Surprise me, she texted back. I trust your opinion. And she did. Gabe was cultured, classy, informed. The more she got to know him, the more impressed she was by him. She couldn’t quite believe that a man of his caliber was interested in her, and yet, he seemed to adore her. He looked at her like he’d never seen anyone more beautiful, touched her like she was a goddess. Her stomach fluttered, and her cheeks flushed at the thought of him. It was an infatuation, she told herself. It was not more than that.

“Two lattes for Natalie!”

She stepped up, slipping the hot drinks into cardboard sleeves before grabbing them and pushing her way out into the street. The March sun was high in the sky, doing little to jettison the seasonal chill. But the sun’s rays, the coffee in her hands, the Broadway show to look forward to, warmed her, made her feel light and happy. It had been a while since she’d felt that rush of gratitude for her life in New York, that feeling that she was on the right path. Crossing at Third Avenue, she hurried back to campus and her next class.

At the main building, she paused, her hands full of coffees. As she waited for an exiting student to hold the door open for her, she felt it, subtle, but there; a chill, a prickle, a frisson of dread. Some sixth sense, some instinct for self-preservation made her whirl around and scan the streets. No one was looking at her—students, construction workers, tourists, all going about their day. But her eyes moved to the opposite side of Twenty-Third Street, and she spotted him. This time, she was not hallucinating. This time he was not a mirage. There, loitering outside a thrift shop, was Cole Doberinsky.

The lattes slipped from her grip, the paper cups hitting the sidewalk, dislodging their plastic lids, sending coffee splashing over her shoes and jeans. Cole wore a black hoodie over his sandy hair, but she knew it was him. His physique was familiar, strong and wiry. His posture was tense, tightly coiled. For a brief moment, their eyes connected, and she saw her shock and fear reflected back at her. Cole had not wanted her to spot him. But she saw something else in his dark eyes. Anger and resentment. Cole Doberinsky still hated her.

She thought of the gun hidden in her sock drawer. Should she have been packing it to school? What would her liberal, art-school friends have thought of that? And would she have the guts to walk over to Cole, pull the gun from her pocket, and point it at his face?

“Are you okay?” It was her classmate Keltie. She bent down and picked up the dropped cups. “What happened?”

“I don’t know,” Nat mumbled. “They . . . slipped.”

She turned back toward Cole, but he had disappeared.

21

Broadway

Nat was shaken by the encounter with Cole. She’d been lulled into a false sense of security when her ex had failed to materialize, but now she knew. He was in New York because of her. The only mystery left was what he planned to do to her. And what she was willing to do to protect herself. Nat had no one to talk to about the boy’s sinister appearance. She couldn’t burden Ava with it, given all she’d been through. Her roommates already disliked her and would see “stalker ex-boyfriend” as definitive third-strike material. And Gabe Turnmill had not signed up for all her drama. He’d been tender and supportive when Nat had conjured Cole in the French bistro, but she didn’t want to belabor the issue.