ONE HUNDRED.

ALESSANDRO, AKA DON VALENTINO.

TWO WEEKs EARLIER.

I swivel in my chair, turning myself, so I can stare out the window. The same window I always found Ivy gazing out of.

Ivy.

Ivy Bishop.

My headache.

The only woman who has managed to put my very existence on hold.

She is the only woman who has ever run away from me, causing my heart to stop beating and my breath to cease.

Each time Ryan enters my office with an update, a glimmer of optimism for him tracking her down sits on my shoulders.

Sadly, that sliver of hope is genuinely starting to disappear, along with the desire of me striving to track her down.

The morning she abandoned me in bed, I had relentlessly called her number, but her phone continuously kept going straight to voice mail.

By that time, the evening had come around. I had a bad feeling and I drove myself to Nicole's house, the same friend that wouldn't let me leave without her by my side like a thorn in a rose when Ivy had fainted at her papa's funeral