I walked inside and headed toward the bathroom where I locked myself in. As soon as the door closed the tears started falling. I wasn’t even sure what I was crying about anymore. There was the fact that I was going to be raising twins alone, Todd was dead, I had no family, I had no support system, and the biggest one at the moment, I was a pregnant, hormonal mess. A knock on the door had me quickly wiping my eyes and calming my breathing. When I swung the door open, I expected to see Drew, but instead I saw Harper. She pushed her way inside and leaned against the counter.
I tried to ignor the pang in my chest when I saw it wasn’t Drew. I didn’t need a man in my life, but still, Drew had somehow become something of a friend and part of me wished that he was the one here to check on me.
“Are you okay?”
“Yeah, I’m totally fine. I was just having a little hormonal me time.”
“I remember those days, crying over every little thing that made me sad.” She waited for me to say something, but I had no clue what to say. I didn’t know this woman and I couldn’t really say anything if I wanted.
“So, I’m assuming the dad is no longer in the picture?”
“No.”
She nodded in understanding. “Well, I won’t push for details. If you want to tell me, I’m here to talk.”
“Thanks.”
“That actually meant that I’m going to get it out of you one way or the other, so you might as well give in now and tell me everything.”
I laughed at her bold statement as she handed me a tissue.
“Seriously, though. You can come to me anytime you need to talk. I know what it’s like to not have the father in the picture.”
“Jack wasn’t in the picture?”
“Ethan isn’t Jack’s son. I mean, biologically. He’s never treated him differently, but Ethan is the product of a one night stand while I was trying to get over Jack. It didn’t take him long to come around though.”
“Wow. That’s…That’s something else for a man to step in and take care of someone else’s child. What happened with the one night stand?”
“It happened over in England. I don’t even remember his name. We didn’t exactly exchange particulars. I just wanted to feel something and move on. It didn’t end exactly as I hoped, but I got Ethan and Jack in the end, so it’s all good.”
“Yeah, I don’t think that’ll be the way my story ends. Drew barely can stand me most days.”
“So you have a thing for Drew?”
“No.” I said a little too quickly. “It’s not like that. I just mean, he’s the only man that I even consider a friend in this town and now that I’m pregnant with twins, I doubt I’ll be reeling in the guys. Besides, I’m not looking for anyone right now.”
She reached down and grabbed my left hand, running her finger over the faint white line that was still on my ring finger. Even though I wasn’t supposed to, I still wore my wedding ring when I was at home. It felt so wrong not to wear it and for just a little while, I could pretend like Todd was just on a business trip and would be home soon.
“Well, no one says that you have to move on right away, but you have the girls and me now. We’ll be here to help you with whatever you need.”
“That’s a nice offer, but I need to do this on my own.”
“You know what? That’s the same thing I said to Drew when he told me he would be there to help me with my baby. Do yourself a favor. Don’t push away the people that are willing to help you. We could be really good friends if you give us a chance. Come on. Let’s get you cleaned up and back outside before they get to wondering what we’re doing in here.”
“Thanks, Harper. Believe me, I will take you up on your offer at two in the morning when I’m not getting any sleep.”
Harper laughed and then helped me fix my makeup. We headed back outside and I sat down with the girls who pretended nothing was wrong. I listened to Harper and Anna tell stories about each other for the next half hour and I had to say, they were pretty funny.
“Harper, just face it. You’re a walking disaster. It’s not so much that you get into trouble, it just seems that it appears whenever you’re around,” Anna said.
“Oh come on. That’s not fair. Name the last time that I got into any trouble.”
Jack walked over and interrupted. “How about a few weeks ago when you thought you’d plant some flowers and you dug into the ground before talking to me. You hit the sprinkler line and flooded the backyard.”
The girls all burst out laughing and Harper crossed her arms and huffed. “That wasn’t my fault. If you had helped me like I asked a few weeks before, I wouldn’t have had to do it myself.”
“Wait. Were the sprinklers running when you hit the line?” Ryan asked.
“No. I had started digging and didn’t realize I had hit the line. Then Jack’s mom called and asked me to go over with Ethan and I left it for the next day. When I woke up, I got my coffee and went to sit out on the back porch. By then, the sprinklers had already started running and all the water was pumped out into the yard.”
“Yep, and why don’t you tell them what happened after that,” Jack said, crossing his arms over his chest.
Harper shot him a death glare. “I saw the water coming up and I went over to try to plug the hole before Jack saw, but I ended up getting all wet. It created this giant mud puddle around me and I was covered in mud in about two minutes. Jack had heard the baby crying and was wondering where I was, so he came outside to find me and saw me slipping and sliding in the mud. He just stood there laughing at me!”
Everyone was laughing at her and she took it all in stride.
“See, the thing you gotta understand, Sarah, is that Harper here could find trouble sitting in her own living room,” Jack said as he continued to laugh at her, but then he walked up to her and gave her a big kiss. “I swear, one of these days I’m gonna have to wrap you in bubble wrap.”
