I don’t go straight to the shop. Instead, I head across the plaza in the direction of my apartment to grab some lunch, pausing at the window of the café on the corner. I’ve got crusty bread and mozzarella at home, but those pastries behind the glass look divine.
“Valentina,” a voice calls from behind me. “Or are you going by something else now?”
Even out of context, Marcel’s voice doesn’t surprise me. I’ve been hearing it in my head for weeks. Every day I have at least one an imaginary conversation with him, and even now, as I turn around, I half expect to see nobody. But it’s him, sitting at a café table no more than ten feet away, that smirk on his face. Exactly the same.
“I wasn’t sure,” he says. “I thought you might be Jane again.”
“Not Jane.” I walk toward him, suddenly off balance, like the cobblestones are sinking in places. When I go to pull out the chair across from him, I can’t. It’s weighted by a large gray boot. A cast. Crutches lie at angles beneath the table.
He leans to the side and swings a chair from a neighboring table with his left arm. His right is in a sling and looks to be casted too, wrist to shoulder. He pushes the chair toward me. “Here.”
I sit. “You’re okay. I mean”—I glance at the mammoth medical boot—“you’re not okay, but you’re alive.”
“More or less. You thought I was dead?”
“You didn’t return my calls.”
He laughs, and he looks good. Happy. Strong. “A guy doesn’t return your calls, and you automatically assume he’s dead? That’s confidence.”
“I just . . . the last time I saw you, you weren’t exactly in good shape. I didn’t know how badly you were hurt. I didn’t know anything. Did you drive all the way back to Montreal?”
“I made it to Atlanta, then called my dad.”
“What did you tell him?”
“Some story about partying with friends and getting jumped outside a club. He flew me home from there.”
I swallow, wanting to ask him why he didn’t call back, but not wanting to bare my desperation. “You should have called to let me know you were okay.”
“I hardly remember those first couple of weeks. Two surgeries on that one.” He points to his left leg. “A cracked rib and collapsed lung. Dislocated shoulder. Fractured ulna.” He lifts the cast on his right arm. “I didn’t know Victor had been arrested until after I was out of the hospital, and by the time I was with it enough to get your messages, you weren’t picking up. By the way, your sister says to hurry up and get a cell phone here.”
“Lola told you how to find me.”
“Yeah,” he says.
“If I get a cell phone here, she’ll be able to call me whenever she wants.”
“So will I.”
I smile and it feels right, in the same way that Girona and the shop and Rosa all feel right. But dreaming and imagining someone is here puts a strange shadow on reality. Did I wish it true? His real face is clearer and brighter than in my imagination.
“Miss me?” he asks.
“Yes.”
“Good. I’d feel like an idiot if I came all this way and you didn’t want me here.”
“I want you here.”
He smiles. That feels right to me too.
“Your parents—I can’t believe they let you come,” I say.
“That’s only because you don’t know them. I have to be back in two weeks to get a walking cast. That’ll be on for eight weeks, at least, then physical therapy for a year or something ridiculous like that.”
“A year.” I stare at the row of toes peeking out of the end. He has nice toes. I’ve never really looked at them before, but now I’d kind of like to examine them.
“It wasn’t your garden-variety fracture,” he says.
“But do they expect you to make a full recovery?”
“Mostly. They think. The bones in my ankle were totally shattered, so I’ve got steel rods and stuff in there now. Don’t look so horrified—it’s not like I had a career as a professional runner ahead of me or anything. You should’ve seen me setting off alarms at airport security. They practically strip-searched me right there. Apparently, wearing two casts is the same as asking to have every body cavity thoroughly examined.”
I laugh.
“You’re too far away.” Before I can inch forward, he reaches out and pulls my chair toward him so our knees touch.
Being so close to him, so suddenly, it feels like the breath has been sucked out of me. I stare down at the cast on his leg. “Does it hurt?”
“Not anymore.”
“I’m sorry.”
“You didn’t do this,” he says gently. His hand drops to my leg, where cotton meets skin.
I shake my head. “I made you bring me to Miami, and I made you set fire to the yacht, and then my father—”
“Both of those were my idea, and you aren’t your father. Besides, being temporarily crippled has its perks.”
“Such as . . .”
“Hot nurses.”
I roll my eyes.
“Actually, my nurses were mostly old and hairy. Seriously, though, my injuries are the only reason my parents didn’t ship me off to military school.”
“You would not do well in military school.”
He snorts. “You’re telling me.”
“So instead of getting sent to military school, they let you come to Spain?”
“I told them you’d reform me.”
“In two weeks? Not possible.”
“I know.”
“But you can start by going to my apartment”—I pause to point at the tall, red building across the plaza—“and making me dinner while I work my shift at this shop right there.” I point to the yellow awning.
“I’ve already been to your apartment. Rosa is probably rifling through my suitcase right now.”
I narrow my eyes. “What makes you so sure I’ll let you stay with us?”
“Rosa already said I could,” he says. “And because you’re glad I’m here.”
He’s got me there. I am. I put my hand over his hand, and he turns it palm up, circling my wrist with his fingers.
The clock tower rings. I stand, pull my key out of my satchel, and give it to him. “I have to go to work.”
“You aren’t going to make me stand up to kiss you, are you?”
I blush. There’s no reason for the sudden shyness. It certainly isn’t the people wandering past in the plaza. This is Spain. Kissing is breathing.
I sit back down, close my eyes, and lean into Marcel’s lips. I’m right. Kissing Marcel is breathing. His hands move up my arms, pulling me close, and I’m suddenly sure of what’s happened to me. I’m free. I belong to myself. I’m Valentina.
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ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
[acknowledgments tk]
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ABOUT THE AUTHOR
JESSICA MARTINEZ lives in sunny Florida but loves writing about her icy Canadian roots. She graduated from Brigham Young University and is also the author of Virtuosity. Find out more at www.jessicamartinez.com and follow her on Twitter @jlmarti1.
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ALSO BY JESSICA MARTINEZ
The Vow
The Space Between Us
Virtuosity
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COPYRIGHT
Katherine Tegen Books is an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers.
KISS KILL VANISH. Copyright © 2014 by Jessica
Martinez. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.
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ISBN 978-0-06-227449-6
EPub Edition March 2014 ISBN 9780062340887
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