The only part of Fleischer’s speech I catch is the end, when she informs us that the Ten dinner is canceled this year. Jane isn’t back yet from California, and Fleischer believes the dinner is a frivolous, unnecessary affair. Even though I can’t stand Fleischer’s brand of education—devoid of any fun or humor—I’m secretly relieved. That dinner would have been another event I’d have to sit through, pretending I’m okay.

My father insists on taking me to out to a restaurant on Saturday night, before he leaves early Sunday morning on the first flight back to San Francisco. I reluctantly agree, because I can’t think of an excuse to get me out of it. But when he asks Ollie to join us, I inwardly cringe. It’s not my father’s fault; he has no idea that Ollie isn’t himself. I hope I can rush us through the meal as quickly as possible.

I’m still considering telling my dad everything. It’s all I’ve been able to think about since he got here. I’ve run scenario after scenario in my head. How he might be able to help us, if I told him the truth about Ollie’s Duplicate. How he might just as easily insist on going to the authorities or the FBI, putting Ollie in grave danger without meaning to. How he might try to protect me, and his company, instead of putting Ollie first.

We’re at a cramped Italian restaurant downtown, near my father’s hotel, silently eating spaghetti while Duplicate Ollie shares details with us about the new documentary film he’s working on. Ollie’s copy is oblivious to all my woes, of course, though a part of me wonders if he can tell something’s been off with me for weeks.

“Stress,” I tell him when he asks me if I’m okay. “Waiting to hear from colleges. I promise, that’s all it is.”

My father’s quiet, but that’s no surprise; he’s a man of few words as it is, and he never was good at father-daughter outings like this one.

I’m about to suggest we skip dessert—desperate as I am to end this whole affair and send my father back to his hotel, and California—when I get a buzz on my plum.

Eager for any excuse to flee this dinner, even momentarily, I gaze down at the message, even though I know it’s rude. How many times has my father left a dinner midway through to attend to business? I know he won’t dare say anything.

I’m surprised when I see who the message is from: Jane.

Emma, I only have a second. I’m writing because I think you’ll know what to do. There’s no time, they’re outside my study door, two men, I think they want to take—