But instead he sat there, frozen, rereading the email as though he didn’t trust the words. When he couldn’t take it anymore, he ended the session and sat there until a German man in a loud floral shirt asked if he was done. Blake apologized quickly and left.

All the way back up to the hotel room, something hammered away in the pit of his stomach. He opened the hotel room door and got straight to work. He had to pack. He had to get his stuff together.

And then he had to leave.

Julia awoke to a sudden banging and groaned. Not daylight—it wasn’t fair! She wanted to sleep forever. What was that noise?

She gathered the sheets up across her chest and sat up sleepily. Bang. Blake slammed a drawer shut.

“Too early for noise.” She yawned. “Mmm, do I smell coffee?”

“On the dresser,” he said without looking up.

She sat up straighter. “What’s going on, Blake? The bus isn’t until four—we have plenty of time.”

“Yeah, I gotta go sooner than that.” He balled up a pile of T-shirts and stuffed them in a bag.

It felt like someone was lining up to punch her in the gut. But the hit hadn’t connected yet, because Julia didn’t understand what he meant.

She just knew that for some reason, in a matter of moments, there was going to be pain.

“Blake?” she asked.

He straightened his back. “Have you seen my trainers?”

“Blake, what are you doing?”

“Shit, can you see if they’re under the bed?”

“Blake!” she practically shouted, trying to make him snap out of it. She reached for one of the hotel robes and wrapped it around her, suddenly aware of how naked—how vulnerable—she was. “I thought you were coming with me to São Paulo.”

For a moment he stopped, one sneaker hanging out of his bag, the other still in his hand. “And do what? Spend all that time stuck on a bus to wind up in a city where I don’t want to go?

“We were just talking about this last night. You said you wanted to take me to the airport. You said you didn’t have any plans.”

“Yeah, well, something’s changed.”

“Apparently it has.” She stared at him in disbelief.

“What does it matter? You’re going home anyway.”

“Is that what this is about? Me going home? Talk to me, Blake,” she pleaded as he hastily crammed clothes into his bag. “Where are you going?” Her voice sounded small in her ears.

“Santiago. No point going to São Paulo when I can get a flight from here.”

“Well aren’t we Mister Practical.” She swung her legs around so she was sitting on the edge of the bed. “Blake, will you slow down a minute? Why Santiago? Why are you so upset?”

“I’m not upset!”

“Like hell you’re not!” Julia gestured at the room, which looked like a tornado had torn through it. In all his packing, he’d made the place a mess.

“Something’s come up,” he said with exaggerated patience, as though talking to a child. “Believe it or not, there are things I have to do that aren’t about you.”

“That’s not fair, Blake.”

“No, not fair is waking up to a note and half your bank account gone.”

“What are you talking about?” Suddenly she realized. “Oh my god—Santiago. Did something happen to Jamie and Chris?”

Blake shoved the contents of the bathroom counter into his bag. She didn’t bother pointing out that he’d taken her toothpaste, too.

“She left,” he said.

“What do you mean, she left?”

He shrugged like it was no big deal, but he was a terrible liar. “I got an email from Jamie this morning. They were going to Chile and then flying out later this month and she just…up and left. With Lukas,” he added like an afterthought, and Julia felt her heart stop. Shit. So that’s what this was about.

“I thought Lukas was going to the Pantanal,” she said carefully, still trying to put the pieces together.

“He is. With Chris.”

“So what, Chris is traveling with Lukas and then meeting up with Jamie for their flight?”

“Don’t you get it, Julia?” He turned on her in exasperation. “Chris is gone. She isn’t going back to Australia. And she isn’t going back to Jamie.” Blake leaned against the bathroom counter, his back to her. “I thought they were joking,” he said quietly. “When they said that in the bar by the river that night, I thought they were joking.”

Julia stood, but she didn’t reach for him. She felt herself poised taut on the narrow tight rope line that connected them. She had to walk carefully, but she didn’t know how.

“Jamie’s in Santiago now?” she asked.

“He got on the plane to Chile like they were going to, an empty seat beside him the whole time. His flight to Australia isn’t for another two weeks, and it’s expensive to change it.”

“So you’re going.”

“Yeah.” He locked eyes with her through the mirror. “I’m going.”

“I guess this is good-bye, then.”

“I guess it is.”

The silence between them dragged on, Julia standing behind him, both of them looking at each other through the bathroom mirror. She took a deep breath. This was going to be okay, because it had to be. That was all there was to it.

“You’re a good friend,” she sighed, feeling suddenly exhausted. “I’m surprised he asked you to come, but I understand needing to help. It’s good of you to be there for him.”

Blake frowned in the mirror and his eyes darted away.

“Wait.” Julia took a step back, wrapping the bathrobe tighter around her. “He did ask you, didn’t he?”

“What does it matter?” Blake said quickly, turning around to face her. “Obviously I need to go.”

“Blake, you know I’m the last person who’d ever say ditch your friends. But no, there’s nothing obvious about it.”

“What were you expecting? It’s not like I wasn’t going to go anywhere after you left.”

“But you’re not just leaving, Blake. You’re making your big dramatic exit so that you can be the one to leave before I do.”

“I didn’t plan to get this email from Jamie,” he started.

“The email that doesn’t ask you to come to Santiago.”

“What do you want me to do, Julia? Ditch Jamie? Come to Chicago? As if you’d ever ask.”

“You didn’t even give me the chance!” she cried.

He shook his head. “If you wanted it, you would have said something.”

She couldn’t believe what she was hearing.

“Do you want to come?”

He looked her right in the eye. “Of course not,” he said coldly, without even the smallest trace of a frown.

He was telling the truth.

Julia staggered back and sank onto the edge of the bed. The punch had finally come, knocking her down. It felt like everything within her had stopped working—her legs, her brain, her heart.

“You stormed in here determined to be mad at me,” she said. The tears were streaming down her face, but she wasn’t crying. Her voice was remarkably calm. “Congratulations. Now you’ll never be left, since you get to leave first. I hope you have a nice life, Blake. I hope you have fun traveling.”

She said the last word with as much venom as she could muster, trying not to hiccup through her tears.

Blake grabbed the last of his clothes and zipped up his bag, heaving it onto his back. “You’d never ask—not for real. You didn’t ask me to Rio. You didn’t bring up anything about Chicago earlier. Of course you wouldn’t ask without me first paving the way.”

“How dare you—” Now she really was crying, but her hands were balled into fists and she was too angry to wipe her cheeks. “How dare you pretend your leaving is my fault.”

“I’m just speaking the truth. You’ve got this vault, and sometimes I think I’ve gotten through but then your guard is right back up again, telling me you’re a good friend like you’re not upset. Pretending that everything’s fine.”

Careful. She’d tried to be so careful. Until, before she knew what was happening, it was too late.

“Leave,” she whispered, everything watery through her eyes. When he didn’t move, she said it again, stronger this time. “Leave.” She didn’t have to take this from him.