question is that?”

“It’s kind of an important question, don’t you think?”

“That’s just silly. Why would you ask me that?”

“Still not really an answer.”

He tried to pull me closer, but I resisted.

“Of course I love you, Chloe,” he finally said, not meeting my eyes.

“But are you in love with me?” I pushed.

“Are you in love with me?” he asked quickly, now meeting my eyes. And for the first time in my entire history with this very golden boy, he looked . . . unsure.

“No. No, I don’t think I am,” I answered, my eyes stinging. Endings were never good, even when they needed to happen. I slipped out from under his arm and stood before him as he leaned on my car.

He ran his hands through his hair, scrubbed at his face, and when he looked at me again, he was in problem-solving mode. “You go back to your dad’s, relax a bit, get a good night’s sleep, and then let’s talk tomorrow, okay?”

“No, Charles, I don’t think that—”

“This is all happening too fast. We need to slow down a bit, look at the practicality of this, figure out the best course of action to move forward.”

“You’re not listening to me, Charles. This isn’t going to—” I started, and he talked over me again as he walked toward his own car.

“I’ll call you in the morning, or stop by. Yeah, I’ll stop by and we can go for a drive, talk some more.”

“I don’t want to talk more tomorrow. Not if you’re going to continue to—”

“Okay, see you in the morning,” he finished, getting into his car while I still stood there sputtering. He peeled out of the driveway, and I was left alone and frustrated.

“I can’t believe that just happened,” I said to myself, turning to get into my car. And as I did, I saw the curtains in the living room flutter. I waved to my mother—she knew she was caught.

I drove back to my dad’s, brought in my first suitcase, set it down in the living room, and told him, “I need to get the hell out of this town.”

He totally agreed with me. Which is why the next day I found myself driving up the coast, headed for Monterey.

Chapter three

Here’s why my dad is the best. Without badgering or hounding, he asked only enough questions to understand why I needed some space. And he came up with a wonderful solution right away.

My father’s family had a ranch in Monterey, up in the hills just outside of Carmel. Almost smack dab in the center of the California coast, it was like another world. I hadn’t spent much time there in recent years, but when my grandfather died the property went to my father and his sister. And when Aunt Patty passed away a few years after that, the ranch stayed with my father. My mother hated it up there, so over the years our visits became fewer and fewer. It was a beautiful property, but it hadn’t been renovated in years and was badly in need of an update. It had a very specific look to it, sort of a time capsule scenario. But for what I needed right now? It was going to be heaven.

And heaven was also currently in this car, which currently held me, my suitcases, a forty-eight-ounce Coke (not diet), and three fried cherry pies that I’d bought at a roadside stand.

As I sped north, away from the questions and the talking-to’s in San Diego, I was both excited and nervous. I’d never lived alone before. I hadn’t been to the ranch in probably five years, and Dad hadn’t been there in over two.

He had someone up there who kept an eye on it, people to come in and clean every so often, and a handyman who made the necessary repairs. Since no one had stayed there in quite some time, my dad had called in a crew to get it ready for me, and now I was moving in for as long as I wanted it. When my father offered it to me, I knew how lucky I was.

“You want to head up north to get some space, that’s fine with me, kiddo. I think it’ll be good for you to be alone for a while. Who knows, you might find you like it up there and want to stay.”

“I can hardly stay there forever. How adult would it be for me to just go from living in my mother’s house to living in my father’s vacation home?” I asked.

He laughed. “It’s not just my vacation home, it’s yours, too.”

“That’s sweet, Dad. I appreciate your letting me head up there for a bit,” I said as I went upstairs, thankful for the lifeline he was tossing me.

“The house is yours for however long you want it.”

“Pardon me?” I asked from the landing.

“Just keep it in mind.”

“I say again, pardon me?” I leaned down to peer through the banister at him.

“Pardon you nothing—take as much time as you need,” he said.

“You’re kind of amazing, you know that?”

“I do know that, actually,” he said, his eyes twinkling.

So while I had no real plans to stay up there very long, the idea that I could? If I wanted to? Options . . . kind of a good thing.

And options in a small, beautifully quiet town felt like exactly what I needed. I’d grown up on a stage. With dance competitions, modeling competitions, pageants almost every other weekend, I’d learned very early on that anything worth doing is worth doing in front of people.