Chapter
One
Guggenheim Museum
Spain
Michaela Devlin crossed the large forecourt
toward the immense titanium-covered sculptural building glinting in the
November sunlight. She made her way down the awkward stone stairway that marked
the museum’s towering entrance, then abruptly stopped in front of the gigantic
set of glass doors as a jolt of familiarity hit her and snaked down her spine.
She whispered. “Him.”
It wasn’t the first time she’d sensed Him or tried in vain to recapture vague
snippets of memory left in his wake—but the experience had never been as strong
or as tangible as it was now.
She frowned and drew in a deep, steadying
breath. He’d entered her dreams three months earlier, a faceless shadow who’d
unlocked a part of her that she was still trying to define and understand, a
part of her that had been screaming for a release she never knew she’d wanted.
Or, perhaps she did know. Isn’t that why she divorced Sebastian?
She sighed and flicked her gaze to the
middle-aged couple she’d passed only a few moments earlier negotiating the same
awkward stone stairway that curved downward toward the building’s towering
entrance. She returned her gaze to the high set of dark glass doors and closed
her eyes.
Technically it wasn’t cheating. She and
Sebastian had already been divorced for more than eighteen months—twenty-two to be exact—so such an
allegation wasn’t even relevant. She was allowed intimate feelings for another
man, even if they were only phantom ones. Still, she’d hidden a part of herself
from Sebastian, and the uncertainty as to whether or not it’d been an
unconscious or conscious thing had weighed heavily on her heart for the last
three months.
She shook her head of the very real memories of her ex-husband
surfacing in her mind and demanding her attention. She didn’t want to remember
the pain she’d caused Sebastian. Not right now. She’d loved him once and despite
her reticence had always thought he had been the one. She’d blamed the demise
of their marriage on the pressures of work, but now she was no longer quite so
sure. Was it because of Him? Had he
always been in her heart? If so, who was He,
and why couldn’t she remember Him?
“Miss, are you coming inside?”
Michaela opened her eyes at the sound of an
older female voice pulling her from her thoughts. The middle-aged couple had
finally reached the bottom of the broad steps and had slipped by her unnoticed.
They stood within the entrance of the museum holding one of the towering dark
glass doors gallantly open to her. Michaela forced down the emotions crowding
her mind and strolled into the building, smiling at the couple and thanking
them for their consideration. She would try to make sense of these disturbing
feelings later after she’d spoken with Sebastian.
She moved deeper into the museum with as much
confidence as her inexperience in three-inch heels would allow, checked her
coat at another set of doors, then crossed the threshold into the vast atrium.
The architecture was breathtaking—uplifting like a Gothic cathedral.
Huge titanium, glass, and colored limestone
walls staggered her senses with sinuous stone and polished metal competing
where the glass left off. Vast metal footbridges hung from the roof, and
serpentine walkways hugged the contours of the walls.
Michaela’s gaze crept steadily higher past the
glass elevators to the enormous metal flower-shaped skylight centered at the
top, letting in the soft stream of winter light that filled the room and bathed
her face. She took a sip from the glass of champagne she’d procured from a
white-gloved waiter standing near the main foyer and tried not to appear overly
awestruck by the one hundred and fifty foot high, dome-shaped space towering
about her or buckle beneath the weight of stares singling her out.
This event wasn’t for the common visitor.