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Approaching the office feels illegal. If someone told me that there was an invisible force field outside the door that caused fear and panic in the face of an intruder, I would believe them fully and without any further evidence.
To my absolute shock, I find that the door is unlocked. Adas has used nothing but fear to keep me out of the office, which has me both impressed with him and angry at myself for falling for it.
It’s not as neatly organized as I would expect it to be, at least not for someone who has been keeping it such a secret for so long. Honestly, I was expecting there to be sociopathic levels of cleanliness. How would he know if something was messed with or went missing?
Whatever the reason may be, his organized chaos is nothing but an advantage for me.
I start with the papers on his desk, shuffling through them until I see something that might catch my eye. Most of them are bills from the clinic or from the physical therapist who I had been seeing.
Come on. There must be something more obvious.
I have to force myself to move more slowly, to truly allow myself to find it instead of missing it in my haste.
After sorting through the papers on the desk and promptly scattering them again, I go through the inner drawer where the files are kept.
Toward the back of the filing cabinet is a tab markedRuth Blakely.
Ruth Blakely?
Did Adas have a wife before me? Is that what he isn’t telling me?
My pulse races, and I feel myself growing fevered and weak as I reach for the file.
When I open it, I could onlydreamthat he had been keeping an ex-wife from me. What I see is so much worse.
A photo of myself is staring me right in the face. I’m wearing a uniform as though I work at a diner or fast-food restaurant. I don’t look significantly younger than I am now either.
Why would I have worked in the food industry if Adas had all this money? There’s absolutely no way I would have chosen to do it just as a pastime.
I turn to the second page, finding screenshots of a social media profile with the nameRuth Blakely, my face emblazoned all over it. Within the screenshots, I find posts written by me, most of them all about that awful band that Adas kept playing for me.
What the fuck?!
So Ididlike them at some point?
And he was using them to make me believe I really knew him?
Whether or not I like them now is irrelevant. The fact is that I’m not at all who Adas says I am, and now I can’t be certain that he is who he says he is either. He’s certainly not my husband and definitely not someone I’d want as one.
Fear comes over me in a horrific wave, starting at the top of my head and rolling down my spine as reality settles in.
I’ve essentially been kidnapped.
But from where?
With as much information as he has, there’s got to be an address somewhere. I didn’t live with him, that’s for sure.
I flip through pages and pages of screenshots and notes before I find it – 1882 South Poplar Ave., Apartment 306.
I stare at the address for what feels like hours. When I finally snap myself out of it, I look up the address on my phone, seeing the apartment pinged forty-three minutes south of the estate.
That’s where Adas says the “bad side of town” is.
Was he being serious? Or did he just not want me to go and find out for myself?
I take the file and shove it under my shirt just in case someone sees me trying to leave.
Fortunately for me, Adas is a real braggart about his car collection, meaning I know exactly where each set of keys is kept. I sneak down to the underground garage, panicking as I grab a random set of keys and clicking the lock button until I find the correct car.
