chapter 28

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The thing about nightmares, Isla thought, was that you always woke up

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The thing about nightmares, Isla thought, was that you always woke up.

In the months after Monaco, Isla would jolt awake, her heart hammering its way out of her body. She became an early riser. She'd make tea and go on a walk, or curl up on the couch and read a book. Once, when Isla was feeling inspired, she even went to the gym with Tiff (a mistake, given that she couldn't walk the next day).

Yes, Isla thought, you always woke up from nightmares.

But there was no waking up from this.

Burning car. Smashed barrier. People screaming. Isla saw it all in camera flashes. Her knees wobbled, and it took her a moment to realize that she was standing, that at some point she must have risen to her feet.

Matthew was in that car.

Even now, Isla didn't know why she'd stayed in Abu Dhabi. All she knew was that on the way to the airport, she'd thought of what Matthew's face would look like when he mounted the podium — flushed with triumph, champagne-drunk — and she'd asked the driver to turn the car around.

Now, Isla understood why.

Something had brought her here. Someone wanted her to be with Matthew right now. No matter what happened.

Isla hurtled down the stairs. "Matthew!"

She shoved people blindly, stumbling for the track. Someone tried to stop her — a pit crew member? — but she batted him away. Terror ripped through her. She hurtled a fence, her lungs burning, with either smoke or sprinting or both.

Two uniformed figures were pulling someone from the blaze. Paramedics? Yes; Isla could see their badges. A stretcher materialized, and even from this distance, Isla could tell that the person being loaded onto it was in bad shape.

Isla sprinted for the ambulance.

"Matt!"

The figure stirred. A paramedic said something to Isla, his voice sharp, but she ignored him. She fumbled for Matthew's hand.

"Matt?"

"Red," Matthew croaked. "Stay back."

"I'm not leaving you."

"Don't—" Matthew choked, his breath rattling like stones in a tin can. "Don't. Want. You—" Another wet cough. "More. Nightmares."

Her heart gave a painful squeeze. "Matthew, I don't care. Don't you get it? I would gladly have nightmares for the rest of my life, if it meant that I got to stay by your side. I belong here. I belong with you."

People lifted the stretcher into an ambulance. Isla scrambled in afterwards, and this time, nobody tried to stop her. Matthew's eyelids fluttered.

"Isla..."

"Let me stay this time," she said.

This couldn't be Monaco all over again. She'd been a ghost for weeks, wandering through the corridors of her life, unable to really feel anything real. She still had nightmares. She still avoided Sebastián's brother, Emilio.

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