Page 16 of Kill Your Darlings

I stared down at the manuscript.

I needed to read the entire thing again, of course.Slowly.Thoroughly.I needed to understand how much U.N.Owen really knew.How much they’d gotten right.How much they’d gotten wrong.How much was guesswork?How much was genuine knowledge?

But abruptly I was all out of…everything.The merger, Finn, and now whatever the hell this was?Whatever emotional currency I’d had left was spent.I was down to pocket lint.I felt sick, shaken to my core.

I had a plan of action and, for now, that would have to do.

Stick to the plan.

In the meantime…

I carried the manuscript into the dark bedroom, stepped out onto the balcony, and shoved the binder down between the large stone urn and the smaller pot containing the little windmill palm.I’d spent enough time in hotel rooms to know that the staff doesn’t bother to water the plants while the room is booked.

For a moment, I stood there, hands braced on the iron railing, breathing in the cold sea air, gazing out at the scattered lights glittering beyond the black water, the stars glistening overhead.

“You’re fine,” I said, as I’d been telling myself for the last twenty-three years.

But for the first time in a very long while, I knew I was not.

Finn was a runner.

I was not.

At conferences, rain or shine, he’d be up at the crack of dawn, pounding the pavement for an hour or so while I headed to the hotel pool.

Which was how he knew where to find me on Thursday morning.In the rooftop pool on the horizon deck, working out all my nervous tension and alarm in the pleasantly heated water.

The rooftop pool wasn’t large, but it didn’t need to be.Sleek and slate-edged, it stretched like a lap of poured glass toward the far edge of the terrace, where the Pacific fell away into fog and sunrise.Low glass panels lined the perimeter, keeping the wind at bay without interrupting the view.

I had the entire deck to myself until Finn appeared.Even without my contacts in, I recognized the approaching blur in faded jeans and a black T-shirt.I knew his outline, tall and straight and confident.I knew his stride, easy and assured.Like there was nothing he wasn’t prepared for or couldn’t handle.It’s an underrated but very attractive quality: competency.

I didn’t think he was smiling until he reached the edge of the pool and gazed down at me.Then I saw the white curve of his smile in his tanned face.He was wearing sunglasses, although the morning was gray and cool and damp.

Late night drinking with the boys?Boy.Almost literally.

He said, “I thought I’d find you here.”

I smiled up at him.“And here I am.”

He hesitated, glanced behind himself, and sat down on the black mesh foot of the nearest lounge chair.“We missed you last night.”

I managed not to roll my eyes, but couldn’t help a dry, “Did you?”

I didn’t need glasses or contacts to feel the directness of his look.

“Keir—”

“No need.”I said lightly, “All good things come to an end, no?”

“Yes.”His tone was odd, almost self-mocking.“That’s exactly what I thought you’d say.”

I made a face.“I’m getting predictable in my old age.”

He moved his head in negation, polite and automatic.

With everything else going on, you’d think I wouldn’t have the nervous energy for anything but the latest and most pressing catastrophe, but you’d be wrong, because as I stared up at him, my mind was roiling.

But why?I don’t understand why now.Because, after the last time, I thought we were moving toward…