That is, until one job changed everything.
The surrogate was uploaded into the body of a wealthy executive. His assignment was to confront his client's wife with his affair and desire for divorce.
Except the surrogate couldn't do it.
He looked through his client's eyes, saw his wife, and...
...Knew that he wouldn't hurt this woman for any price. Never before had the pain of his clients—cowards and escapists, all of them—contained such wonder as she possessed.
This beauty would haunt him.
I flew into Pam's office.
"This—" I blinked and cleared my throat, lowering the pages I was brandishing.
Pam was giving me a death glare.
"Hi Hannah, thank you for knocking."
"Sorry, I—"
"Go on." Pam sat back in her chair and sighed, gesturing with her pen. "Let's hear it, since you can't seem to contain your zeal."
I smoothed my skirt and took a breath. I was stunned. Damn, I had just barged into Pamela Wing's office like I owned the place. That wasn't what shocked me, though.
For the first time in nearly two months, I had forgotten my misery.
I had forgotten my hollowness.
I needed more of this story.
"This is..."
"As ever, Hannah, your eloquence astounds."
"It's very partial," I stammered.
"Keenly observed. The author assures me she has another twenty pages on the way."
"I'd like to read them. If that's alright with you." I gazed out the window. If I met Pam's eyes, she would see my desperation. "The... protagonist. It seems obvious he'll hijack the body of his client, you know? And..."
I could feel Pam's eyes on me.
"And that's an interesting quandary. So much is unstated here." I swallowed. "The cultural commentary on our attitude toward pain and escape. And consumerism. The Thoreau epigraph about desperation is pretty perfect, too. This feels really relevant. I mean, people do lead lives of quiet desperation, until something or someone comes along and—"
I clamped my mouth shut.
Fuck. Okay, how did this become me spilling my guts to my boss?
Pam raised a brow. She looked curious, not deadly.
"I think you're right," she conceded. "It's relevant. We'll talk more about it when we've read the next pages."
I turned to go, pausing outside my door.
"Ms. Wing?"
"Hm?"
I lifted the manuscript.
"You don't really represent speculative fiction, do you?"
"No, but I make exceptions for my established authors."
Established authors.
So it was true; Pam was letting me read something remotely important.
For the first time since Matt and I parted ways, I imagined how it would feel to be a partner with Pam and Laura. That was my dream. At least, it was the old Hannah's dream.
"It's not without flaws," I said after a beat. "Mostly small conceptual oversights that need explanation. But it's..."
I glanced at the manuscript. Did my subjective opinion mean anything here?
"Ms. Wing, it's the most compelling thing I've read all year."
Chunks of The Surrogate arrived on a weekly basis throughout September. I read them like a junky getting my fix. I'd never really liked science fiction, but The Surrogate didn't read like science fiction. It was a love story.
Just as I'd anticipated, the surrogate pursued his client's wife, but not in the body of her husband. Not initially. He contrived reasons to meet with her in his own aged body and in the bodies of other clients. He met her as a man, a woman, a child...
He loved her through every face of love. To her, the faces must have seemed like facades, but one continuous truth joined them.
Finally, the surrogate schemed his way back into the husband's body.
My eyes raced across the page. God, where was this going? Body theft was a crime punishable by death, and anyway, what was the surrogate thinking? Did he plan to seduce the woman from her husband's body? She didn't even know him!
The scene was getting insane. The surrogate was about to go to bed with the woman he loved, and he was pretending to be her husband. It was impossibly wrong, and yet I wanted it to happen. Later he could explain, later, but now—
"Hannah Catalano?"
Someone was standing in my doorway. The air went out of my lungs. That voice, that tall frame. I yanked my feet off the desk and nearly tipped over in my office chair.
Oh my god, it was—
Not Matt.
But it was!
It was Matt plus a few years and black hair and a friendly smile.
The man advanced, his hand thrust toward me. He was dressed in a stylish dark suit. I stumbled to my feet and shook his hand.
"Yes, hi," I said.
The man's likeness to Matt derailed me. I stood there blinking owlishly at him.
"Nathaniel Sky. Call me Nate."
I plunked into my chair.
"I'm sorry," he said. "I gave you a shock."
Gave me a shock? More like a violent blow to the heart. I was looking at Matt's brother. Memories of Matt went off like fireworks in my brain. My eyes watered. The way Nate was smiling, his graceful carriage, his imposing presence—it was all Matt.
"Well." He cleared his throat. "I won't take much of your time."
"S-sorry, I... sorry. Yeah, no, um, sit, please..."
Wow, English.
Nate chuckled and tilted his head. The gesture was so Matt that I had to turn away.
"I've come to ask a favor, Hannah. Can I call you Hannah?"
I nodded. Safe to say, coherent sentences would not be forthcoming.
Nate ignored the chair. He moved around my desk and his heavy hand came to rest on my shoulder. Thankfully, the touch was genial and comforting, not one of Matt's touches.
Matt's touches... demanding, desperate.
