He chuckled, taking a bite of his sandwich. “I can picture it now—bags of food sitting in the middle of the kitchen for days while you come in every once in a while to dig out a box of Pop Tarts.”
She laughed. “That’s about the way it works. Except it’s not Pop Tarts, it’s Honey Nut Cheerios. I think I’m addicted to the stuff.”
He took another bite, chewing thoughtfully. “So, you haven’t left the house in a while, except for last night. Who knew you were going out?”
The sudden nature of the question caught her off guard. One second they were laughing and talking about Pop Tarts and Cheerios, the next he’d gone all intense on her.
“Laurissa is the only one who knew. She showed up and dragged me out to see a movie and grab dinner. You don’t suspect your own sister was involved in the break-in, do you?”
“Definitely not, but you have to admit it’s convenient as hell that your house gets broken into the one night you decide to go out, right? It means the thief was either incredibly lucky you were out or he was watching the place for a while and made his move the moment you left.”
The coincidence hadn’t been lost on Peyton. She and Laurissa had talked about it while the cops had poked around. They’d come up with dozens of convoluted and outlandish theories. Peyton was a writer. But Noah had cut through all their wild speculation in seconds with his bleak—and rather creepy—assessment of the situation. The idea that someone had been outside her house day and night watching her every move made the hair on the back of her neck stand on end.
“Which one do you think it is?”
She wasn’t sure which she’d rather have him confirm. The first meant she was lucky to be alive, the second meant she had a determined stalker.
“I have no idea,” Noah said with a casual shrug before taking another bite of his sandwich. “If we’re lucky and the guy never comes back, that means we have our answer.”
Peyton sipped her iced tea. “You keep referring to the person who broke in as a he. Is that based on any kind of evidence, or simply plain old sexism?”
Noah snorted, reaching for another sandwich. “Good point. Consider me properly chastised. I’ll endeavor to be more inclusive when I’m talking about the thief.”
“Don’t worry about it. I figured it was a guy, too,” she said. “I was merely hoping you knew something the cops didn’t tell me.”
“I wish I did,” he admitted.
As they ate, Noah asked her to walk him through the events of last night’s break-in one more time. That wasn’t too difficult since she’d already gone over it at least twenty times for the police and then Em.
“What’s up with saving your book to an external hard drive?” Noah asked, licking some avocado mayonnaise off his thumb in a way she shouldn’t have found intriguing, but did for some reason. “Hasn’t your publisher ever heard of the Cloud?”
Peyton laughed. “I asked them the same question. Unfortunately, they’re sort of old school that way. When the third book in the series took off and became an international bestseller, they got worried someone would hack the Cloud and find the book or that someone on the inside would pluck it off and sell it to the highest bidder. I’m lucky. If they had their way, I’d be locked in an underground bunker somewhere writing this thing on a manual typewriter. The hard drive was the compromise.”
“International bestseller, huh? I guess I can understand the paranoia.” A frown marred his otherwise perfect features. “How many people know you carry the drive around with you all the time?”
“Not many. Em and Laurissa, of course, and a few people at my publisher.”
“That’s good,” Noah murmured. “If there really is someone determined to get their hands on your book and he discovers you carry it with you every time you go out, he’s more likely to come after you instead of trying to break in to your house again.”
She shuddered. “Then let’s hope they never learn about the hard drive.”
Noah picked up his glass, regarding her over the top of it. “Laurissa told me that you guys went to San Diego State together. Did you go to college for creative writing or something like that?”
“Not exactly,” she said. “I’ve always loved books and reading since I was a kid. I wrote stuff all through middle and high school, but nothing serious. Just goofing around, you know? I went to SD State to get an undergraduate degree in English and my master’s in education. I figured it would be a natural fit for me.”
“And it wasn’t?”
She laughed again. It was easy to do that with him, she realized, which was kind of crazy. It usually took her forever to get comfortable with a guy, but with Noah, it was like she didn’t even have to try. “Actually, it was. I taught for a couple of years. Teaching is a ton of work for sure—don’t ever let anyone tell you differently—but I enjoyed it.”
“Okay, so how does one go from being a hard-working English teacher to an international best seller?”
“The normal way, I guess. By pure accident.” She smiled as she thought about how many times she’d told this story at book signings and conferences. It was something everyone wanted to know. “During summer breaks I wrote stuff for one of the big fan fiction sites. It wasn’t meant to be anything more than a fun way to relieve a little stress. But then Em sent me an email saying she liked my voice and wanted to know if I had any original material. I sent her what I had and about a year later, the first book in my young adult series hit the
