Layla held her breath, waiting for Sam’s response. Was it really over or did he still care?

“Layla!” Sam’s angry shout echoed down the hallway, sending a thrill of excitement up her spine.

“I’ll meet you outside in a just a minute.” She gently detached herself from Sunny. “I think I know that guy. I just want to say hello.”

They met halfway. This close, she could smell the familiar scent of his body wash, see every line and shadow in his handsome face. Her blood heated and her glisten became a glow.

“You bellowed?” She clenched her teeth as she tried to contain the emotion welling up inside her.

“Who is he?” His smooth, deep voice made Layla melt inside.

“Hi, Layla.” She mocked his deep voice. “Nice to see you again after all this time. How are you? How’s the business? How are your parents doing? What are Daisy and Max up to?”

He shut his eyes for a beat. “Are you with him?”

She looked over at Karen with her perfectly smooth hair, trim figure, glisten-free skin, and the arms that had been wrapped around her Sam.

My Sam. Layla’s chest tightened. For a brief time he had been hers. She wanted to tell him how much she’d missed him. How it wasn’t the same working without him or going on blind dates alone. She wanted to tell him how many times she’d seen something that would have made him laugh and felt an ache in her heart that he wasn’t there to share it. She wanted to tell him she loved him, but when she heard Karen’s heels clicking on the tile floor toward them, all that came out was:

“Yes.”

It wasn’t a lie. She was with him today.

“Are you . . .” His voice caught, broke. “. . . marrying him?”

“Why do you care?”

“We didn’t finish the game.”

Her mouth opened and closed again. “You own the building, Sam. The game doesn’t matter. The office is yours.”

His corded throat tightened when he swallowed. “It was never about the office.”

“What was it about, then? Was it just about the win?”

“Sam.” Karen touched him lightly on the arm. “We need to go.”

Layla had to fight the urge to slap her hand away. Could her nails be any longer? She’d seen tigers at the San Diego Zoo with shorter claws.

Still, Sam didn’t move. “It was about—”

“Sam, the CEO just arrived,” Karen said loudly. “We can’t keep her waiting. This is the only time she has free before you leave for New York.”

New York? Layla didn’t want to ask, but she did. “Are you . . . moving away?”

“I’ve decided to go back into medicine.” His face lit with hopeful anticipation. “I’m trying to get back into the residency program here, and if that doesn’t work out, I’ll go with whoever wants me. New York is a possibility because I have some contacts there. I’ve been away for so long, I’m not sure I’ll have many options.”

Layla’s mouth went dry. “That’s great. I mean, going back to medicine is great. But . . . moving away? What about Nisha and your parents?”

“They’re doing fine. We’re all moving on. I couldn’t help Nisha the way I had wanted, but hopefully, as a surgeon, I’ll be able to help people like your dad and advocate for changes to a system that failed to hold Ranjeet accountable for his actions.”

How irritating. Why couldn’t he be his usual arrogant, obnoxious self? Why, when he had found someone else, did he have to be so nice?

“What about your downsizing business?”

“Royce and I are looking for someone to take my place,” he said. “I have to brush up on my skills before I apply for my residency, so we have some time.”

“Layla?” Sunny opened the door. “Are you coming? I only get forty-five minutes for lunch.”

“Can we talk?” Sam asked. “Later?”

Her gaze flicked to Karen, and she shook her head. It had been one thing to tell herself she could survive loving and losing again. It was something else to have Sam standing right in front of her and know he could never be hers.

“No.” She swallowed past the lump in her throat. “We can’t.”

If her refusal affected him in any way, he gave no sign. Instead, he just nodded. “We’re remodeling the office. You left some papers behind. They look important, so you might want to collect them before the contractor starts work tomorrow. I’ll be in New York, but Royce will be around if you have any problems.” His cold, impersonal tone hurt more than the speed with which he’d moved on.

“I’ll do that.” Her hand fisted by her side, nails digging into her palm as she struggled to maintain her composure.

Sam hesitated, and for the briefest of seconds she thought she caught a glimpse of pain in his eyes. Or was it regret? “If you change your mind about talking . . .”

This had to end. The torture was unbearable. “I won’t.”

And with one last, lingering look at the man she loved, she turned and walked away.

* * *

• • •

LAYLA pushed open the door to the office above her parents’ restaurant. With the movers coming tomorrow to take the furniture to the new Sunnyvale Spice Mill, she wanted to see it one more time and pick up the papers Sam said she’d left behind.

“Can I help you?”

Layla startled when she saw the unfamiliar woman sitting at the reception desk. She’d gotten so used to seeing Daisy when she walked in the door that the neat, tidy desk and the perfectly ordinary-looking woman behind it just seemed wrong.

“I came to drop off my keys and pick up some stuff. I used to work here.”

“You can give them to Royce. He’s at his desk. Go on in.”

Layla walked past the gray leather couch that now took up the space where her purple chaise had been. Her new shared office space was fully furnished so she’d brought the chaise to her cozy new apartment in the Marina District, only one block from San Francisco Bay near Fort Mason.

“Look who’s here. It’s Excellent Recruitment Solutions.” Royce leaned back in his chair as she took a quick look around. Other than the Eagerson desk that her father had happily parted with, the rest of the furniture had been replaced with glass and steel—cold, corporate, and ultramodern.

“Actually, I changed the name to Patel Personnel,” she said stiffly, dropping the keys on his desk.