Alle Kapitel von Unbroken: Her Return to Gold: Kapitel 11 – Kapitel 16

Harper zipped the suitcase and sat on the lid to force it shut. It was barely eleven, and she'd already done more this morning than in the last three months. The suitcase waited by the bedroom door. Two garbage bags sat in the hall, one bound for the curb, the other for Melrose. The house was so quiet she could hear the fridge humming downstairs.She'd expected to feel sad. Mostly, she wanted coffee.Her phone buzzed with a text from Valentina. "Lunch. Noon. Maison Rose. We're talking Keaton, Myles, and Austin, in that order, and you're not allowed to say no."Harper thumbed back, "Do I get a say in anything?"The reply came in seconds. "You get a say in dessert."Harper laughed out loud in the empty bedroom. She didn't change out of her jeans and white tee, and she didn't check the mirror twice. She grabbed her keys and drove out through the gates.Maison Rose hid behind an ivy-covered wall off Canon Drive, a little French bistro that lived up to its name. Roses were everywhere. Clim

Chapter 13: Five Minutes"Myles." Serena's voice cracked on the name, thick with tears, the wounded princess right on cue. "Baby, I need you. Some psycho just attacked me. I'm at Maison Rose. Please, please hurry."She hung up and rounded on Harper, chest heaving, her cheek still glowing red. "You're going to regret this.""Probably not," Harper said.Valentina perched on the edge of the table and crossed her legs. "Make yourself comfortable. We'll wait."So they waited.Harper sipped her sparkling water. Chloe whimpered into a napkin. Madison and Tatum hovered like bridesmaids at a funeral, glancing from the phones still pointed their way to the terrace entrance and back again.Five minutes. Harper counted.Then a black Rolls-Royce slid up to the curb outside the ivy wall, long and sleek as a yacht, and Myles Crawford stepped out in a charcoal suit. His jaw was tight. His eyes were blazing. He came through the rose arch like a man walking onto a stage.Harper waited for her stomach t

The Rolls-Royce rolled north on the 5 with the windows up and the air conditioning set to sixty-eight, exactly how Myles liked it. Up ahead, the Grapevine climbed into brown hills. Behind him, LA shrank in the mirror.It was Saturday. His grandfather's ninety-second birthday weekend. Every Crawford who mattered would be at the compound by nightfall, and tonight Myles would walk the woman he'd chosen into the old house and watch the whole family fall for her.Everything was going according to plan.Almost everything."Babe, can you not take the curves like that?" Serena flipped down the visor mirror and dabbed concealer over the faint pink mark on her cheek. "I'm trying to fix my face. Literally. Because of that psycho's friend.""It's barely visible.""It's visible to me."Myles glanced at her and sighed through his nose.He'd told her to dress conservatively. Twice. Once over breakfast at the hotel, and again in the elevator. "My grandfather's old-school. Modest. Classy. Think cardig

The Austin heat found Harper the second the terminal doors slid open.It wrapped around her like a towel straight out of the dryer, heavy and warm and smelling faintly of cut grass, hot asphalt, and somebody's barbecue pit miles away. She stopped short on the curb. A man rolling a golf bag nearly clipped her heels."Sorry," she said, and didn't move.Valentina pushed her sunglasses down her nose. "Are you smelling the air?""Shut up. Yes.""Babe, that's a shuttle bus.""It's a Texas shuttle bus."Valentina snorted and waved down the rental car van. While they waited, she scrolled through her phone, the only one of them still connected to the world."Okay. Updates. The video's at four million. Chloe's dentist apparently has a waitlist now. And Keaton booked us a suite."Harper turned. "He what?""At his hotel downtown. The Ashford. Top floor." Valentina held up the screen: a short, polite text, not a single emoji. "I didn't say yes.""Good.""I also didn't say no.""Val.""It has a roo