“So, hit me. What do you want to know first?”
“What's the real reason you came back? And don't say it was for me.”
“It was for you,” he said.
“But why now? Why not years ago? Why not six months ago? The truth, remember.”
“You had a life, a good life, and I wasn't going to take that from you. You're a good man. And I'm not. I had nothing to offer you, I could only bring trouble into your life.”
I couldn’t argue with that. It was starting to sound like Symanski was right about Jake. About Carson. “Are you saying I don't have a good life now?”
He frowned at me. “Can you really say this is what you want? Do you love it here so much you see yourself spending the rest of your life running an ice-skating rink and taking Ryan back whenever he decides he wants you?”
I’d be insulted, but he wasn’t wrong. “It’s not particularly what I want for the rest of my life, no. But what I do know is you’re only telling me half the truth so I’m going to give you one more chance before I kick you out, steal your car, and make you walk home. Why did you really come here? Why now? I know you, and saving me from myself would not have been enough of a reason for you to face your mother again.”
“Fine. You’re right.”
As the sun lowered to the horizon, the wind picked up, sending ripples through the long brown grasses at the side of the road. I gave in to the urge to run my hand over the arm of his sweater. “Ooh, it is soft.”
“Cashmere,” he said.
“Nice.” I bumped shoulders with him. It was hard to remember I should be mad at him. Maybe what I learned from him tonight would bring back the anger, but part of me had already accepted that what Ryan said was the truth—that Jake as Carson Grieves had been, and probably still was, a criminal and a con artist. I couldn’t imagine Jake doing any of that. But I really needed to know. The sun was rapidly setting and we were getting further and further from home. “Talk, Carly. The truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth.”
With one final grip of the steering wheel, he relaxed against his seat as if he were done fighting with himself. “A person that I was close to died recently. Before he died, he told me he wanted more for me than he’d had. He didn't want me to be alone, and he said that deep inside I was a romantic and that I’d only ever loved you in my life. He made me promise that I would at least give it a shot so that I didn't die alone like he did.”
Wow. That was not at all what I’d expected to hear. After the silence stretched a few long seconds, he turned to look at me.
“I don’t know what to say. Was it a boyfriend?”
“No, he was my mentor. He taught me everything I know, so I feel like I owe it to him.”
And now we came to it. “Mentor, huh?”
He nodded.
“Truth or dare?”
“Truth, of course. Though am I tempted to say dare. What would you dare me to do?”
Hmm. What would I? Anything that popped to mind felt juvenile, which I suppose was the point of the game. And though the idea of seeing Jake streak through the library was amusing, the consequences of his getting caught as an adult were a lot more dire than those of a teenager. “I’d need some time to think of something,” I confessed. “But this is truth. So, Jake. Truthfully. What, exactly, did this mentor teach you?”
20 Eric
“He taught me how to be Carson Grieves. How to take from the world without having to live by its rules. He taught me how to gather and buy and sell information and how to evaluate what would be important and how to run a con.”
Okay then. That was a good start. He really was telling me the truth. And he actually had been, probably still was, a con artist. Whatever that entailed. “What do con artists do? Cheat old ladies out of their pensions?”
“Some of them do. Some of them run corporations and cheat their employees out of their retirement funds.”
“Which kind are you?” I couldn’t see him do either of those things.
“I’m neither of those. I like to think I’m more of an information broker at