Page 111 of Death on Riddle Road

He nodded, as if he already knew that, too, and kept talking.“Plus, I recognized Sheila M as an anagram for Ishmael —Call me Ishmael, the opening ofMoby Dick.That got me to books.Fiction.A classic.Wasn’t a far jump toAbandon All.”

“Not a far jump?”

“Besides...”The glint definitely held amusement...and more.

“Besides, what?”

“I was a fan.”

“OfAbandon All.”

“Of you.”

“How could you...?”Stupid question considering the money, time, and effort that went into making the purported author ofAbandon Alla public figure.“Why?”

“Heard you on an interview when I was in the hospital.”

He had to mean after the injury that took part of his sight and caused him to leave the Chicago area — events he hadn’t talked about.

“Learned a lot about voices while I was recovering.Did you know your voice now is more like the public author ofAbandon Allthan any other part of you?Or should I say it the other way around?That the public author ofAbandon All’s voice was more like the real you than any other part.Anyway, I heard your voice.Ordered the book on audio right then, but as great as it was, it wasn’t your voice and it didn’t hit me the way that interview had.Or all the other interviews and appearances of yours I tracked down.”

“You saw other—?”

“Every one I could find.By the time I came here I’d accumulated quite a lot.Not an obsession shrine like a stalker—”

I’d have to remember that to taunt him with.

Later.

“—but a collection of research.By the time we met, I could see pretty well.And noticing more.Like your nails.”

“Mynails?”

“Perfect in every interview—”

And what a pain they’d been to keep up.But the PR people insisted.

“—but you keep them short now.Then you said having them long changes the angle of your hands on the keyboard and hurts your wrists, and it fell into place.”

When I told him about trying to write fiction, there’d been something in his reaction I hadn’t been able to pin down.I’d settled onlaid back.But that hadn’t been right.

It had been this.

“But I don’t—Oh.Because I had long nails during my author-of-Abandon-All-days.”

“Yup.Which meant you weren’t writing then.Didn’t write the follow-up books, which came out while you were doing interviews, saying you did write them.”

“I could have been dictating.”

“You said you didn’t in several interviews.Talked about the feel of the keyboard as the words came out.”

I’d wondered at times if he sensed I wasn’t telling him everything.If that kept a sort of gap between us.

Turns out, heknewwhat I wasn’t telling him and waited for me to tell him.Perhaps reluctant to bank too heavily on our relationship until I did.

“I did have my reasons,” I said abruptly.

“Kit.”