Page 83 of The Fixer

“Will you open it?”

“Of course.” He slid his finger under the flap, slicing it open the way he had the one Paulo had given me. Only this time, when he pulled the paper out, the small piece of plastic that fell out only thunked quietly against the metal table.

“What’s this?” I asked, hands trembling as I picked it up.

Jet lifted his gaze from the letter. Took the thumb drive from my fingers, holding it as if it were a priceless jewel. He turned those silver eyes to me, mine pulling from the letter written in my father’s handwriting, another note to me.

Jet’s tongue swept out across his lips, prodding at the corner of his mouth. Every ache I’d ever felt, all the heartache and the pain, wrapped me so tight I didn’t know how to breathe.

The loss.

The betrayal.

All scrawled across this paper in harshly written script.

And I knew, before he said anything, my life would never be the same.

“Eliza.” Jet shook his head, teeth sinking into his lip. “We need to talk.”

21

Eliza

Hoisting the heavy box up onto my hip, I pressed the button beside the door. A quiet buzz issued from inside the apartment, and a few moments later, the lock clicked and the door swung open.

“Eliza? What are you doing here?”

I shifted. Swallowed against the hard lump in my throat. “Hi, Uncle Niles. I brought you some of Dad’s albums.”

He reached for the box, relieving me of its weight. “You didn’t have to do that, Eliza. I’d be happy to go pick them up.”

Niles turned into his apartment, and I followed behind, hand fumbling at the necklace strung around my neck. He placed the box on the kitchen table and opened it up.

“It’s okay,” I told him, my voice catching in my throat. “I’ve been over there the past couple days, trying to go through everything. I needed a break, so I thought I’d come see you. And, well, he left them to you. And since you can’t really have the Thunderbird...”

Dad’s Thunderbird. One of the things he loved most in his life, along with his record collection. He’d left both to Niles in his will. But Dad had been driving the Thunderbird when he crashed, totaling it, which only left him with the records.

Since everything else had been left to me.

A tear streaked down my cheek.

“What is it?”

“The records,” I told him, blinking back more tears. “Someone broke into his apartment. They knocked over one of the shelves where he had them and some of the records were ruined.”

I wrapped my arms around myself, and Niles pulled me into an awkward hug.

“It’s okay,” he told me, patting my back. “I’m sure whatever is left is just fine. But you should be resting. You don’t need to be going through your dad’s things right now.”

“But I do need to, Uncle Niles. I do.” I pulled back, gazing up at his familiar blue eyes. “It’s been a month since he died. I can’t… I can’t move on with my life until I do this. And I need to move on!”

Niles winced at the crack in my voice, at the tone that was just a little too sharp. I was tired, so tired of the pain.

“It hurts,” I cried, clutching a hand to my heart. “Everyone’s gone and I don’t know how to go on.”

He had never been comfortable when I showed too much emotion, shied away from me as if it were some disease that he might catch. A grimace pulled at his face. “What about that man? What was it? Jim, or Jake?”

“Jet,” I said, almost a whisper. I shook my head and hugged myself tighter. “He’s not who I thought he was.”