For the next hour, everyone shared their favorite Harper stories, to which she good-naturedly laughed along with. After about another two hours, I decided it was time for me to head home. I’d had a great time, but I was getting tired and my bed was calling my name.
“It was great to meet everyone, but my back is killing me and I’m ready for bed.”
Drew stepped forward and spoke to me for the first time since his friends arrived. “Why didn’t you say so? I could have gotten you some pillows or something.”
I quickly peeked around the group, seeing everyone looking a little shocked at Drew. “It’s fine. I was fine. I’m just ready to call it a night. Thanks for having me over.”
I started to head to the steps when I heard someone’s boots on the steps behind me. I turned to see Sebastian walking down the steps behind me. Maybe he was leaving too. I continued to walk toward my house, but when he should have turned to go to his truck, he continued to follow me toward my house.
“Um. Did you need something?”
“Nope. I’m just walking you home.”
“Okay. Well, thanks. So, Drew tells me that you run a security firm?”
“Yeah, I started it after I got back from the war.”
“Where were you stationed?”
“Afghanistan and Iraq. I served for thirteen years and then I got injured and was discharged.”
“I’m sorry. Do you mind me asking how you were injured?”
“I got too close to an insurgent strapped with explosives. They went off and I lost some of my vision in my left eye. It’s not too bad, but I couldn’t pass the eye exam to get back out there.”
“So how does that work, you having the security company?”
“Most of my job is administrative. I can still do some work, but I mostly delegate to the teams now. It sucks, but there really isn’t much opportunity for me to be involved when I’m the boss.”
“I bet you miss it.”
“Yeah, I do.”
“Once a soldier, always a soldier.”
He looked at me funny and I had a feelin
g I’d said too much. I already knew the mindset from Todd. When he was discharged for PTSD, he had a difficult time adjusting to being home. Even after he got better, he wanted to re-enlist, but I had begged him not to. I wanted to start living with him and not through him. Luckily, he’d had an offer from a security firm that he was very interested in and he decided to take it.
“Yeah, something like that. Anyway, I figured if I couldn’t serve anymore, I needed to do something that put my skills to use. I opened my firm six months after I got home and we’ve been slowly building ever since.”
“How do you get clients way out here?”
“We’re only about an hour from Pittsburg, so that’s a pretty easy commute for setting up meetings. Then, when I get a job farther away, I send a team with everything they need. It actually works pretty well with today’s technology. If things go well, we might be setting up another office out east, maybe New York.”
I stumbled when he said New York and he grabbed my arm to steady me. There were plenty of places to set up a firm in New York, but if he went there, the chances of my identity staying hidden would become substantially less.
“Are you okay?”
“Yeah. I’m fine. You know, pregnant people have horrible balance.”
He didn’t look like he bought a thing I was saying, so I climbed the steps to the porch, hoping to escape his scrutiny. Unfortunately, he followed me right to the door.
“Thank you for walking me home. It was nice to meet you.”
“Sarah, I know you’re running from something and if you ever need help,… please let me know. I can help you.”
“What? I…I don’t know what you’re talking about. I’m not running from anything.”
“Really? I did a background check on you. It’s very…thorough. None of it makes sense though. It says you were born and raised in Texas.”
“Yeah, that’s right.”
“But you don’t have an accent, not even a hint of one, and Drew told me that you looked up a recipe for sweet tea because you had never tried it. Funny since Texans love sweet tea. Also, you dye your hair and wear colored contacts. It’s almost like you’re trying to look like someone else.”
“Did you ever think that I did my best to drop the accent because I didn’t want to sound like I was from the south? Or maybe that I was too poor for sweet tea growing up? Maybe I just like to feel like someone else every once in a while and that’s why I color my hair.”
“And wear colored contacts?”
My heart was thundering in my chest. I didn’t know quite what to say to this man. I couldn’t let on who I was. It wouldn’t be safe for him or for me, but I didn’t know how to convince him that I wasn’t on the run. If he figured me out, I was going to have to run again and I was just settling into my new life here.
“You paid for this house in cash, which either means that you have a lot of money laying around or you didn’t want a money trail. You didn’t carry a phone on you until Drew gave you one and you have no online activity, which means you don’t want a big online presence. You don’t even have a bank account. You pay for everything in cash.”
I needed to find a way to shut him down. He was calling me out on every single thing I was doing to protect myself and my child.
“Where do you get off talking to me like this? You think that because you’re in security you know everything about me? I don’t like credit cards so I don’t use them. I’m a luddite, so no, I don’t go online, and what is wrong with paying cash for what I need? You’re just picking apart my life trying to find something about me that you don’t like. Do you want me to move? You don’t like me in your town? Just say the word and I’ll leave. It’s not like there’s anything holding me here.”
He stepped in close, trapping me against the wall. My heart started to pound in fear. What if he worked for Cordano? I needed to leave. It was no longer safe here.
