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“I have good and bad news,” he announces.
“The bad news is your team told Grayson what was going on. What the fuck?”
His lips thin. “I’ll get back to you on that. Right now.This.We have security footage of a man entering your father’s room to deliver the coffee,” he says. “No one at the hotel recognizes him. That’s good news. It lends to a suspect other than you.”
“What’s the bad news?”
“He resembles a man we picked up on camera loitering around your building last night.”
Suddenly my father’s poisoning isn’t a singular event. “There’s a hitlist,” I say, “and I just happened to be there two times, at the right time, to save Harper and my father.”
“I’m thinking the same,” Savage agrees.
“Harper’s on the list,” I say and I start running.
Chapter seventy-eight
Harper
Antsy and going crazy, I search Eric’s cabinets and find hot chocolate, which I make. I actually really love that he has hot chocolate, and I try to imagine him at the grocery store making the decision to buy that hot chocolate. It’s such a humanizing thing to buy and I feel like often people see the genius not the man, and it’s destructive in ways I don’t think they understand.
I boil some water in the microwave and make the sweet beverage. I even find marshmallows. He’s a kid in a man’s body and I love it. I really want to know this side of Eric. I sit down at the island in the kitchen with the bag of marshmallows, the cup and drop a handful inside. I snatch a pad of paper and pen I find in a drawer and I start writing the numbers and letters from that sequence we’d been given by the man by my house. I write them over and over, and they feel familiar. I eat half the bag of marshmallows trying to find the memory in my mind. There’s a memory. There are also enough marshmallows in my stomach to perhaps make it explode.
I stand up and start to pace, and when I spy a Rubik’s cubes on a shelf I grab it, and start spinning it. What do those numbers and letters mean? What do we deal with all of the time? Parts. VIN numbers. Bank accounts. Badges. I stop walking. A badge. Could it be a badge number? I don’t have my computer, but I saw one in the office. I hurry inside and locate the MacBook on top of the wooden desk. I power it up and use my access codes to enter the Kingston system. I pull up the employee badge numbers and type in our mystery sequence of letters and numbers. Nothing. I sigh. Blake checked this of course, anyway. I wasn’t going to find anything, but something about this premise of a badge number feels right in my mind.
Frustrated, I decided maybe I’ll just ask Smith if he has any ideas. I’m close to something. It’s worth a try and I have to do somethingto keep my mind off the fact that Eric is with his father. If I let myself get lost in that thought, I’d picture his father dead right now.
I enter the living room and oddly Smith isn’t here. “Smith!” I call out but there’s no reply.
Nervous now, adrenaline pumping through me I walk toward the front door, and wonder if he’s in the hallway. I open the door and no. He’s not here either. A chill runs down my spine. Something feels wrong about this. Something feels very wrong. I shut the door and lean against it. I lock the door, my instincts shouting at me. I dial Eric, but he doesn’t answer. Smith had to go to the bathroom. He took a bathroom break. I race about and check that theory and it’s a no-go.
I dial Blake, and he doesn’t answer. I don’t have Smith’s number.
On alert now, in a big way, I grab the coat Mia bought me and put it on. My gut is telling me to run and I don’t know why. If I open this door and he’s still not out there, I’m listening to it. I’m leaving. I’ll hide. I’ll go to the Walker offices. I google their address and find the walk will be short. I have a plan. I’m probably being paranoid, but I can’t seem to fight this need to escape.
I open the door again and this time I’m not alone.
Chapter seventy-nine
Harper
“Eric,” I breathe out and any relief I feel is momentary as I take in the hard lines and shadows of his face, and the blistering anger in his eyes. “What’s happening?”
“Where the hell do you think you’re going?” He backs me into the apartment and shuts the door.
He’s angry, really angry, which makes me angry. “Smith was missing. You weren’t answering your phone.”
“Smith was at the end of the hall talking to me. I didn’t answer because I was already here.”
“And I knew that how? What is going on?”
“Where were you going?”
“Somewhere safe.”
“Because you’re not safe here with me?”
I blanch. “What? What are you talking about?”
