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Chapters (57)
  1. Cover
  2. Dedication
  3. Epigraph
  4. CHAPTER ONE
  5. CHAPTER TWO
  6. CHAPTER THREE
  7. CHAPTER FOUR
  8. CHAPTER FIVE
  9. CHAPTER SIX
  10. CHAPTER SEVEN
  11. CHAPTER EIGHT
  12. CHAPTER NINE
  13. CHAPTER TEN
  14. CHAPTER ELEVEN
  15. CHAPTER TWELVE
  16. CHAPTER THIRTEEN
  17. CHAPTER FOURTEEN
  18. CHAPTER FIFTEEN
  19. CHAPTER SIXTEEN
  20. CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
  21. CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
  22. CHAPTER NINETEEN
  23. CHAPTER TWENTY
  24. CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
  25. CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
  26. CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
  27. CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
  28. CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
  29. CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
  30. CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
  31. CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
  32. CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
  33. CHAPTER THIRTY
  34. CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
  35. CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
  36. CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
  37. CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR
  38. CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE
  39. CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX
  40. CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN
  41. CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT
  42. CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE
  43. CHAPTER FORTY
  44. CHAPTER FORTY-ONE
  45. CHAPTER FORTY-TWO
  46. CHAPTER FORTY-THREE
  47. CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR
  48. CHAPTER FORTY-FIVE
  49. CHAPTER FORTY-SIX
  50. CHAPTER FORTY-SEVEN
  51. CHAPTER FORTY-EIGHT
  52. CHAPTER FORTY-NINE
  53. CHAPTER FIFTY
  54. CHAPTER FIFTY-ONE
  55. ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
  56. ABOUT THE AUTHOR
  57. What’s next onyour reading list?

Cass keeps looking down, but she reaches out a hand to Lulu.

Lulu takes it, and lets Cass guide her inside.

CHAPTER FORTY-FIVE

THE LAST TIME Lulu goes to The Hotel, it’s the middle of January. She wears the same boots she had on that first night, but everything else is different. It’s day, for one thing, an ordinary blue-and-white Saturday, and it rained yesterday, so the hillside she and Cass drive up is lush with new green and small, open flowers. Even the thick, pale skins of desert plants and cacti are washed clean and dustless. The gate stands open and ready for them.

The first time Lulu came to The Hotel, the only person who’d ever betrayed her was herself. And so she trusted everyone else.

Cass parks out in front, straight on in one of the spots, like she’s always been civilized here. Ryan comes out of the lobby to meet them. He looks bristly and wary and uncertain in a way that makes Lulu want to make sure she doesn’t look at him too long, in case she starts to hallucinate tenderness underneath it. She’s not here to imagine anything about Ryan. She’s just here to make sure Cass survives the reality of him.

There’s a moment just before they open the car doors. “You ready?” Lulu asks Cass.

Cass looks at her softly. “Yeah,” she says.

“You sure you don’t want me to come—”

“I’ve got this.”

Cass gets out of the car.

Lulu stays where she is. She looks down at the last moment, so she doesn’t have to see Cass and Ryan navigate greeting each other. So what if he took the option from her—she’s still decent enough to feel the instinct that he deserves privacy. She stares at her hands for long quiet minutes. The habit of not taking out her phone at The Hotel is so deeply ingrained.

When she looks up again, Cass and Ryan have their backs to her. They’re walking over to the pool. Lulu waits for them to disappear from view before she eases her door open and steps out of the car.

The front door of The Hotel is still unlocked. Of course it is. Ryan is so used to believing that he’s invulnerable.

The lobby is set up like an actual lobby now: a small lounge with couches and plush chairs, a coffee table, a bunch of art magazines; a front desk with flowers on it, though the space isn’t supposed to open for another handful of weeks. The elevator is probably working by now, but Lulu takes the stairs out of habit.