The phone rang insistently, but Nick didn't bother to pick it up. Miranda had acquired an unpleasant habit of calling him as soon as he got up in the morning, and it was already wearing on his patience. But she was his girlfriend again after all, so there wasn't much he could do about it except not answering her and lying to her about it later.

He adjusted the cufflinks on the sleeves of his shirt and his tie. When or how exactly had he resumed his relationship with Miranda? He couldn't remember. He had accompanied her to a lot of events to get Valeria out of his head, at some point the press had started talking about them as a couple, and suddenly Miranda had begun to behave as if they were... He hadn't consciously accepted that, but it seemed that—eventually—that would have been the natural outcome for the two of them anyway, especially after Valeria had disappeared.

And she really had disappeared. Nick had been left with so many doubts, so many incomplete thoughts after the alterc