The Owner of His Heart by Theodora Taylor

she said. “But when I saw the number on the Caller ID, I thought maybe it was him.”
    Nathan decided to get off the subject of Andrew. “I, um, put in my college applications like we were talking about and I got accepted into a few of them, including Carnegie Mellon and Yale.”
    “Oh, that’s great, Nathan,” she said. “I’m really happy to hear it. Is that why you called?”
    “Not exactly. I’m trying to decide whether I should go to Carnegie Mellon with you guys or maybe go out-of-state. And I was wondering if you could come by the house and help me make the decision.”
    He held his breath. Having just made that whole excuse up, he had no idea whether she’d buy it or not.
    “Really? Me?” she said. “You don’t want to ask your brother?”
    “I already know what he’ll say. He’s a CMU Tartan through and through, his blood runs plaid. CMU was his first choice and he used Pitt as a back up, but you applied to way more places, so I think you’re the better consult for this.”
    He half-expected her to call him out. She’d applied to a few more places than Andrew, but not enough to qualify her to give him advice about where to go to college.
    “Oh, I get it,” she said.
    He stopped breathing and braced himself, sure she’d figured out he had a crush on her. “Everybody’s out of town, and you need some company.”
    Layla’s ability to always believe the sunniest version of a story never failed to amaze him. “Yes,” he said. “The house is big, and I’m not used to being here alone.”
    Again, he was afraid she’d call his bluff. But then she said. “Sure, I can come over. Give me thirty minutes, okay?”
    His heart jumped in his chest, excited at the prospect of being in the same room with her alone. He’d had no idea back then, what he was setting in motion.
    The memory of that phone call dissolved and he came back to present day. No, he couldn’t let her stay in Pittsburgh, he decided, remembering what had happened the last time. But maybe he could visit her. He really did like her idea for a physical therapy spa. And if he invested, it would give him a good excuse to go to wherever she was, ostensibly to check up on his investment, but really to get his Layla fix until he no longer needed her.
    He whistled as he unlocked and pushed open the loft’s fire door, but when he walked inside, he found her standing there, obviously fuming. “You paid off all the detectives in the city, just so I couldn’t retain their services?”
    His eyes narrowed. “You tried to hire a detective?”
    “Yes,” she answered. “I have the right to hire someone to try to figure out what happened ten years ago. But you don’t have the right to stop me from hiring a detective.” He removed his suit jacket with a sigh, kissing the happy homecoming he’d imagined good-bye and going straight back into business mode. “Layla, you’re assuming ethics on my part, but I don’t have any, not in this situation, and especially not when it comes to you. I don’t want you to know what happened during the year you lost, and I refuse to apologize for that.”
    “Fine.” Layla said, spreading her arms. “I can find an out-of-state detective.” She went over to his desk and sat down, presumably to look someone up on the computer.
    “And then my detective will find your out-of-state detective and pay him off. You cannot win this game, Layla. I have too much money, and too few principles when it comes to you.”
    Layla turned around in his desk chair. “Wait, you have a detective you keep on retainer just to keep me from hiring my own detective?”
    He smirked. “No, Layla. I hired a detective to investigate you when you first came to town, then I kept him on to try to find out who’s been threatening you. The preventing you from investigating component is only one of his duties.”
    Layla stared at him for a few angry seconds before saying, “Okay, I’m leaving.”
    Now he went from smug to confused.