she’d have to get out and face strangers who might recognize her and be familiar with the scandal surrounding her. Even with Dallas beside her for moral support, even with Santa Barbara seeming quite removed from LA and her relationship with Ethan, she felt the jagged edge of anxiety drag through her, tearing at her confidence. She wished they could return to New Horizons Boys Ranch immediately, so she could retreat inside Aiyana’s home. She was safe there. No one could find her—other than Aiyana and Aiyana’s immediate circle, of course.
“I don’t know...” She stared out at the people scurrying past the bronze dolphins cavorting in the middle of the walkway between two rows of shops.
The weather was far better than they’d anticipated. Although it had been raining when they left, the sun had come out since. It was turning into a beautiful day. She could wear a coat, but she might look odd pulling up the hood like she wanted to do.
“You don’t care what these people think,” Dallas said.
She glanced at him. “That’s easy for you to say. You’ve never been embarrassed this deeply.”
“How bad could that video be?” he asked. “Maybe I should watch it so that I can understand.”
Her gaze had drifted right back to the window. At this, she whipped her head around to look at him again. “No!” she said desperately. “I’ll get out.”
She heard him chuckle and knew his comment had been a ploy to pry her from the van, but the more she got to know him—and the more she liked him—the more mortified she became at the thought that he might see what so many already had. It was becoming progressively more important to her that he never see that video.
Her knees threatened to buckle when she landed on her feet, but she managed to stay upright and move out of the way of the door so she could close it.
“Where should we go first?” he asked, coming around the van.
She studied the shops as though she were about to face a firing squad and grabbed a pair of sunglasses out of her purse. “I don’t care,” she muttered as she put them on.
He laughed at her morose response but surprised her by taking her hand. “We got this. Come on. No one is going to say anything to you without answering to me.”
She expected the next few minutes to be excruciating. But people were more interested in their own shopping than they were her. When no one stopped to stare or point, she began to relax, but she didn’t let go of Dallas. The warmth of his hand, calloused in places because of his climbing, felt more reassuring than she wanted it to. She’d always prided herself on being a fierce, independent woman. But Ethan Grimes had dealt her such a leveling blow. She hated that she’d been stupid enough to get involved with him in the first place. She should’ve been able to ascertain the kind of man he was much sooner.
“See? Everything’s fine,” Dallas said as they stopped to gaze up at a historic mission bell hanging over another sculpted dolphin, this one spouting water.
She checked the walkway to be sure a crowd wasn’t forming to laugh at her. She knew that was ridiculous, but she was so self-conscious. “Thanks for...for helping me through this.”
“Of course.”
The afternoon flew by. They admired the elaborate Christmas decorations both inside and outside the various stores, grabbed a late lunch at a sidewalk café, picked up a few gifts and tossed a coin in a fountain that had sculptures of turtles climbing onto rocks. On a bench that had a statue of Benjamin Franklin at one end, they sat and enjoyed an ice cream cone.
By late afternoon, Emery was finally to the point where she could remove her sunglasses and talk and laugh freely, even walk without having to cling to Dallas. But just as they were getting ready to head back to Silver Springs, they drifted into a quaint and expensive chocolate shop. She was planning to send a box of chocolates to her mother, thought it might help encourage Connie during this difficult period, when she realized the woman behind the counter was someone she’d known in high school.
“Sidney,” she said, the word pulled from her automatically as soon as Sidney looked up.
“Emery! What are you doing here?”
Emery felt the hair on the back of her neck stand up. Sidney had been one of those friends in school who was