I rounded a corner. And froze.
On the sidewalk ahead of me a man moved quickly down the hill. It was the blond hair that had snared my attention. Like a beacon. Shiny and thick.
Martin?
He wore a tailored coat and carried a briefcase. People parted around him like he was a shark in a sea of dark tones of gray upon gray upon black. He strode swiftly, heading away from me.
My heart began to hammer. My mouth turned dry.
I jerked into action, pushing and shouldering through a stream of people coming off a bus. Martin turned around a building, disappearing from sight. I began to run, my portfolio bumping against me and flapping out and hitting pedestrians, who cursed at me.
I rounded the corner, panting. Then stopped. Rain drummed down, fine and steady. I glimpsed him again. He was halfway down the block, where the sidewalk was nearly empty. I hurried after him, not even considering properly why I was following him, or what I’d say when I reached him. If it was even him.
He stopped at an intersection ahead of me to wait for cars to pass. He turned and looked directly at me.
I stilled.
It was him—it was definitely him. I raised my gloved hand. But he looked straight past me, through me. His face blank.
“Martin?” I called, raising my hand higher, waving. “Martin!”
He looked over his shoulder as if to see whom I was calling to. Then he crossed the street and vanished into the entrance to an underground parking garage.
In shock, I slowly lowered my hand. It was him. I was certain it was him. Or . . . could I be wrong?
I scurried forward and stopped at the entrance to the concrete ramp that led down into the bowels of the garage. He’d gone down there. The garage exhaled a cold, damp smell. I hesitated, then started down the ramp to the first underground level. I rounded a curved concrete wall. From there I could see through a gap down to the next level. Martin. He’d stopped beside an orange Subaru Crosstrek. I was about to go farther down the ramp when the driver’s door of the Subaru swung open.
A woman got out. I couldn’t see her face. She had a woolen hat on against the cold, and a scarf was wound around her neck, hiding her chin. She was bundled into a puffer coat, so I had no clue of her body shape. And the light was dim. She kissed him, and he placed his hand at the small of her back. The memory of Martin touching me in that way slammed through me. I tried to swallow. The woman walked around to the passenger side, got in. The door shut. Martin put his briefcase on the back seat, climbed into the driver’s seat, and shut the driver’s side door. The engine started.
My brain reeled. He’d said he was leaving Vancouver on Monday last week. The hotel manager said he’d never registered at the Hartley Plaza. But I’d seen him sign that bar tab to his room. Was I going mad?
The car reversed out of the parking space. It came up the ramp, making for the exit into the street. I panicked and glanced around in desperation for a place to hide. A door to my right led to a stairwell. I opened the door and ducked inside. As the door swung slowly shut, the Subaru drove past. Martin looked out the window. I tried to press back against the wall, but he saw me through the open gap. The car continued, and the stairwell door swung shut.
I sucked in a shaky breath. Had I imagined this? No. It had to have been someone else, not Martin. Not the warm Australian developer seeking a backer for his project in New South Wales. Not the man who wanted kids and had been so attentive . . . the man I’d had sex with in an elevator.
I rubbed my face hard.
Mistake—that’s all. I’d made an error. He was someone who looked like Martin Cresswell-Smith. A doppelgänger. It was not unheard of. And I’d been sucked into some weird concept of reality after seeing a child that could be Chloe. That was all this was.
Then, as I stood in that cold, concrete, pee-scented stairwell, my phone rang. I fumbled in my purse, checked the caller ID.
Not a familiar number.
I connected the call with a shaky gloved finger and put the phone to my ear.
“Hello?”
There was a moment of staticky noise. “Ellie . . . hello? Hello—can you hear me?”
I blinked. My legs sort of sagged. I glanced through the tiny window that was set into the stairwell door as if the car might still be there. But there was nothing. I felt confused.
“Are you there, Ellie? This is Martin. Have I got the right number?”
“I, uh . . . yeah. Yeah, this is Ellie. Um. Could you hang on a sec? I . . . I’m just . . . in a store, paying for a purchase.” I pressed my phone against my coat, muffling the sound. I waited, gathering my wits, trying to organize my thoughts, hoping I could make my voice sound normal. I put the phone back to my ear. “Sorry about that.”
“Before you say anything, Ellie, I want to say I am so sorry not to have managed to return your calls until now. I had my phone nicked at Heathrow, somewhere between a fish-and-chips shop, an airport bar, and the plane. It had your contact details. I had to wait until I got home and could get my history and contact information reloaded.”
“Where . . .” My voice caught. I pushed open the door and
