Chương 4
“Outside.”
“Watching?”
“Yes.”
Daniel looked toward the door as if Caleb might somehow be standing behind it six years later.
“And after I talked to you?”
“I reported that contact had been made.”
“The picture.”
“Yes.”
“What happened next?”
“I was supposed to see whether you would contact me.”
“You gave me your number.”
“Yes.”
“I texted you that night.”
“I know.”
“You still have the message?”
Maya looked at him.
Daniel’s mouth twisted.
“Stupid question.”
“I remember it.”
“Of course you do.”
“You wrote, ‘I owe you a jacket cleaning bill and possibly a less embarrassing second impression.’”
Daniel stared at her.
“That was mine.”
“What?”
“That was ours.”
Maya’s eyes broke then.
A tear slid down the side of her face toward her ear.
“I know.”
“No, you don’t.”
“I do.”
“You took something I thought was ours and filed a report about it.”
“Yes.”
He looked away.
The monitor beside her gave another soft beep.
Daniel hated it.
He wanted the room to acknowledge that something had ruptured.
Instead, the machines continued measuring ordinary things.
Heart rate.
Oxygen.
Time.
“What did you write?” he asked.
Maya’s voice barely carried.
“That you initiated contact.”
“That’s it?”
“And that you appeared interested.”
He laughed again.
“Appeared interested.”
“I hated that language.”
“But you used it.”
“Yes.”
“What happened after that?”
“Vale told me to continue.”
“For how long?”
Maya looked down at her wristband.
“Three weeks.”
Daniel went still.
“Three weeks.”
“At first.”
“At first?”
“I stopped reporting after three weeks.”
Daniel stepped closer.
“You stayed with me.”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
Maya’s mouth opened.
Nothing came out.
Daniel nodded slowly.
“Don’t say because you fell in love.”
She flinched.
“Why not?”
“Because that is the easiest possible answer.”
“It wasn’t easy.”
“It is now.”
Maya pressed the cold pack harder against her face.
“I liked you before I was supposed to.”
Daniel’s expression did not move.
She continued anyway.
“You were not what the file said.”
“There was a file on me.”
“Yes.”
“What did it say?”
“Daniel.”
“What did it say?”
“That you were thirty.”
“I was.”
“That you worked in healthcare administration.”
“I did.”
“That you had recently moved back to the city.”
“I had.”
“That you were close to your mother.”
Daniel gave a humorless smile.
“Apparently not close enough.”
Maya looked toward the door.
“Evelyn didn’t know.”
“That’s one thing we agree on.”
“The file said you were cautious with strangers.”
“Was that funny to you?”
“No.”
“Was I a challenge?”
“No.”
“A target?”
Maya closed her eyes.
“At first, yes.”
Silence filled the room so completely that Daniel could hear someone rolling metal equipment past the door.
He rubbed his mouth with one hand.
“How much were you paid?”
“Daniel.”
“How much?”
“Not directly for you.”
“How much were you paid?”
“Twenty-four dollars an hour.”
He blinked.
For some reason that detail offended him more than a large number might have.
“Twenty-four dollars.”
“I was an employee.”
“So destroying my sense of reality came with dental?”
Maya stared at him.
Daniel looked ashamed immediately.
“That was cruel.”
“It was.”
“I know.”
Maya removed the cold pack and set it on the tray beside her.
The skin beneath her eye was darkening.
Daniel looked at the bruise and then away.
“Why did you stop reporting?”
“Because Caleb asked me to get access to your apartment.”
Daniel’s head lifted.
“For what?”
“He wouldn’t say.”
“And that finally bothered you?”
“Yes.”
“After three weeks.”
“Yes.”
“What did you do?”
“I refused.”
“And then?”
“Vale called me into his office.”
Daniel waited.
“He said I had misunderstood my role.”
“What did that mean?”
“That I wasn’t being paid to have opinions.”
“Did he threaten you?”
“Not exactly.”
“Maya.”
“He reminded me that he knew where my mother lived.”
Daniel’s anger shifted.
Not gone.
Changed.
“Your mother?”
“She was still in Arizona then.”
“I know.”
“He said it casually.”
“What exactly did he say?”
Maya stared at the blanket over her legs.
“He said, ‘Your mother still on East Marigold?’”
Daniel sat down again.
“You never told me that.”
“No.”
“Why?”
“Because I quit the next day.”
“And that solved it?”
“I thought it did.”
“You thought a private investigator hired to track me would just accept that?”
“No.”
“What happened?”
“Caleb came to my apartment.”
“When?”
“The night after I quit.”
Daniel’s eyes narrowed.
“What did he want?”
“He wanted the notes I had kept.”
“What notes?”
“About you.”
Daniel leaned back as if she had pushed him.
Maya’s voice thinned.
“I wrote things down because Vale required daily contact summaries.”
“Things about me.”
“Yes.”
“Personal things.”
“Yes.”
“What kind of things?”
Maya could not look at him.
“What you ate.”
Daniel said nothing.
“Your schedule.”
Nothing.
“Who called you.”
Nothing.
“Your routines.”
Daniel’s face slowly closed.
“Anything else?”
Maya’s fingers curled against the sheet.
“You told me once that when you were nervous, you called your father’s old voicemail even though the number had been disconnected.”
Daniel stood.
Maya closed her eyes.
“Get out,” he said.
“Daniel.”
“Get out.”
“I’m in the hospital.”
He stared at her, and for one terrible second they both almost laughed at the absurdity of what he had said.
Instead Daniel turned toward the door.
His hand closed around the handle.
Behind him, Maya spoke.
“There’s something else.”
He stopped.
Her voice trembled now.
“Caleb didn’t come for the notes because Vale wanted them back.”
Daniel turned.
Maya’s eyes were fixed on him.
“He came because he wanted me to help him find out who hired Vale in the first place.”
Daniel kept his hand on the door handle but did not open it.
“What did Caleb think?”
“That the assignment didn’t make sense.”
“What part?”
“All of it.”
Maya drew a shallow breath because anything deeper pulled painfully across her abdomen.
“Vale usually worked for divorce attorneys, insurance companies, businesses checking fraud claims, people trying to find relatives who didn’t want to be found.”
“And I was different.”
May you like
“You weren’t hiding.”
Daniel let go of the handle.
