“Numb,” she replies. “I was actually—” She’s cut off by a burst of music from her purse.
Pulling the zipper, she frees her phone and answers. “Hello?”
Giving her the most privacy I can, I step back to the stove and remove another strip of bacon from the packet, but unfortunately, it’s not needed.
“Oh, no. Oh— Xander, I’m so sorry. I have to go. Thank you for everything, but I really have to go!”
“Is everything alright?” The sudden upset in her voice makes me follow her all the way into the hall, but she flies out of my apartment without giving me an answer, leaving me with a spatula in my hand and Tiger around my ankles.
What could be so important this early in the morning?
7
SNOW
Miss Montoya?”
“Yes, that’s me.” I stand abruptly, clutching my bag between both my hands.
“Come with me.”
The bank manager smiles politely and motions for me to follow, so I fall into step behind him as we weave through some desks and into an office located just behind the counter.
“Have a seat.” He closes the door behind us and moves around the desk, sitting and facing me with the same polite smile. “What seems to be the problem?”
Where do I even start?
“This is…” My head’s all over the place. Between Caleb’s sudden death, being alone in my apartment, drinking, hurting myself, and glimpsing an accidental full-frontal view of Xander, none of my thoughts remain stationary for long.
Everything clashes together and yet it all pales in comparison to the reason I’m here.
“My rent declined,” I say, clutching at the first piece of information in my mind while toying with the end of my bandage. “And it shouldn’t because I have enough in there to cover the next six months of rent. So I came down here and the woman back there, at the desk, told me my account is empty?”
“Ah, yes.” The man, Samson on his badge, nods. “She did mention you were rather distressed.”
“Can you blame me?” I shift forward to the edge of the seat. “Where is my money?”
“Do you have your account details with you?”
“Yes.” I pass over the same paperwork I gave the woman at the desk, including my ID, then wait while my breath catches in my throat.
That call in Xander’s kitchen was terrifying because my rent was the one thing I wasn’t supposed to worry about and in the New Year, I was going to take it all to finally visit my parents.
Samson taps away at his computer for a few minutes and nods slowly. “She was correct, there are no funds in that account.”
“And like I toldher, there should be at least seven grand!” My racing heart becomes a blur in my chest. As I peer around at the screen, Samson turns it toward me and shows my account.
“As you can see, your account is empty.”
“This… this doesn’t make any sense. How is this possible? How—where did my money go? How is it all gone?”
“Ma’am, I ask that you lower your voice.”
“Sorry, sorry.” Shaking my head, I wrestle with myself to regain control of my fear, but it’s escaping out of me in tendrils, lashing out at anything it can reach. “It can’t be gone.”
“You cleared your account last week. You should have received a confirmation as well as a warning that if your account remains empty, then it will automatically close within the month.”
“No, no, you’re wrong. See, Iplannedto empty the account but I only decided that a few days ago and I haven’t touched the money in there because—” It hits me with the force of a punch and my gut wrenches downward.
