Finally, I turn a corner and see the nameplate Thatcher Montgomery.
I’m close.
I pass by the open office door, heart pounding. There’s a middle-aged white woman with a neat brown bob sitting at a desk just outside who glances at me, then back down at her computer.
I walk three more feet and stop.
The plate outside the office next to it reads Harold Montgomery.
The desk in front of his office is empty. But I’d be willing to bet that’s where Patrice sits. Maybe she’s in the bathroom. Or—just my luck—she called in sick today.
With no other choice, I backtrack to Thatcher Montgomery’s office. I face his assistant, give her my best aspiring-intern smile, and say, “Excuse me?”
She looks up. “May I help you?”
“I hope so.” My heart is pounding so loud, I’m afraid she can hear it in my chest. “I’m supposed to meet Kendall Montgomery. Have you seen her?”
The woman purses her lips. “Kendall doesn’t intern in this department.”
“Oh.” I make a big show of looking embarrassed. “I must have— Downstairs, they must have sent me the wrong way, I’m so sorry, I’ll just message her and let her know where I am—”
I look down at my phone and pretend to send a text. “She’s going to meet me here,” I report. “So I’ll just…”
The woman gestures to a row of chairs along the hallway, directly across from Harold Montgomery’s office. “You can wait there, if you like.”
“Thank you.”
I take a seat and wait, tapping my foot as I do. If Patrice is in the bathroom, she’s taking a long time. Or she could be out today, since Harold Montgomery’s office appears unoccupied. I wonder if the other assistant would notice if I just darted in there.
Or maybe she saw my sister last year, since she sits right outside his office, too.
I swallow, then clear my throat. “Um. Excuse me, Miss, um—”
“Patrice,” the woman says.
My heart lurches.
Patrice is Thatcher’s assistant. Not Harold’s.
Maybe she got promoted. Or maybe Harold just used his brother’s assistant to help him sneak my sister in because…because she’s more trustworthy or something, I don’t know. But the point is, the woman who can tell me what I need to know is right in front of me, right now.
I look down at my phone, open the voice memos app, and discreetly press record.
Then I step closer to her desk and paste a smile on my face. “I’m meeting Kendall because I wanted to apply for an internship here next summer.”
Patrice nods, not especially interested.
“My, um, friend interned here last summer. Maybe you met her?” I pull up the photo of my sister I saved for this purpose. “Her name was Fiona?”
I hold my phone in front of Patrice’s face. She looks at it for a long moment.
And then she shakes her head. “We get a lot of interns around here in the summer,” she says, typing something on her computer. “I don’t remember most of them.”
My heart sinks.
She has to be the same Patrice. How many assistants named Patrice can there be around here?
Does she really not remember letting Fiona in through the service elevator a year ago?
Or—and as I think this, I take a step away—is she so loyal to Harold that she’s lying to me?
I watch her typing and realize she could be alerting him, or Thatcher Sr., who might have even been aware of what his brother was doing, right now.
I need to leave.
“Oh, Kendall just told me to meet her downstairs,” I blabber. “Thanks for your help.”
I turn to head down the hallway—and then stop.
Because walking toward me are Kendall—and Seth.
And neither of them looks exactly pleased to see me.
38
“H-hey.”
Kendall tilts her head. She, at least, looks more curious than pissed.
