James Patterson: 7th Heaven

And thank you, God, she’d been acquitted.

Three days ago she’d taken the blood and hair he’d sent her and put it into that letter to Yuki Castellano. Now the hard part was over and Junie was traveling light. She had worn boy’s clothes on the bus from San Francisco to Vancouver, the flight to Mexico City, and now she was on another plane, on her way to a little village on a beach in Costa Rica.

This remote and enchanted place would be their new home, and Junie Moon hoped with her whole being that someday Michael’s heart would be fixed and that paradise would last for-fricking-ever.

She’d changed into a cute little sundress in the bathroom, fluffed up her newly straightened dark brown hair, put on the chic cat’s-eye glasses. The wheels of the plane bounced on the landing strip and all the passengers began to clap. Junie clapped, too, as the plane rolled to a stop.

Moments later the cabin door opened and Junie stepped carefully down the steps that had been wheeled up to the aircraft. Junie scanned the many faces peering out at the plane from the small outdoor terminal.

And there he was.

He’d shaven his head, had grown a goatee, and he was brown all over from the sun. He was wearing a bright striped shirt and cutoffs, grinning and waving, calling, “Baby, baby, over here!”

No one would ever recognize him, no one but her.

This was her real life.

And it was starting now.