Chapter 33
Becker’s penthouse is insane. The footage we’ve been looking at barely prepared me for the reality of it.
The man basically owns a palace on top of a building, one that spans over three floors and too much square footage to count.
There’s a fucking twenty-seat theater room, even.
In the heart of New York City. Who does that? !
The decoration is dated and oppressive, with dark woods and overly complex wallpaper.
Everything is expensive, from the furniture to the trinkets exposed all over the place.
Something tells me the art hanging on the walls is probably priceless as well.
But aside from two Picassos and what looks like a Van Gogh, I’m too uncultured to recognize anything.
If there’s one thing I have nothing to say about, it’s the view. It’s spectacular. This building is much higher than our hotel room, and the panoramic view all around offers an amazing vantage point over the city. We aren’t right next to Central Park, but still close enough to see it well.
Paola and I started with a couple of random rooms, then she led me to Becker’s office.
He keeps it locked whenever he isn’t in it, and she’s one of the few people to have a key, along with Mrs. Reed.
The fact that he likes to keep it private only strengthens my assumptions.
There is something in there, whether I find it or not.
To my dismay, I can’t get my hands on the supposed safe in Becker’s office.
Maybe we should have trusted Paola when she said there was none.
Maybe he lied to Lorelei, and the computer isn’t being kept as securely as he pretended.
But then, where is it?
Nearly the whole day goes by, and I have nothing.
I spent the whole time either cleaning when we were in a monitored room or looking for where that damn laptop could be hidden.
I’m so frustrated by the lack of results that I ask Paola if I could give the office another shot.
Reluctant at first, she eventually agrees when I offer to double her day’s wages.
So, making sure no one’s watching, we sneak to Becker’s office, and Paola unlocks the door but stays outside, cleaning the hallway’s wall-mounted lamps, ready to warn me if anyone approaches.
There’s something eerie about this room.
Maybe it’s the complete lack of windows.
Or the dark wood that spans from floor to ceiling.
Or maybe it’s the butterflies. Pinned in wooden frames and organized in eighteen columns and seven rows, a hundred and twenty-six butterflies and moths are neatly arranged on the wall that faces Becker’s desk.
They vary in size and color, and the sheer quantity is impressive.
It looks like an exhibit from a museum, with gold plates underneath each frame to display the scientific name of each specimen.
Had it been anywhere else, I might have found the display beautiful. The various colors, shapes, and sizes are nothing short of stunning. In here, though, it looks … macabre. Like a hundred and twenty-six tiny corpses, pinned on Becker’s wall.
When Lola told us her story, I didn’t pay much attention to the safe word Becker gave her.
“Chrysalis” is as good as any, so I didn’t bat an eye.
But as it turns out, Becker has a bit of a passion for butterflies.
Maybe even an obsession. It has to be, given how there are more of those framed insects scattered around the penthouse.
If I had to take a random guess, I’d say there are nearly two hundred of them. But the bulk of it is right here.
Remembering I have to be quick, I rip my attention away from the frames and start searching.
I already looked everywhere I could think of this morning, to no avail.
The frames are too small to hide a safe big enough for a laptop, so I haven’t bothered to look behind them.
Instead, I passed a finger between them, searching for a seam or something.
This time, I grab a chair, kick my shoes off, and step on it to do the same on the higher ones.
When I find nothing, I step down, return the chair to its spot, and slip my shoes back on.
Maybe I should look in the small closet space again.
It would be a great spot to hide a safe.
I swiftly enter it, flick the overhead light on, and start scanning.
The dark Victorian wallpaper makes the space feel smaller than it is.
Careful not to change the position of anything, I pull out some binders on the shelves to look behind them. There’s still nothing there. How hard can it be to find a fucking safe?!
Two knocks on the door out there startle me. Paola. Is she warning me or speeding me up?
Refusing to have to find out the hard way, I return everything to its exact position, exit the closet, and double-check that I didn’t leave anything out of place. Then I grab the bucket with cleaning supplies I took in with me and discreetly open the door.
“We need to go,” Paola whispers. “The shift is over.”
“Right, sorry.”
