let herself believe that her life was one of her choosing. That she was forging her own path.
It was a lie.
At home, at her grandmother’s estate, she lived by established rules. By her parents rules.
In the real world, she lived by the rules of her boss at work and her lover at home. Turner owned her apartment. He set the parameters of their relationship. Well, she’d brought them up, stated them in the open. Poppy didn’t blame him for what they were. She’d gotten herself into bed with him: literally. But why had she left her family in the first place? It wasn’t to work exhausting shifts and be a fuck buddy.
She’d screwed up her chance; there was no one to blame for that except herself.
Poppy couldn’t begin to know just how much she’d messed up.
Her phone chimed from somewhere near the door. She remembered dumping it there when coming in from work the previous night. Although the sound wasn’t of a message or call, she figured there was no point lying around on the couch any longer.
Primrose had always been a late sleeper. It wasn’t yet noon, so Poppy didn’t assume she’d see her sister for a while.
She got up off the couch, thinking about a shower as she retrieved her phone from her purse. In case anything went wrong with Charley, she’d want it close. Zoey might call. It broke Poppy’s heart that she’d have to cancel their planned meeting later that day.
Poppy didn’t really know what was in her head as the screen lit up and she unlocked it in preparation to text Zoey. Except something drew her eye to her name. Her name in a breaking news notification on her home screen. Back tracking to the home screen, she couldn’t believe what she was reading. “Billionaire stakes ten million dollar reward for return of his love: Poppy Granger.”
Madness. It was utter…
She couldn’t believe it.
Although she clicked on the story, she couldn’t take it in. Holden. Telling their story to the press. They didn’t have a story the last time she checked. He loved her. Missed her. Would do anything to have her back.
And that was the final straw. It would be a circus. Fast. People at work, people from Naughtie’s, even other tenants would recognize her from the picture at the top of the story. And it wasn’t just on one site. If one editor had deemed it interesting enough to be breaking news that caused an alert, other outlets would be all over it too.
Dropping her phone into her purse, Poppy let it fall to the floor and dashed into the bedroom. “Primrose! Get up!” she hollered.
Her sister was face down in the middle of the bed, but she did raise her head up, not that Poppy could see anything under her mussed hair.
“What?”
“Call Tiller,” Poppy called, going into the closet to grab a hair tie.
She was about to reach for her case when she stopped to look around. There was nothing there she needed. Nothing that would fit in the life she was going back to.
Shedding her nightshirt, she grabbed her torn and sullied bridesmaid’s dress to step back into it, then went back into the bedroom.
Poppy was encouraged to see Primrose sitting up. “We need a car downstairs and a plane on the tarmac at the airport,” she said, zipping her dress up as best she could. “We’ll need security at the other end.”
Primrose took her time about pushing her hair from her face. “What happened?”
“You don’t want to know,” she said, going over to grab her sister’s purse from the floor. “You need to call now, there’s no time to explain.”
Primrose’s phone was tucked in its little slot, so Poppy plucked it out and held it towards her sister so she could unlock it.
It didn’t take long to find Tiller’s number. Poppy pressed call and threw the phone onto the bed in front of her sister.
“Call them and get the car outside immediately.”
Getting with it, Primrose picked up the phone. “Hang on a second,” she said. Poppy wasn’t sure if the words were aimed at her or Tiller until her sister lowered the phone. “Is it Holden?” Wondering what Primrose knew, Poppy frowned. “He showed up at the house as I was leaving… He’s really desperate to find you.” Her hand sunk lower. “What went on between you two?”
Not half as much as would go on when she saw him again. “Just get the car here as fast as possible and meet