Panic burst to life in her gut, an ugly twisting thing that was all too familiar from the days when she’d tried to track down her father, terrified that he’d been in a crash or something else equally awful—only to discover that he’d fucked off to a casino or shacked up with a new ladylove.

Shoving away from the table, she strode out to her balcony and took deep gulps of the cold air. “Snap out of it,” she told herself. “You knew this was coming.”

Except she hadn’t. Because it was Danny.

Danny, who’d carried her on his back for countless races and never dropped her even when that meant he went down face-first instead. Danny, who spoke to his nieces and nephew every weekend like clockwork. Danny, who’d messaged her first every single time since he’d been away.

She’d told herself to be better, to reach out first, but the fear was a choking hand around her throat.

Danny wasn’t her father.

He was also a young and sexy male in a foreign country where he was considered a star. She knew it bothered him a little, that the spotlight had turned on him even so far from home. But over there, it seemed focused more on him as a man and less on his sporting prowess, which he was able to laugh off.

“I have a brother who is a damn underwear model,” he’d said when she teased him about the adulation. “Trust me, I know I’m just flavor of the month.”

He hadn’t mentioned the attendant female attention, but Catie had a brain, could figure it out. Danny was hot, and New Zealand or Japan, women noticed that. It was late afternoon heading into early evening in his part of the world now, so he could’ve just forgotten their online date and gone out for dinner.

Striding back to grab her phone, she checked the screen. Nothing.

Stomach acid burning, she decided to leave it and work out. But all those things she’d just thought about Danny, they made her hesitate. So, though her cheeks burned, she went to the part of her phone where she’d stored the emergency contact information he’d sent her. His family all had the same information, and they’d surely have told her if anything had gone wrong…

She hesitated, not wanting to feel foolish and stupid and clingy.

Two months. No missed calls or ignored texts.

It still took everything she had to call the number for his friend Takuro. Better to start there than with the head of the club. The phone rang and rang, and she was just about to hang up when it was picked up.