Chapter 5
Chapter Five
Present Day
Jack felt jittery. He shoved his phone in his pocket, slung his backpack on his shoulders, and walked the halls of the airport, averting his eyes from anyone’s gaze.
He couldn’t believe how long he’d been in Mexico.
He couldn’t believe how long he’d been hiding out—hiding out from yet another version of his life.
He missed Addison and the kids with a raw, awful ache.
When he’d exhausted himself, he crashed in another seat near his gate and checked his phone to find a text.
Charlotte: Make sure that when you run to us, you don’t leave anyone else behind.
Jack felt crushed with secrecy. He knew that Charlotte didn’t know anything about his life in Hawaii, nor about Addison and the kids. But it was true that Charlotte knew him better than almost anyone, that she knew he was the kind of person to panic and run when the time came.
Jack still remembered his last few days in Hawaii. He remembered the alarm bells going off in his head, telling him to run, run as fast as he could.
It had been a gorgeous day, the last full day before he fled. Gorgeousness wasn’t such a rare thing in Hawaii, but Jack had spent so much of his life in cold places that he never forgot to thank his lucky stars for the warm sun and the warm waves and the warm sand under his feet.
But that particular day, the day when everything had changed, Jack had felt sort of dreary and off.
He and Addison had gotten into a fight the night before.
It was nothing major—something to do with Kennedy’s soccer jersey.
He was supposed to wash it in time for her game, but he’d forgotten.
Addison had had a really rough day at work, and she’d burst into tears.
They’d had a few words, but they’d made up almost immediately afterward, telling each other how sorry they were.
She’d said, “Seth, you know I get so in my head sometimes.” And by then, Jack was so accustomed to being called “Seth” that he’d really felt he was Seth Green, that he’d been born as Seth Green and would die as Seth Green.
It hadn’t ever been weird to be called Seth, especially not by Addison, who loved Seth Green the most.
By that time, Jack had been managing his own repair business for the better part of ten years.
His office was located near the pier, where he had access to the boats that pulled up, requiring all kinds of repairs: engines, sail mechanics, and even architectural work.
It was true that Jack had always been handy, even back at the White Oak Lodge.
But living in Hawaii, Jack had rebranded himself as a literal jack-of-all-trades, the sort of man who could fix anything and wouldn’t overcharge you for it.
Of course, none of his clients knew him as Jack.
That morning, Jack was needed at a woman named Ashley Tullson’s place, where he did some plumbing work, followed by an electrical touch-up.
Ashley was a little bit older than he was, a divorcée who frequently teased him about how handsome he was and how she wanted to steal him from his wife.
Jack didn’t exactly like these jokes, but he smiled and faintly laughed along with Ashley, mostly because he figured that her jokes came from a dark place of hurt and abandonment.
She paid him more than he asked for, and he gave her a few tips to ensure she didn’t need him back too soon.
“You’re the best, Seth,” Ashley said. “Thanks for keeping my lights on.”
Jack returned to his office near the pier to eat lunch.
He sat on the dock with his legs dangling over the water, eating a sandwich and watching a kite surfer far out on the water.
The kite was bright pink and cheerful, and the surfer was powerful, whipping around.
Jack crunched through a bag of chips and considered what else he needed to do today.
Maybe he could take a peek at Hampton’s boat motor before the kids got out of school.
Kennedy had a soccer game today, so perhaps he could catch that.
It was then he heard his wife’s voice coming from the other side of the office, near the parking lot.
It wasn’t such a rare thing for Addison to swing by his work to say hello, but Jack knew that her decision to do that was often loaded, given the fact that her doing that was what had led to her learning about her first husband’s cheating.
Jack had never once considered cheating on Addison.
But he knew that Addison struggled to get over her past trauma.
But who was Addison talking to? Jack strolled off the dock and headed for the parking lot, wondering if Addison had run into one of his clients. Maybe Jack had forgotten about a meeting he’d lined up for himself. He wasn’t always the most organized.
When he turned the corner, he found Addison face-to-face with an older man in his late sixties or early seventies, with black hair lined with silver. He was broad-shouldered and a little more than six feet tall, and he was watching a video on Addison’s phone and smiling.
“How about that?” the man said, shaking his head. “She’s a natural.”
“She’s talking about going pro,” Addison affirmed. “But her dad and I want her to go to college, of course. She thinks we’re old-fashioned.”
“Plenty of colleges offer soccer scholarships,” the man said.
The voice shot through Jack’s mind and tugged him deep into his memories. He felt frozen with shock. For there was no way he could mistake who that voice belonged to.
The man talking to Addison was his father. It was Benjamin Whitmore.
It was the first time Jack had seen Benjamin since the night they’d escaped the White Oak Lodge fire, the night they’d changed their names and faked their deaths and started new lives.
Jack thought he was dreaming. He closed his eyes tightly, only for Benjamin and his wife to laugh again about something Kennedy was doing on Addison’s phone.
This was a proud-sounding grandfather, Jack realized.
This was Benjamin, trying to make up for lost time.
Without fully understanding why, rage laced itself through Jack’s stomach and boiled to his tongue.
He thought he was going to start screaming.
What was he doing here? What did he want?
“Excuse me,” Jack interrupted. “Can I help you with something?”
Benjamin and Addison raised their heads to look at him. Addison smiled wider, then hurried over to brush a kiss across his cheek. “Hi, honey! This kind man was asking me about our kids, and I got carried away. You know how I can be.”
Benjamin laughed broadly, never once betraying that he knew who they were. “I’m a grandfather myself, and a father of six, if you can believe it. I know how it is.”
Addison grinned. “I came to say hey and bring you something to snack on,” she said, hauling a bag of chocolate chip cookies from her backpack and handing them over to Jack. He knew she wanted to make up for their argument from last night.
Jack heard himself thank her. He gazed into her eyes and wondered if she suspected anything. But Addison turned to look at Benjamin and said, “I’d better get back to the hotel. It was wonderful to meet you, Mr….?”
“Mr. Hudson,” Benjamin lied. “Pleasure to meet you as well.”
“My husband can fix anything,” Addison said, squeezing Jack’s shoulder a final time before she headed back to her car to drive away.
Even with Addison out of earshot, Benjamin muttered, “I don’t know if he can fix everything this time.”
Jack’s gut stirred with fear. “Let’s go inside,” he said, turning and beckoning for his father to follow him.
Benjamin did, his boots stomping against the concrete walkway. When they reached the shaded interior, Jack clamped the door shut and crossed his arms. His heart pounded so much that he imagined his father could hear.
Benjamin offered him a soft smile. “She’s wonderful.”
“How did you find me?” Jack spat.
Benjamin laughed. “I found you because I was chasing your Tio Angelo. He led me here.”
Jack felt as though he’d been smacked. “That’s impossible.”
Benjamin looked every bit as old as he was. He slumped into Jack’s office chair and spread his hands out on the desk. “I’m sorry to say it isn’t. When it comes to your uncle, nothing’s impossible. He’s always been a few steps ahead of me.”
Jack needed a drink of water badly. He searched the counters for his bottle but found only an abandoned coffee cup from either yesterday or the day before. “What do you mean he led you here?” he demanded.
“For the past few years, I was living all over the place,” Benjamin said.
“I thought for sure that Angelo had moved on, or died, or decided that the past didn’t matter any longer.
I lived with Chloe for a little while—Nina’s mom, you know—but that didn’t work out, not long-term.
It occurred to me that I would never get over your mother, not really.
So I was preparing for the next phase of my life, of living alone, maybe on a mountain somewhere.
I didn’t want to think about the past any longer.
I was lying to myself when I thought I was over it.