Page 92

Adrian

I will not check June’s email today. I will not. I’m going to stay away from her social media. I’m going to finally let her go.

Some people do affirmations in the morning. I try to convince myself not to stalk June. This is who I am now. This is who she turned me into.

Staring at the ceiling, I can almost ignore the buzzing from my phone, signaling me to get the hell out of bed. I have a flight to catch. From Chicago I went to New York, and there’s a strong chance I’ll be heading to Seattle after. The details of that job haven’t been finalized yet, and I’m not willing to commit until they are.

Another hotel. Another bed warmed only by me.

And all the time, there’s the temptation of scraping any piece of information I can from June’s accounts, since there wasn’t a job available close to her. Yes, I checked. Sue me.

All I have is checking on her online. Anything so long as it means a chance to look at her, to read the updates she posts in her unique voice under the account of her pen name. She is a virus that took root and grew deep inside me.

Today is the first day I’m going to be free of her. This is it.

All right. Maybe after one more check to make sure she’s okay. Then that’s it.

What can I say? I’ve watched her in action. I know what a literal walking disaster she can be. Every time I check her accounts, I expect to see something about her hurting herself or accidentally offending someone in public by narrating her thoughts out loud. Hell, she could’ve gotten herself arrested or hauled into a psychiatric facility. I truly wouldn’t be surprised.

I finally shut off my phone alarm. I always give myself plenty of extra time to reach the airport, so I’m not in any hurry when I swing my legs over the side of the bed and begin my usual stalking. How far I’ve fallen.

That’s the problem in a nutshell. I have fallen. I didn’t mean to. I didn’t want to. It happened without me realizing it, and now it’s too late to do anything about it.

Now all I have is a pale substitute for the real thing. But it’s all I have, so I cling to it, opening her Facebook feed to read her latest updates. The sight of her profile picture tightens my chest, as always. Those wide, trusting blue eyes, that silky hair. Her smooth and impossibly soft skin. And that mouth . . .

I’m halfway to getting hard by the time I scroll down to see whether she posted anything since yesterday afternoon, since I was busy working last night and too tired by the time I got back to the hotel to do much more than collapse into bed.

As it turns out, she posted a link along with a short explanation. I can almost hear her in my head as I read her words.

Hey, everybody! It might not be the holidays, but I have a present for all of you. I know, I know, I shouldn’t have. I’m too generous.

I’ve published a new short story and made it free for all of my beloved readers. Let me know what you think—it’s a tale close to my heart.

Close to her heart? I’ve tapped the link before I know what I’m doing, opening a document with a title that makes my jaw drop. Falling for the Hit Man.

“Holy shit,” I whisper, my eyes darting back and forth as I scan the story, my heart stuttering.

One thing is sure within the first chapter: She didn’t bother trying hard to come up with names for her characters. “Adriano and Junia?” I ask with a disbelieving laugh. There’s no way she expected me to read this, is there? Then again, why else would she have made it so obvious she’s writing about us?

My hands are trembling, blood rushing in my ears, blocking out all the sound around me. All I care about is reading anyway, absorbed by the story that is surprisingly close to what we went through. The chance encounter—on a train this time rather than a plane. Junia mistaken for Adriano’s girlfriend. The two of them together, with Junia learning about his world while he fights to learn just who is out to get him. She left out Adriano’s brother—I’m glad of that.

She did, however, mention a fearsome, kick-ass Mafia boss named Serena. I wonder who that could be. I have to laugh at her girl crush.

I’m not laughing, though, as the two of them part ways. “The words were on the tip of her tongue,” I whisper, and it isn’t the story’s setting I see in my mind’s eye. It’s the two of us at the airport, those final moments we spent together. She looked so unsure. Was this what was going on in her mind? “Why couldn’t she come out and say it?” I read aloud. “If she had learned anything about herself throughout this adventure, it was that she possessed a well of courage and strength she never knew existed before. She might even thank him for revealing that part of herself. As long as she could make him understand how much he meant to her.”

The words leave me breathless. I wish she had said something. I wish I had. I could’ve told her how proud I was. She never folded, she never pleaded. She never stopped being herself either. No amount of hardship could change her. Why didn’t I tell her?

Like in real life, the two of them part, with Junia facing heartbreak once she’s back home. The story is coming to an end—the bar at the side of the screen is almost at the bottom now.

The story jumps six weeks at the end.

The phone in her hand represented not only communication, but deep uncertainty. Should she use it? Did he really need to know? Would he care?

Would it be fair if she never told him what she now knew?

“What do you know?” I demand, reading faster instead of savoring her words. I’ve never been on the edge of my seat like this.

She’d been courageous before. She could be courageous again. Taking a deep breath, she got it over with all at once, the way she would rip off a Band-Aid in one swift motion. Her heart fluttered, and indecision flooded her system as the phone rang once. Twice. Maybe he wouldn’t pick up. Maybe he was using a different phone from the one he did before. Maybe he didn’t care enough to answer.