Chapter 3 #2
VESPER: Always.
GHOST: Mysterious.
VESPER: You like mysterious.
GHOST: Apparently I have terrible judgment.
Another night:
GHOST: Still considering the wedding?
VESPER: Perhaps.
GHOST: I hate that word.
VESPER: I know. That's why I use it.
And later, after enough wine to make me reckless:
VESPER: What if we meet and hate each other?
His answer takes longer than normal.
GHOST: Then at least I'll know what your eyes look like when you're disappointed.
I read that one for an embarrassingly long time.
My eyes.
Cornflower blue.
Not that he knows.
Ghost knows caramel hair.
Part of my mouth.
A shoulder.
Fragments.
That's all anyone gets unless I decide otherwise.
By the time I reach California, Vesper barely resembles the woman who steps onto land.
My black wig is straight as silk and cut just below my shoulders. Muddy brown contacts flatten my eyes into something forgettable. No orange-blossom oil. No jewelry. Nothing expensive.
I darken what needs darkening and dull what needs dulling.
Pretty attracts memory.
I don't want memory.
I want invisibility.
So Sabine Beaumont disappears.
In her place is Jenny Hernández, a seasonal worker with decent Spanish, imperfect English, and a history vague enough that people fill the gaps themselves.
I let them assume what they want about my immigration status because fear makes people oddly protective.
It bothers me to use that instinct, but anonymity has never been a clean business.
Nobody asks for the story if they think hearing it might obligate them to act.
That works in my favor.
Jenny finds kitchen work.
Jenny cleans.
Jenny carries boxes.
Jenny knows how to lower her eyes when rich people walk past.
Nobody looks twice.
That's the irony of wealth.
The richer the room, the more invisible certain people become.
I spend eight days tracing the wedding.
Not through Kane Haverhill.
That would be stupid.
Weddings are ecosystems.
Florists.
Rentals.
Catering.
Musicians.
Transportation.
Temporary staff.
A harpist who advertises every private event she's ever played except the ones she's been explicitly told not to mention.
Small companies with polished websites and badly protected administrative systems.
Invoices passing through too many hands.
Schedules copied into email chains.
No single piece gives me everything.
Together, they build a map.
Palo Alto leads me south.
Santa Barbara creates another thread.
A Beverly Hills event designer closes the loop.
Then I eye the estate.
Private.
Coastal.
High above the Pacific.
The invitation matches.
Every time.
I should feel triumphant.
Instead, I feel something close to guilt.
Ghost trusted me with a door into his real life.
I'm preparing to enter through a wall.
The problem is that I still don't know whether Ghost is real.
Not in the way that matters.
I'm not worried he doesn't exist.
He exists.
Years of conversation prove that.
What I don't know is who owns the intelligence behind the words.
Governments have used honey traps since people discovered secrets were valuable.
I've done work adjacent to enough three-letter agencies to know kindness can be operational.
French services.
American services.
British.
People who are friends until the objective changes.
People who become enemies because somebody signs a different paper in another building.
Ghost could be intelligence.
A long game.
A foreign service trying to identify Vesper.
A private contractor.
A criminal operation.
Someone hired by Blackwell.
The last possibility keeps me awake.
Because Blackwell has been hunting someone like me for years.
Not Sabine.
Not Vesper, as far as I know.
The intruder.
The person slipping into outer layers of Blackwell systems and taking things the company would prefer remained buried.
Me.
I've never stolen money.
Money is boring.
Information is useful.
A corrupt executive needs convincing?
Information.
A government intermediary lying about where certain surveillance technology ended up?
Information.
A corporate lawyer who helped bury evidence tied to my father's death?
Information.
I collect leverage.
Sometimes I use it.
Sometimes I hold it.
Blackwell wants the person behind those breaches.
Xavier Blackwell’s father most of all.
I've read enough whispers about Xavier himself inside private networks to know that much.
The eye in the sky.
The heir who can find anyone.
Except me.
Ghost, meanwhile, has never once asked me a question that feels like interrogation.
That should reassure me.
It doesn't.
The best interrogators rarely sound like interrogators.
So I keep moving.
And I build a way out before I build a way in.
The night before the wedding, I approach the estate from the sea.
Not the main perimeter.
I don't need to.
There is a small cove beneath the cliffs, half hidden by rock and accessible only when the water cooperates. I arrive offshore in a battered little tender that looks forgettable beside the yachts farther down the coast.
My dive gear goes with me.
Wetsuit.
Mask.
Tank.
Fins.
A dry bag with clothing, a second wig, makeup, contacts, and everything I might need if the exit becomes complicated.
I stash the gear where saltwater and stone will keep it out of casual sight.
No electronics worth finding.
No name.
No Vesper.
My escape route waits below.
Tomorrow I enter through the front.
If something goes wrong, I leave through the Pacific.
Simple.
Almost.
Nothing involving Ghost has been simple for years.
Wedding morning begins before sunrise.
Jenny Hernández arrives with a temporary catering crew wearing black trousers, flat shoes, a white shirt, and the universal expression of someone being paid too little to carry something heavy.
No one questions me.
Why would they?
I am carrying glassware.
Rich people rarely suspect the woman holding the tray.
The estate is already alive.
Flowers everywhere.
White roses.
Green vines.
Staff moving beneath stone arches.
Security stationed discreetly enough that guests will eventually mistake them for well-dressed employees.
I count cameras.
Then stop.
Not because there aren't many.
Because something is wrong.
There are fewer than I expected.
Much fewer.
The wedding is almost analog.
Interesting.
Someone designed privacy into the event instead of surveillance.
No guest phones.
No personal cameras.
No active public networks.
Credential checkpoints.
Human security.
Offshore patrol.
Even the sky is protected.
Ghost's friend has serious money.
More importantly, serious security.
I begin wondering whether Ghost is one of the men wearing earpieces.
That would make sense.
A private-security specialist.
European connections.
Technical fluency.
Maybe Ghost isn't a guest at all.
Maybe he's working.
The thought disappoints me.
I dislike that immediately.
By nine, I have changed identities twice.
Jenny handles setup.
A brown wig replaces the black one during a bathroom break.
Different contacts.
Different posture.
Jenny becomes someone attached to event rentals.
Nobody notices.
Why would they?
People see uniforms before faces.
The tiny camera I brought is no larger than the decorative hardware hidden along my clothing seam. It captures still images, not continuous video. Less data. Less risk.
Getting anything out is harder.
The event's communications lockdown is excellent.
Almost.
Nothing is ever completely closed.
I wait.
Observe.
Find the smallest gap.
Then use it once.
No repeated pattern.
No trail worth following.
I move toward the ceremony lawn.
The arch is finished.
White flowers against blue Pacific.
Beautiful.
Almost offensively romantic.
I stand low beside a stack of folded linens, angle my body as though checking placement, and capture the photograph.
One image.
I send it into NULL.
Then whisper in Italian, barely loud enough for myself to hear.
“Chi è il vero fantasma adesso?”
Who's the real ghost now?
A smile threatens.
I suppress it.
Somewhere on this estate, Ghost is about to realize Vesper has arrived.