Page 43 of Masked

“Leslie!”

“Reva! I just noticed your call from a few days ago. Forgive me, I was out of the country. What’s going on? I miss your face.”

Reva laughed. “I miss yours more. It’s been a wild few days. Parker and I broke up.”

“Oh no. I’m sorry. What happened?”

She winced. How much was she supposed to tell her best friend?

“That story is going to take a lot of wine to get through. When are you free to hang out?”

“I’m in New York for the next week, but as soon as I get back, we’ll open a bottle, and you can tell me all about it.”

They made small talk for a few minutes before Leslie got another call and had to hang up.

She tucked the phone in her back pocket as she reached the spot on the path where she’d started. A man stepped out from behind a tree, blocking her path. She gasped and backed away. It was the angry man she’d seen going into the office.

“Give me your purse,” he demanded, stalking toward her.

She did not know if he had a gun, but everything in her screamed he was dangerous, so she handed it over.

He snatched it and took off running.

Without thinking, she pulled out her phone and dialed Noah’s number.

“Noah,” she whispered when he answered.

“What’s wrong?”

She sucked in air through her nose and tried not to sound panicked. “I… someone… Can you come get me?”

“Reva.” His voice was stern, yet soothing. “Tell me what’s wrong.”

“I got my purse stolen in the park across from the office.”

The background noise on Noah’s end changed, and she heard a door slam shut. “Did you call the police?”

Her head was spinning, and she sat on a nearby bench. “No. I’m not even sure how it happened. And my first instinct was to call you.”

“Go back to your office.”

“He… he was there first. I bumped into him going in, as I was coming out for a walk.”

“Fuck. Stay right there. I can be there in fifteen minutes. Do you have pepper spray or anything?”

“It was in my purse,” she whispered.

“It’s OK, sweetheart. I’m on my way. Call the police, too.”

The call ended, and she dialed nine-one-one like she should have done to begin with.

Noah arrived five minutes after the police did. There wasn’t much they could do except pull security footage from her office building, so after she gave her initial report, Noah insisted on taking her home.

“I’m sorry if I interrupted something important,” she whispered when she settled in the passenger seat.

“Never be sorry about that. You’re a priority for me right now, Reva. If you need me to drop what I’m doing to help you or rescue you, I will. And if I can’t, I’ve got people I can send in my place. Are you OK?”

She shook her head. “Not really. It was so jarring and unexpected. It’s like he was looking for me. But I have no idea who he was. Can we pretend it didn’t happen for now?”

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