I removed my glasses and rubbed at my eyes. I couldn't believe, after almost three months, how much raw emotion I felt.
"I didn't come here to bring you pain," Nate said quietly. I ventured a glance at him and he smiled gently. "I've heard so much about you. I wouldn't have come if I had any other option. I need your help. You must know this is about Matt."
I blinked rapidly.
"How is he?" I whispered.
"Not good." Nate shook his head. "Not good, Hannah." He turned and walked to the window, gazing down at the street. I studied his back while I collected my wits. Geez, the gene pool was seriously skewed in the Sky family's favor. Go figure.
"He's drinking. I don't know how else to put it." Nate's voice was low and full of feeling. "Hannah, he's my brother. He's my little brother..."
It was weirdly comforting not to be the only person at a loss for words.
We were both silent for a while, fighting our emotions.
"What can I do?" I said at last.
"Maybe nothing. I don't know. I could always pull him back from these ledges. Not this time." Again, Nate shook his head. He was so somber; it was like we were talking about a dead man. I shuddered and my heart lurched. How bad was Matt?
"Where is he? What's happening?"
Nate turned and met my eyes.
"I knew you would help," he said. "He told me so much about you. I knew you had to be—" Whatever Nate was going to say, he let it go. A Pam-like efficiency came over him. This, I could see, was far easier for Nate than emotion.
"Good," he said. Had I agreed to something? "He's staying at our uncle's cabin in Upstate New York. I got you a one-way ticket to the nearest airport and a rental car. Anything can be moved, date-wise, but I don't see why—"
"Wait, what?"
Nate produced a folder from his laptop bag and began spreading documents on my desk. He looked earnestly between me and the papers, his dark brows raised.
"Hm? I've cleared your schedule with Pam, don't worry. She and I have spoken. We all have a common interest here, which is—"
"Excuse me? Look, I—"
This had to be a joke. Incredulity was quickly replacing my fear. Matt's brother just sauntered into my office and was now strong-arming me into flying to New York to rescue Matt's alcoholic ass (that was doing god knows what in some random cabin), and oh, before I even agreed to this crackpot plan, he'd talked to my boss and cleared my schedule—
"...some spending money," Nate was saying, "travel expenses, anything you need above and beyond the car and the ticket. All my contact information is here. I insist you keep the change as I know this is something of an inconvenience."
I turned my deer-in-headlights look on the envelope Nate was pressing into my hands. Thoughtlessly, I rifled through the bills. Brand new Benjamin Franklins. Okay, I was counting. One thousand, two thousand, three thousand—
"Five," Nate murmured.
My head shot up.
My god, this wasn't for travel expenses. This was a bribe.
Nate moved toward the doorway, leaving the money in my hands and the travel information on my desk. I was paralyzed with anger. That was fortunate for Nate, because otherwise I would have brained him with my stapler.
"I'll be in touch," Nate said. "I'm staying in the city for a few days. Call me if you have any questions. Hannah, I knew you would help. The way Matt spoke about you..."
There it was again, that guileless vulnerability. This a**hole loved his brother, at least, who also happened to be an a**hole.
Briefly, I envisioned Matt and Nate sitting together and discussing me. Conspiring? Was this a ploy to send me running back to Matt's arms?
No, no way. Matt was drinking. Matt was in trouble. I needed to think.
"You're both the same," I fumed.
Nate glanced over his shoulder.
"Of course we are." He smiled and shrugged. "We're brothers."
CHAPTER 23
Matt
THE FINGER LAKES are wine country.
Fuck, they even have this thing called the Seneca Wine Trail. You go around the whole goddamn lake hitting up wineries until you pass out. It's like a hall crawl for cultured adults.
Granted, I wasn't about to hit the trail. I did hit up a few wineries, though. I'd borrowed my brother's bike, a silver Icon Sheene, and I tore all over Geneva like a maniac.
Not caring is really damn liberating.
I kept the cabin stocked with wine, bourbon, and Dunhills. Nate stopped pestering me around the middle of September—thank god. He'd had a damn good idea, me getting some time alone in nature or whatever, but I didn't need him to mother hen me the whole time.
So I was drinking again. So what? I forgot how much I loved it.
And fuck, I wrote Ten Thousand Nights drunk off my ass. It's still my most popular novel. I could write The Surrogate wasted, no problem.
I wrapped myself in an afghan and sat out on the porch. I made my weekly call to Pam.
"Matthew," she sighed.
God, that bitch. What did she always have to be such a bitch? I was starting to expect her oh-no-it's-Matt-again tone, like damn, too bad I have to talk to my most famous author.
"Yeah, sorry to rain on your goddamn parade," I slurred.
Silence.
"I mean fuck, Pam, it's not like I'm f**king nobody. Last time I checked—"
"It's the time, Matthew." Her voice was quiet and faraway. I looked at my phone. It was four in the morning.
"You're two f**king hours behind me! God Pam, also, fuck, work on my schedule. I'm the next f**king Balzac. What about Proust? He used to—"