Page 262 of The Professor's Wife

I watched as a patron left the pub, tossing a napkin into the bin, and that’s when I remembered the paper bag Oliver had discarded. I stilled, thinking.

Was I seriously considering fishing it out?

Surely not—

I answered my own question by stepping out of the car and going to the bin. I popped the lid and found the paper bag withinseconds. I grabbed it, took it back to the van, and sat once more behind the wheel. I felt crazy opening it and peering in.

What the hell was wrong with me?

I frowned at what I saw. I stuck my hand in and pulled out what looked to be a puffer. The prescription sticker on the front was scratched to shit, leaving no way to tell whose name had been there. I dropped it back and pulled out the second item. A lanyard with a white keycard that had the University initials decorated on it, with B13 labeled in the corner. Maybe it was something Oliver used at the University that he no longer needed. Both items were underwhelming. What did I hope to find? Something incriminating? Who was I truly after right now? Oliver… or was it Daisy? Was I so tormented by the thought of her using me that I needed to disprove it by having evidence that Oliver was some kind of evil man?

I dropped the lanyard back, scrubbed away the tired lines on my face, and grabbed for the cold bottle he’d given me. One glance in the mirror and I could understand why. I was red, lips dry. While he looked like Prince fucking Charming, I looked like a spooked drifter. I guzzled the bottle down and then sat there watching the blue sky, feeling lost…

Feeling empty.

Feeling like I just wanted to drive back to her.

I shut my eyes.

Fuck.

I woke up with a dry mouth and a pain behind my eyes that felt like someone had driven a nail through my skull.

For a second, I didn’t know where I was.

Darkness pressed against the windows. The parking lot was now full and loud with people and headlights and bodies moving in and out of the restaurant like the whole fucking world hadn’t slipped sideways while I slept.

I sat up too fast.

Pain cracked through my neck, and I gripped the steering wheel, breathing hard.

“What the fuck?”

My voice sounded thick and slurred.

I looked around the van.

The guitar case in the back. Satchel still on the passenger seat. The paper bag folded open near the cupholder—

Empty.

I stared at it.

The puffer was gone.

So was the keycard.

For a few seconds, my mind wouldn’t move. I just sat there, looking at the open bag like the things might reappear if I waited. I grabbed it and turned it upside down. Nothing fell out. I checked the cupholder, the floor, under the passenger seat, between the seats, my jacket pockets, and the console. My hands moved too fast, stupid and frantic, searching places I knew they couldn’t be.

Gone.

The puffer and the university keycard were gone. The same puffer and keycard Oliver had thrown in the rubbish bin outside the pub. The same ones I’d fished out like a fucking lunatic because something about him had made my skin crawl.

My eyes moved to the empty water bottle.

The one Oliver had tossed me.

It lay on its side near my boot, label half-crushed, a few drops still gathered along the plastic tip. My stomach twisted as I remembered his face in the parking lot. The concerned smile.The way he’d said it was going to be a hot day. Like he was doing me a fucking favor. As though I were some poor red-faced idiot who needed saving from the sun.