“I don’t want you to leave. I want to keep you safe. All of those things separately don’t mean a whole lot, but when you put them all together, it looks very suspicious. It adds up to someone who is running, and I know who you are.” He stared at me for a minute, letting that little bomb drop on me. My food threatened to come back up if I didn’t calm down. I grasped for the handle behind me, hoping that I could slip inside away from this man that was supposedly Drew’s friend. He must have read my mind because he reached for the handle and opened the door, ushering me inside. He steered me toward the couch and then sat down next to me. I did my best to avoid his stare, certain that if I looked at him, I would give myself away.
“Sarah, look at me.”
Slowly, I turned my head to stare into his knowing eyes. They softened slightly and he reached out to grasp my hand.
“I know you’re scared, but I can help you if you’d just trust me. I won’t share your secret with anyone. No one at my company knows who you are and I won’t tell them unless it’s absolutely necessary.”
I still didn’t know what to say. He might be guessing and looking for me to confirm his suspicions.
“Sarah Matthews testified and helped put away Giuseppe Cordano and Marco Abruzzo. You disappeared for a funeral the same week that Sarah Matthews testified against Abruzzo. I know from Drew that men came to pick you up that were heavily armed, probably WitSec. I know you have all the same facial features, height, and weight as Sarah Matthews. When I suspected who you were, I ran you through a facial recognition program and changed your hair and eyes. Guess what? It looked just like you do today, minus the baby bump.”
I couldn’t listen to this anymore. I got up and raced back to my bedroom, pulling my suitcase out and throwing clothes inside. I heard him approach me, but I couldn’t spare any time for him right now. I had to move fast before the mafia found me.
“Sarah, you don’t have to leave. I’m here to help you.” I couldn’t. I just kept packing. “Sarah, just sit down for a minute and listen to me.” He grabbed my arms and gave me a slight shake. I finally looked up at him with tears in my eyes. He gently pushed me down on the bed and then sat in front of me on his haunches. “I know the rules of WitSec. I’m not asking you to admit anything, but I’m going to give you my cell number and you use it day or night if you feel like something’s off. I can get here faster than any agent and I can protect you and your children.”
“Why would you do that?”
“I would do it for anyone that was in danger, but mostly because Drew considers you a friend. I know that you can’t tell him what’s going on and that’s a heavy burden to bear. I can help you keep up appearances so that it doesn’t get overwhelming. Just trust me to help you.”
“If you found me, so can they. I have to go before someone else recognizes me.”
“I found you because I’m trained to look past disguises. I’ve also been following the case, so it didn’t take much for me to link the two. I promise you, the average person is not looking at you and saying, ‘oh, there’s Sarah Matthews’. Sean is suspicious, but he’s a cop. He’s suspicious of every newcomer. I can help you with him also. You don’t have to uproot the life you’ve started here. Look, I wouldn’t have approached you, but I can see you’re struggling with keeping everything straight. I know what you’ve lost and I know what you’re facing. I wanted you to know that you’re not alone. I want to be someone you can come to if you’re struggling. I know that you can’t talk about things when they get tough, but you can trust me and you can call me when you’re feeling overwhelmed. I promise, I only want to help.”
“You promise not to tell anyone?”
“I swear it. I won’t say a word.”
I really didn’t want to call WitSec and ask to be relocated right now. It would be difficult to move half way through my pregnancy and finding a job would be difficult to say the least. Who would hire me so close to my due date? Besides, I had really started to like living here. It was peaceful away from all the chaos of the city and without Todd, the city would feel empty. Who knows where they would sti
ck me if I asked to be moved? They would no doubt move me if they knew Sebastian knew about me.
“I’ll stay, but I’ll be moved if WitSec finds out that you know. I’m content here so please don’t mess this up for me.”
“I won’t. Here, get me your phone and I’ll give you my number.”
I got up and grabbed my phone, handing it over reluctantly. I wanted to trust him so badly. I just hoped I didn’t get burned.
“Alright. You keep your phone on you at all times and if something is off, even if it’s just a feeling and you don’t have proof, call me and I’ll be here as fast as I can. I promise I will keep you safe.”
I nodded and felt a little relief for the first time since this whole ordeal had happened. I finally had someone that was in my corner and sticking around. Better yet, he was a friend of Drew’s and his friends had already made attempts to accept me into their circle. Now I just had to focus on these babies and pray that Sebastian could really help me through all this. He was the only one that I could really rely on now.
CHAPTER NINE
Drew
SEBASTIAN HAD WALKED Sarah back to her house a half hour ago and I was still waiting for him to return. What the hell could he be doing over there for this long? Everyone else was sitting around bullshitting, but all I could do was watch for any sign that Sebastian was on his way back over. Maybe she wasn’t feeling good and Sebastian was taking care of her. Or maybe she was finally opening up to somebody, but shouldn’t that somebody be me? I was her neighbor after all and I was the one that invited her over today. The thought that really turned my stomach was that Sebastian might be over there flirting with her and asking her out. It wasn’t that I wanted to go out with her. I was still way too screwed up for that, but I had come to think of her as mine in some weird way.
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