LIAM
Her face is soft and faintly concerned as she walks towards me, and I struggle not to let my irritation overwhelm me. “Is this about Saoirse?” I ask bluntly, turning to face her. “Because if it is, I told Niall already—”
“It’s not about her.” Sofia walks towards me, joining me at the railing, looking out over the city. “It’s about Ana. I wanted to talk to you before—well, Luca said you were leaving tomorrow. To try to find her.”
“That’s the plan.” I look at Sofia curiously. “With Max and Levin, if all goes according to plan. You haven’t come out here to tell me not to go?”
Sofia laughs softly. “Why would I do that? Ana is my best friend. If there’s a chance in hell of anyone finding her, I’d do all I could to encourage them.”
I can’t help but chuckle at that. “Everyone else, your husband included, seems hell-bent on keeping me in Boston and getting me to marry Saoirse.”
Sofia shrugs. “She’s a nice enough girl, I think. But I don’t even really know her. If you’re meant to marry her, that’s your own duty and burden to figure out, but I’m hardly going to tell you not to try to find Ana on account of it. I’m selfish enough to want my best friend back, no matter what it might cost you—if you’re willing to go after her.”
Her blunt honesty shocks me, but I appreciate it. “You’re very forthright,” I observe, watching her curiously. “It fits with what Luca has said about you, though. I suppose I don’t know you all that well, despite what we’ve all been through in the past weeks.”
“You don’t know Ana well either.” Sofia looks at me appraisingly. “Yet you’re willing to put your engagement and position on the line to go after her. Why?”
I open my mouth to answer the question, but she’s still speaking. “An arranged marriage is nothing new for a man like you. My marriage to Luca was arranged, and he wasn’t pleased about it, but he did it anyway. Viktor actively arranged his with Caterina, and her husband before that was arranged for her. Love doesn’t often factor into weddings among crime families; I know that well enough. Caterina and I have been lucky, in the end, despite what it took to get there. So why?”
The question should have a serious answer, and I pause a moment to give it the weight it deserves. “I feel as though I love her,” I say bluntly, giving Sofia the same honesty she gave me. “I know that’s ridiculous. No one can love someone they’ve known as briefly as I’ve known Ana. But I can’t shake her. She’s in my head constantly. I feel, down to my bones, that I have the responsibility of going after her. And all I have to go off of is that one afternoon when I talked to her in the garden. But there was something about her—”
“You’re obsessed with her.” Sofia looks at me flatly. “Men love to think they’re saving women, don’t they? It drives you all to insanity. And I can’t lie and say that it’s not sexy. Luca had this kind of possessive desire with me—” she shakes her head, flushing slightly. “He still does. I see it in Viktor, and I can see it with you. But you need to understand, Liam, if you’re going to do this—”, she pauses, her eyes wide and cautious. “The Ana that you’re going after—the Ana that you met—is a very different person from who she used to be.”
I blink at her, unsure of what Sofia is trying to get across to me. “I know she’s been hurt, physically and emotionally,” I say finally. “Luca and Viktor have been quite effusive about that, in fact. They’ve told me repeatedly that she’s—” I hesitate, disliking the word. “Broken. And I have eyes, I could see that she was in a wheelchair. But when I talked to her, I didn’t see a broken girl. I saw someone who had been hurt, who needed care, but I—”
“Still saw someone very different,” Sofia says, interrupting me. “Look.” She fishes her phone out of her clutch purse, turning her back to the railing so that I can see the screen. She flips through pictures from months ago, and then a year or more, well before her marriage to Luca.
She’s right.“That’s Ana?” I ask, pointing to the blonde girl with her posing in the photos, usually taking the selfies.
Sofia nods. “See what I mean?” She keeps flipping through the photos, and I breathe in deeply.
The girl in the photos isn’t the Ana I recognize, Sofia is right about that. This girl is on her feet, her hair dark instead of blonde the way it was when I met her, flying around her cheeks, a bright smile on her face. She’s poured into short shorts and tight jeans and crop tops, short dresses and miniskirts, wearing makeup. She’s in a ballet costume and pointe shoes, her eyes glowing, ready for the stage. There’s a photo of her and Sofia together, Anaen pointe,Sofia holding her violin.
Sofia flicks a few photos further to a video clip and presses play. “Watch,” she says quietly. “And then there’s another I’d like for you to see.”
The first video is of Sofia and Ana out at a bar. Ana is clearly filming, trying to convince Sofia to stay out later. “Just another drink,” she pleads, laughing as Sofia shakes her head amusedly, trying to push the camera out of her face. “Come on, I won’t even go home with that guy who got my number if you stay out with me! You didn’t like him, right?”
“Of course, I didn’t,” Sofia says firmly, her mouth twitching. “He wasn’t good enough for you.”
“You don’t thinkanyoneis good enough. That’s why you’re still a virgin.” Ana flips the camera so that she’s the one looking into it, her blue eyes bright and a little glazed from drinking. “This is our last night of the semester, and Sofia wants to go home andsleep. But tonight is about making memories, right? Memoriestogether.”She flips the camera again, now so that both she and Sofia are in the frame, her arm thrown around Sofia’s shoulders as she tilts it down. “Best friends forever, right? From roommates to best friends in the whole world. Three months, and I can’t live without you. That’s why you’re staying in the city this summer with me!”
“Where else would I go?” Sofia rolls her eyes affectionately. “I’ve lived in this city my whole life, Ana. I’m obviously staying for the summer.”
“But withme. Inourapartment.”
“Myapartment, that you pay like…barely a quarter of the rent for.”
“Because we’re best friends! Right?”
“Yes,” Sofia finally gives in, laughing as she tilts her head against Ana’s. Sofia is blonde in the video, as dyed platinum as Ana is naturally honey blonde. “Best friends. I’m glad you answered my post for a roommate. I wouldn’t have wanted anyone else. And I’ll have another drink,ifyou promise not to go out with that guy if he calls you.”
“Yes!” Ana fist-pumps, waving for the bartender. “Two more drinks?”
The video goes black then, and I glance at Sofia’s face to see that she’s crying softly, tears trickling down her cheeks. “She was a mess,” she says softly. “But she wasmymess. My best friend, when I had no one in the entire world. My parents were dead. I had a mysterious benefactor giving me money and no one left to care about me, except for Ana. She was wild and crazy and reckless, but she loved me when no one else did. She was my everything for a long time.”
Sofia swallows hard and flips to the next video, pressing play without a word.
It’s a very different video. The strains of Tchaikovsky’sSwan Lakefill the air, and a tall, slender, graceful girl in black with her honey blonde hair pulled back in a tight ballerina bun enters from stage left.