Page 89 of Byte

“Fine,” he said and gave me an appraising look. “What’s going on with you?”

“I have to tell you something, and I’m afraid you’re going to be mad at me, but it’s actually a good thing,” I rambled.

“Just tell me,” he said calmly.

“Johnny Jenkins was convicted of murdering your parents. They thought he kidnapped and killed you but couldn’t prove it,” I blurted. “I’m sorry I went behind your back, but I wanted you to know if it was good news.”

“And what if it wasn’t?” he asked.

“Then I wouldn’t have told you,” I said quietly.

“How did you find all this out?”

“Uh, Google,” I lied.

“Google?” he asked, and I could tell he didn’t believe me.

“I mean, that’s where I started. I’m not sure how I got from point A to point B, but that’s not important. Where’s your laptop? You can see for yourself.” I was nervous and doing a piss-poor job of explaining myself.

“Okay,” he said with resignation and sat down with his computer. “I’ll be damned,” he muttered a few minutes later.

I wanted to say, “See? I told you so,” but decided against it and sat quietly beside him while he read through the articles. I was dying to know what he was thinking, but there was no way I was going to ask. I’d wait until he was ready to tell me.

He spent a while longer clicking through pages and reading articles before he closed his laptop and got to his feet. “Shadow probably needs to go out,” he said. I watched from the window as he took Shadow outside and tossed the ball for him.

When he came back inside, I was almost finished making dinner. I didn’t know what to say, so I didn’t say anything. And neither did he. We sat down to eat in silence. After the fifth or sixth bite, I couldn’t take it anymore. “I’m sorry!” I blurted. “I shouldn’t have done it.”

Byte turned to me with a look of confusion on his face. “What?”

“I’m sorry for looking into your past. You’ve done so much for me, and I wanted to do something for you in return. I didn’t know it would upset you this much. Please forgive me,” I blabbered.

“I’m not mad at you,” he said.

“You’re not?”

“No,” he said with a slight smile.

“Then why in the hell haven’t you said a word to me since I told you?” I demanded. He might not have been mad, but suddenly I was.

“I haven’t?” he asked.

“No! You said you were taking Shadow outside, and that was it.”

“Oh,” he said. “I guess I was lost in my thoughts. I didn’t realize you thought I was mad at you.”

“What was I supposed to think?” I asked.

“I don’t mean this the way it might sound, but I wasn’t really thinking about you,” he admitted. “You dropped a major bombshell on me, and I needed to process it.”

“Have you done that?”

“What?”

“Processed it,” I said and tried to hide my exasperation.

“Yeah, I think so. I mean, it’s good to know I don’t have anything to worry about, but it doesn’t change anything. It’s not like I can suddenly start living as Blake Williams again.”

“Why not?” I asked, slightly disappointed. One of the main reasons I wanted to find out about his past was so he didn’t have to hide his true identity anymore.

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