Total pages in book: 69
Estimated words: 64527 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 323(@200wpm)___ 258(@250wpm)___ 215(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 64527 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 323(@200wpm)___ 258(@250wpm)___ 215(@300wpm)
Something that experience taught me was true everywhere.
“Who was the owner?”
“Some guy who lives on the mountain, apparently. I guess he doesn’t really talk to anyone in town either.”
We spent the rest of our time together having a nice conversation, with her filling me in on what had been going on at her own job and with our family. When we hung up, I was feeling a little bit better, but I was still just as exhausted as I’d been when we started our conversation.
Suddenly, I remembered a beep that had sounded when I’d been on the phone with my mom and checked the screen, where a thin banner said that I had a new voicemail.
Strange. I worked as hard as I could to keep a low profile, having left my iPhone behind in the city and buying burner phones that I had to remember to put minutes on. I clicked on the one button that would open up the voicemail box.
“Hey, baby,” the message started, and I felt the cold sweat start pouring out over my skin. “You’re making it hard to find you, aren’t you?”
I shut my eyes. This wasn’t happening. It couldn’t be.
“Don’t worry, though. I’ll be finding you soon. I bet you miss it back in LA, right? I know it can’t be easy for you to be so far away from everything.”
I hated the way that voice seemed to lull my body into a comfortable rhythm in the same way it always did. It was part of why he was so dangerous. He was so good at making you believe that he actually gave a shit about you. He really was one of the best lawyers I’d ever known.
“I hope you miss me as much as I miss you. I’ll be seeing you soon, though.” He hung up, and I threw the phone across the couch before sitting in the corner, petrified. How had he found my phone number?
Shit. Shit. If he had my phone number, he had my area code…
I couldn’t take it anymore; I got up from the couch and ran over to the toilet, where I immediately threw up. I didn’t move from the bathroom for the rest of the night.
3
DILLON
I definitely got some surprised looks when I parked my truck outside the bank two days later and got out, and it wasn’t surprising. For someone who made it a point not to come to town more than once a month, coming down the mountain twice in one week was definitely out of character for me. But I’d been so distracted by Macy two days before that I’d forgotten my most important stop.
I walked into the bank, closely followed by Bucky, and walked up to the first teller, an older woman named Barbara, who I’d known since the age of five as “Bobbi.”
“Hey, Dillon,” she said, smiling at me kindly when I went up to her window. She’d been another one who’d made a consistent effort with me when I’d come back from Nashville, only to be rebuffed by my annoyingly stubborn ass. I figured I was probably hurting her feelings, and she was sweet enough not to mention it, but for whatever reason, I just had never been able to bring myself to get close to her again.
“Hey, Bobbi,” I said, pulling my debit card out of my wallet. “Can I get my usual cashier’s check, please?”
“Sure,” she said, putting my card into the reader as I put in my pin. “Remind me of the name again?”
“Jackie Fitzpatrick,” I said. Her eyebrow gave the subtlest twitch up, but I knew that she knew I wouldn’t be answering any of her questions about who Jackie was. I’d been coming in to get the checks every month since I’d moved back to town two years before, and I figured that Bobbi probably thought I’d gotten some girl pregnant while I was living in the city and that these were just my child support payments. In a way, they kind of were.
I suspected the dinner invitations were partially so that she could ask me about Jackie, given that she was too professional to ask about her while she was on the clock, but there was no way I was going to show my hand.
“Okay, just make sure that all the information on the paper is correct, and if it is, sign at the bottom.”
I did, following the same protocol I did every month when I pulled the twenty-five hundred dollars out of my account. A cashier’s check, made payable to Jackie Fitzpatrick.
“Perfect,” I said, signing and handing it back to her. She gave me the check in an envelope, and I gave her a brief smile before going next door and putting the check into a certified letter. I hadn’t been taking any chances since I’d started sending her the money, doing everything in my power to make sure the checks got to her and stayed anonymous.