Page 11 of Facade

Shit! Should she just play dumb and pretend she didn’t know what he was talking about? What was the best way to handle this?

Wait, he said he knew she’d be in disguise. How did he know that? Was it common knowledge, or was he the only one?

“Clarke, it’s Jace,” he said. “Did you not realize that I work here?”

“Jace?” It took a moment for her brain to start functioning again. Was this actually the Jace she knew, here at Mars College?

Clarke didn’t know what to think or how to act. She knew that Jace taught combat and agility courses. He had changed jobs a few years ago, but Clarke didn’t remember him mentioning Mars College. Jace was a wolverine shifter, which explained his sturdy build.

She hadn’t seen him since she was nine, when Jace’s family moved. Clarke might have recognized him from the photos he’d posted when he turned to face her if she hadn’t been reeling with shock.

None of those pictures had done him justice, though. Most of them had been taken from a distance with Jace in a group of people. He’d grown into quite the hottie with a square jaw, firm chin, lips that were just full enough to be sexy without looking feminine, and a straight nose.

Jace’s voice was a deep, gravelly rumble that did funny things to her insides. Clarke briefly wondered if her dad had attempted to emulate Jace when he created the DSV potion.

His big brown eyes were as beautiful as she’d remembered, with long, thick lashes any woman would envy. Now that he was in front of her, Clarke could see hints of the boy she’d been friends with in the man he was now. But that was immaterial.

Damn common names to hell. There had to be hundreds of thousands of J. Smiths in the world. It had never crossed her mind that Jace was the J. Smith she was meeting.

Was Jace the reason she had the vision? Could he have had something to do with her dad going missing?

No, she would have drawn him if that were the case. Clarke’s instincts told her that Jace was not involved in her dad’s disappearance. He was a good person who wanted to find Charlie as badly as she did.

The sense that she could trust Jace completely helped calm her nerves. Clarke had faith in her intuition. It had never led her astray.

This was totally unexpected, but Jace wouldn’t betray her. In fact, Clarke was positive that he would help. He hadn’t hesitated to call in favors from friends in law enforcement to find her dad.

“Sorry. This was……a shock,” Clarke said belatedly. “I didn’t realize you worked here.”

“That’s why you didn’t call or text,” Jace said as he again started walking toward her. “It makes sense now. The dean sent an email three days ago, telling us the name of the new monitor, and asking everyone to welcome you to the team. Voudrie is an unusual name. I figured there couldn’t be another person with the same first and last name, degrees, and job experience. That would be too much of a coincidence.

“As the dorm monitor who has been here the longest, the dean accepted my offer to give you a tour of the campus. You had a vision, didn’t you?”

Eventually, she might find humor in the fact that Jace had figured out exactly who she was and why she was here due to her unusual name, while she’d been broadsided by his presence for the opposite reason. But she wasn’t laughing now.

Clarke was still thrown off that Jace was here, but decided to go with her gut feelings. And from what he’d said, he had to be the monitor for the shifter dorm.

“Yeah. I focused on getting a clue that would lead to Dad, and drew the front entrance of the college.

“Only Hannah’s family and Harry know. None of Dad’s friends can do this for me, and they don’t live close by. If I had known you worked here, I would have asked you to look, but still would have come myself.”

Clarke couldn’t just sit around while someone else took all the risks and searched for her dad. It was also possible that she could have another vision while she was here that would give her a direction to look in.

“We all care about Charlie, but he’s your dad. You need to be directly involved rather than waiting for news. I would have done the same thing myself. Someone here was involved in what happened to Charlie,” Jace said with scowl, echoing some of her own thoughts.

“Maybe. The clue could be anything,” Clarke said. She was glad Jace understood why she had to do this herself, and wasn’t angry that she hadn’t confided in him or his dads about the vision.

“And you applied for the job because you’ll have access to the entire campus,” Jace guessed. “I’ll help you. We can search the offices together today before the rest of the faculty arrive.”

“That’s what I was thinking,” Clarke said. “This is the best time to do it.”

Jace was a few feet away from her now, close enough for them to speak normally, but still giving her space. Now that she was over most of her shock, Clarke was relieved that she wouldn’t be doing this alone.

“My mind has been going in circles since Dean Stanhope sent that email,” Jace said. “I was already planning to search the campus, knowing you had to have a serious reason to pretend to be a man and upend your life to get a job here. At least now I know why you didn’t call or text. Do you trust me to search the main entrance and the guardhouse?”

Jace wasn’t sure she didn’t suspect him. As children, they’d been friends, but hadn’t seen each other in eighteen years. Maybe that was why he was keeping his distance. Clarke was mostly focused on his question, however.

“You think we need to check the guardhouse?”