I wait for her confirmation that the coast is clear to exit the office, and she locks it again.
We walk together in silence back to the service quarters.
I can’t believe I spent the day cleaning someone else’s house for nothing.
What a waste of time and energy. Tomorrow, I’ll see with Lex if he can help me move incognito, so I can at least do some recon on the safes Paola told us about.
Maybe Lorelei misunderstood, and the laptop is in one of those …
While I view today as a failure, Lex, on the other hand, doesn’t.
In his eyes, today was a resounding success, since I came back alive and well, as promised.
We stop to get some Chinese takeout on the way back to the apartment, both unwilling to cook.
I take a quick shower to rinse off the day, slip on an old T-shirt of his I claimed as mine a while ago, a pair of comfy bike shorts, and socks.
When I return to the living room, Lex is patiently waiting for me with the food.
As we eat straight from the boxes, Lex and I go over today.
“Are you sure you should return tomorrow?” he wonders at some point. Of course, he’s using the fact that I returned empty-handed to renegotiate our terms.
“We agreed on three days,” I remind him. “I’ll go the three days.”
“So, do you expect the safe to magically appear?”
I squint at him. “I expect to find it, eventually. Or at least find out what the models of those other safes are, so we can figure out a way to get in.”
“And then what?”
“Then, I don’t know. We hire someone to break in? At least they’ll know what kind of safe they’ll need to crack.”
“It would be a good advantage, yes.”
He sets his takeout cup down and leans back into the armchair he’s in.
I take one last bite with my chopsticks and do the same before getting up.
We’ve been wearing comfy clothes since we arrived, aside from the few times we’ve been out.
Since he dropped me off and came to get me, he’s wearing a black button-down and matching pleated pants.
He looks so handsome, my dark guardian angel.
Without a word, I climb onto his lap, which he welcomes with tender hands. “Hey, I know these,” he murmurs when he notices the flying pigs on my socks. I grin at him, thinking back on everything that’s happened since he first saw my pigasus socks.
He undid two buttons on his shirt since we got in, and my gaze drops to the exposed triangle of his firm chest and the dark hair scattered on it. “I know how hard it was for you to let me go there today,” I say softly. “And I’m so thankful you decided to trust me and my judgment, baby.”
“I didn’t have much of a choice, did I?”
“I wouldn’t have gone behind your back, Lex. But I would have been offended if you refused to trust that I could do this. In case you haven’t noticed, I’m a bit of a badass.”
He gives me a tender and crooked grin that melts my heart. “Believe it or not, I noticed. And very early on, not just since I got arrested.”
It’s my turn to smile. My hand goes around him to play with the thick hair high on his neck. “I know you’re as eager to take Becker down as I am, and the only thing that slows you down is my safety.”
He nods, his hand on my hip tightening for a brief moment. “I know I’m impulsive and hot-headed, and even if it doesn’t always feel that way, I’m so thankful that you hold me back when I’m being too much. You ground me, and even when I lose sight of my safety or good sense, you always recenter me.”
“We balance each other out.”
“Exactly.” I come closer, nearly resting my forehead against his. “I’m sorry for being so pushy. It’s just … I can’t wait.”
“For what?”
“For the rest of our lives. I want us to return home and be ourselves. Then, once we’ve found our routine and harmony again, you’ll ask me to marry you,” I say, using my free hand to graze the tempting skin of his chest. “After a while, once we’ve grown tired of calling one another ‘fiancé,’ we’ll marry.
And this will become real.” I take his left hand, which rests on my knee, and play with his fake wedding ring.
“Then, at some point down the line, you’ll put a baby in me.
By yourself or with the help of a sploogesicle. ”
He chuckles, then shakes his head in reprimand.
“Can you imagine it?” I say, feeling so in love with this man, my heart feels like it’s about to burst out of my chest. “Little angels with their father’s gray eyes and genius mind.”
“Or little rascals with their mother’s freckles, curly hair, and equally brilliant brain.”
It’s my turn to let out a soft giggle. “Whoever they turn out to be, I can’t wait to meet them,” I whisper, laying a tender hand over his chest, where the shirt is open.
“Me neither.”