Alexis found Ethan at the window early the next morning and sat with him until breakfast. She tried to stall afterward, but Ethan seemed keen on leaving. His previous nervousness had come back, and she didn't want to leave the room for fear that he'd vanish. She convinced him to stay long enough to leave with her, but he insisted on leaving as soon as possible. She packed a lunch each for herself and for Ethan, hoping he'd at least walk around the city with her before he disappeared altogether.
She promised her dad she'd call later, and by the time she and Ethan finally left, he looked like he'd cease to exist if she so much as blinked. "Are you sure you're okay?"
He nodded. Ever since he'd explained the bruise on his face (he'd simply said he'd hit himself during a nightmare), Ethan had grown increasingly anxious, and Alexis hated to see him so wound up. In the elevator, she touched his hand, and his eyes snapped to her face. "You're tense again." She smiled. "It's not the end of the world," she told him.
"I stayed above ground too long, and going out last night was dangerous. Whoever attacked me had to have known I was staying nearby; I didn't have my backpack with me."
Alexis slipped her hand in his. "It's New York, and you don't particularly stand out. On campus, you'd look like just another student."
"Not to them. They're trained to find me." He took his hand away from hers and put it in his pocket.
"I just don't want you to vanish," she confessed quietly as the doors opened on the bottom floor.
Ethan's response surprised her. "I don't think I'll be able to disappear that easily. I think I might keep turning up, like a bad penny."
"You're not a bad penny," Alexis said.
Ethan shook his head and looked up and down the street. Alexis followed him as he walked to the corner, where he stopped and turned around. "Alexis, you can't follow me," he told her.
"But—" Alexis could feel her face turn red, and her eyes stung with impending tears. She swallowed and cleared her throat, blinking the tears away.
Ethan stood in front of her for a moment before kissing her cheek lightly. "I'll see you again, Alexis Castle." He walked away, and by the time Alexis followed him around the corner, the street beyond was empty.
"What?" Parker snapped. She knew who was on the other end; it was a quarter to midnight, and Parker was thinking about the short call from Ethan.
"You're falling behind, Miss Parker," Jarod said. "I've seen Lyle twice in the last week, but my sources tell me you haven't even stopped by."
"I've been busy," Parker sneered.
"Too busy to do your job? Tut tut." Jarod sounded like he was gloating.
"It's just a small detour. Don't act so pleased." There were better moves to be played in their game, but Parker was desperate for an out, so she asked, "Have you heard from Ethan?"
"No," Jarod replied. "Have you?"
"He called the night after you did and asked about Johanna."
"The murdered lawyer," Jarod said. "I do my homework. I just can't figure out why the Centre would wait thirteen years to kill her."
"I don't know," Parker admitted. "Broots thinks the Centre didn't know about her."
"The Centre, ignorant?" Jarod mocked. "That's like saying the Centre doesn't have two people failing to catch their best Pretender."
Parker was going to take offense, but Jarod hung up before she had the chance. He was right; it seemed unlikely that the Centre would wait thirteen years to kill Johanna Beckett.
The letters were proving frustrating. Broots had given her a copy of all the letters that existed in the Centre databases, but even that was only half of the correspondence. The letters had no greeting, only a signature, always the same: JB. They told Parker little to nothing about the 'special project', but Parker suspected much of the information was in the missing letters, the ones sent from the Centre operative to Johanna.
Without the other letters, there was no sure way of knowing that there was a connection between Catherine Parker and Johanna Beckett, no matter what Parker's instincts told her. She would just have to find the missing notes herself.
Broots poked his head into her office, clutching the half-open door like a shield. "Uh, Miss Parker?"
"What?" she snapped.
"I think you might want to see this," he said.
Parker stashed the letters in her desk drawer and followed Broots down to his workstation. "Amaze me," she said dryly.
Broots brought up the files the letters were stored in. "See the dates on the letters? They're all dated around '85." He summoned another window, this one showing information about the file. "But the entry date—the date the letters were first recorded into the database—isn't until almost fourteen years later."
Parker looked at the long list of information, skimming until she found the entry date: January 10, 1999. "There is no way that's coincidence," Parker sneered.
"It's the Centre," Broots remarked. "Whoever wrote those letters was killed just before the letters went into the database."
Parker frowned. "But that's still thirteen years those letters stayed hidden."
"Weren't there some renovations done on some Centre properties back in '98?" Broots asked. "Tech and security upgrades or something."
"The Centre was bugging their own real estate," Parker said. "Trying to weed out traitors. That was just before I came back to Corporate; I had to stay abroad for a couple extra months while it was going on."
"Someone must have found those letters while they were doing renovations."
"It's an explanation," Parker said, and though she believed it could be true, she also knew it was weak. Hiding anything from the Centre was no cake walk.
Parker had hoped to spend her Sunday afternoon at home, doing nothing of consequence and certainly not standing trial in Raines' office. But, of course, she had a tattler for a twin brother, and he'd convinced The Wheezer that Parker was not doing her job. Now Parker was enduring a long list of accusations, veiled threats, and blatant criticisms of how she'd been chasing Jarod for six years and still hadn't managed to catch him.
When Raines finally let her leave, Lyle was waiting outside with a smug grin on his face. Parker wanted so very badly to wipe that idiotic grin off his face in any way she could, but she was pretty sure he'd just grin through it. "Don't look so pleased with yourself. One day you'll have been chasing Jarod for six years, too."
Lyle laughed. "Yeah, and you'll have been chasing him for eleven. Unless Daddy gets fed up with you first."
Parker shuddered involuntarily. Her repulsion for Raines ran so very deep, and Lyle never missed a chance to remind her that the wheezing creep was, in fact, her biological father. Raines as Lyle's father made perfect sense—they were both slimy, murderous scumbags—but she sometimes wondered at her relation to her twin brother. Had they actually shared such close quarters for nine months without killing each other?
Lyle looked so smug he could burst. Parker tried to remember why she ever gave up smoking. She brushed past him and went back to her office. If she wasn't going to have a quiet day at home, she could at least get something done.
Sydney was in his office when she passed, and Parker was fairly certain he lived there, because he never seemed to go home. "Miss Parker," he called.
She walked into his office. "Any news?"
Sydney was about to answer when Broots walked in. "Miss Parker!" he said, surprised. "Uh, hi."
"Don't mind me," she said. "I'm just here for show."
"Oh, well. I was actually just going to tell you. Jarod's, uh, in New York."
"Is he now?" Parker drawled. "New York's a big state."
"He's in the city," Broots corrected. "New York City. I'm not sure where, exactly, but he's there. Somewhere."
Parker arched a brow. "Pack a bag, Sydney. We're going to the Big Apple for a few days." Jarod in New York was perfect. It was much easier to multitask when everything was happening in one place.
"What, uh, what about me?" Broots asked haltingly.
In her heels, Parker was so tall she had to slouch a little to be on Broots' eye level. "Don't you have some letters to read?"
"Oh," Broots said, laughing nervously. "Of course. Right." He skittered out the door and down the hall.
Sydney studied Parker with that psychiatrist's eye of his. "What?" she demanded.
Sydney grinned, stifling a chuckle. Parker was at a loss to say what he found so amusing, and he refused to say. She gave up on finding out and went to her office, where she took a pre-packed bag out of a cupboard. Chasing Jarod was a full-time occupation, and she'd learned early on that being ready for anything was absolutely essential. She got one of her Sweepers to take her bag to the airstrip and called her pilot. Within half an hour, Parker and Sydney were on their way to New York City.