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CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
“Evan,” Professor Vitucci said on a smile, opening his office door wide and ushering him in.
Just the sight of the older man brought him much-needed calm. “Prof. It’s great to see you.” His home office looked basically the same, though Evan thought the couch was new, and maybe the area rug. He couldn’t remember all the particulars of what the room had looked like the last time he’d been there years ago. That time was foggy. He’d been better, but he’d still been treading water. Stronger, even if his head was barely above the waves that rose unceasingly.
But though he didn’t remember exactly what colors the area rug had been, he remembered the feeling of the room, and that remained unchanged. It still smelled woodsy and clean, and the same bookshelf heavily stuffed with books sat behind his desk.
Professor Vitucci looked virtually the same, too, though he had a bit more gray at his temples than he had before, and perhaps a few more lines fanned his eyes. But his smile was still open and warm, his demeanor relaxed. He’d put Evan immediately at ease eight years before, and he did so now. The professor sat down in his chair, and Evan took a seat on the couch facing him, putting his ankle on his knee as he sat back. “How have you been, Prof?”
“I’m supposed to be asking you that,” he said with a smile. “Me, though? I’ve been great. This is the last semester I’ll be working at the university. In a few months, I’ll be retired for real.”
“Why do I get the feeling yourretired for realis still going to involve quite a bit of work?”
“Ah, you know me too well. Even after all this time. How’s the PI business?”
“It’s good. Better than good, actually. I’m finally at a place where I can pick and choose my jobs.”
“No more jealous spouses?”
Evan laughed. “How’d you know I gave those cases up first?”
“Who wouldn’t? It’s disheartening to watch people betray each other.”
He made a sound of agreement in his throat. “I do a lot of consulting work with the Reno PD now, actually. So I guess you and I are sort of coworkers.”
When Evan had first started seeing him, the professor had told him he’d consulted on a case many years before where a troubled man who’d considered himself a game master had tormented the city for weeks. Evan found it comforting that the man had firsthand knowledge regarding the psychopathy of game-related crimes, if such a field existed, and also that nothing surprised Vitucci. He’d seen it all. Too much. Evan wondered how he maintained such calm, and even exuded it.
“You sound happy, Evan. Much more settled than you were when I last saw you. How long ago was that now?”
“Four years.”
“Hard to believe. And how are you doing? Do you still have nightmares, or have those passed?”
“They’ve passed. I have one occasionally, but nothing regular. Nothing that makes me anxious to go to bed at night. You assured me that would be the case. Just a matter of time. And you were right.”
“Most things are just a matter of time,” he said. “It’s very difficult to believe when you’re in the midst of the pain.”
He nodded. He’d found that to be true. Time didn’t necessarily make the pain disappear entirely, but it sanded the sharp edges. It felt like now it was almost possible to run his fingers along it, to investigate the portions that still held splinters, that still had the potential to make him bleed. He played with the plastic end of his shoelace for a moment. The professor waited. He was good at sensing when someone was taking a moment to choose their words. “There’s one thing that’s still ... difficult for me. Something that I wrestle with, I guess.”
“What is that?”
He raised his eyes and met the empathetic gaze of the professor. “The girl,” Evan said. “The girl who I was abducted with, who I escaped with ...”
“Yes,” the professor said. “The girl. What was her name?”
“Noelle.”
“Ah, Noelle, yes. I never met her, but I remember most of what you told me about her. She helped you cope while you were there. She was instrumental in figuring out how to escape.”
“Yes. Yes, she was.”
“Are you still in contact with her?”
Evan shook his head. “It was painful ... afterward ...” He sighed. How to explain this?
“You became very attached while in captivity,” the professor said, tilting his head as he studied Evan.
Evan nodded, grateful that the professor was as intuitive as ever. “We did. And afterward, it was like ...” He moved his hand and lowered his foot to the floor. “It was like we were desperate to be together, but also desperate to be apart.” Was that right? Sort of. “The desperation to be together was stronger.” He frowned. “For me more than her. Maybe. But we both knew we needed to heal separately, I guess.” He gave his head a small shake, frustrated. “I’m trying to verbalize what’sonly ever been a feeling. I don’t know. I was wondering if it was a kind of Stockholm syndrome.”
