Escaping Reality (The Secret Life of Amy Bensen #1)

“I guess your quick call means you really want to stop me from showing up there.”

“I don’t want you in this part of my life.”

He thinks he’s bad for me. I think I’m bad for him. “You aren’t your father.”

“You won’t convince him of that.” Bitterness and pain ripple through his words.

“Let me come there and be with you.”

“No. You will end up in the newspapers.”

“And you don’t want me there.”

“I don’t.”

I flinch. “Okay. I get it. I’m going to go back to my apartment—”

“No. Shit. Don’t. Please. I’m handling this all wrong, just like I did the other night in Earl’s. Look. Amy. I’m not the person I want you to know right now. That’s why I haven’t called.

I don’t know what will come out of my mouth, but thinking about being back there with you is all that keeps me sane.”

My eyes pinch. “Just come back,” I whisper. “When can you come back?”

“Soon.”

“Promise. I know how you feel about promises.”

“I promise.” He hesitates. “Amy—”

“Yes?” I hold my breath and wait, not sure what to expect.

He lets out a breath. “Tell me you won’t leave.”

“I won’t leave.”

“Promise.”

I squeeze my eyes shut. If I make this promise I have to tell him everything when he gets back. He can’t protect himself from a danger he doesn’t know exists. And I’m pretty certain he’d come after me if I left anyway. “I promise.”

***

Wednesday morning I am at the bank when it opens to discover my account is as empty as my inbox remains. I’m frustrated with Meg’s “out with a client” and “haven’t had time to check the listings” text messages. Surely her boss has to have returned to town, and I head in that direction. When I find the office closed again, I do not feel good about this. I decide to walk to the back door and see if I can get into the building to look around.

Once I’m in the small alleyway, I knock on the door to be safe, and receive no response. I try the door but it’s locked. There is a window that has to be Luke’s office and I decide to try it, praying I don’t get myself arrested. I peek in the window to find an empty office, without furniture or even boxes. The window is locked, so I move to the window on the opposite side of the building to find it’s vacant. Unease ripples through me. Something is very wrong about this.

There could be another office, but from the lobby it looked very small inside. I don’t know what to do.

As much as I dread it, I know I need to stop by the apartment and look for any notes. I still have no mail key since I can’t connect with Meg, but I’ll check my door.

I arrive to find nothing on my door or under it. Hesitating, I turn to Jared’s door and decide to knock. He doesn’t answer. Figures.

Deciding it is Meg and Luke I need to be researching, I stop by INK coffee shop near the hotel to splurge on a mocha to take with me to the room. I’ve just ordered when I hear, “Amy.”

I turn and find Jared sitting in a corner chair with his computer in his lap, his long, light brown hair loose around his shoulders, and that familiar feeling roars through me more powerfully than ever. He motions for me to join him and I hold up a finger, then grab my coffee and join him, claiming the empty seat next to him. “I’ve been worried about you,” he insists.

“After that guy dragged you from Earl’s, I wasn’t sure what to think.”

“He’d had a family emergency and was worried about losing it in the bar.”

His eyes narrow. “That’s your story and you’re sticking with it, right?”

“It’s my story because it’s true.”

He closes his laptop and sets it aside, and my gaze catches on his University of Texas graduation ring. And I know now why Jared is familiar. I must have seen the ring, and my subconscious registered it when I did not. He has a connection to my brother and an image of Chad flashes in my mind. My fingers dig into my leg. I see his face. I actually see his face.

“You look like you saw a ghost,” Jared comments, and I jerk my gaze to his.

“You went to UT?” I ask, and I sound strange, but I feel strange, too.

Jared glances at his ring. “I did. Why do you ask?”

“Way back when, I considered attending.” Because I wanted to follow in my brother’s footsteps and convince my father I was as good as Chad.

“Why didn’t you?”

“New York was home so it made more sense.” It’s a lie I tell easily. I don’t like this connection I have to Jared, but it seems he wouldn’t wear the ring if he wanted to hide it.

“How long ago did you graduate?” I ask, trying to find out if he could be linked to my brother.

“I’m twenty-eight if that’s what you want to know.”

Chad would be thirty now. “I’m twenty-four.”

“So, not long out of school,” he observes.

“A few years.”

“What did you study?”

“Nothing exciting. Business. How does someone get into hacking?”

“Generally by getting into trouble. I had a knack and did a few high-profile hack jobs just to prove I could. A narrow miss with the law and a close family friend shook me up.” He sips his coffee and I do the same. “You don’t seem to be staying at the apartment.”