1. Talia #4
“Sorry,” Talia said. “I’m not good at this PR stuff. Why don’t I let you ask me questions and I’ll answer them?”
“Okay, well…” Laura glanced over her shoulder, as if making sure no one else was in hearing range.
How odd.
“I must confess it wasn’t traffic on 101 that made me late,” Laura said. “I have a scoop about Ideal Life that no one else knows yet, and I was working late on the story. But I wanted to give you a chance to comment before I publish my article tonight.”
“A scoop? What do you mean?” Talia was the founder of Ideal Life. It was her job to know everything, and she wasn’t aware of any news besides this Omni deal.
Did Laura know the acquisition documents had been delayed and hadn’t actually been signed yet?
But a minor bureaucratic French holdup wasn’t newsworthy. In fact, the French attorneys would be in the office in a matter of hours and send the paperwork so that Ideal Life’s and Omni’s lawyers would have it first thing in the morning, Pacific time.
“I have a very reliable source in the Los Angeles Police Department who informed me that a few hours ago, they arrested a woman for murdering her Tinder date. The accused—Rebecca Lawrence—claims her Ideal Life Friend told her that her Tinder date, Gabe Marques, was the same kind of man who had made for bad relationships for her in the past, and Ideal Life recommended that she ‘eliminate him’ ”—Laura used air quotes—“as an option. But Rebecca Lawrence took it literally and killed him.”
“What?” Talia’s stomach went into free fall.
No. This couldn’t be true. Talia created Ideal Life to make things better for people, not to hurt them.
Laura, in full investigative journalist mode, didn’t stop. “How could you let something like this happen?”
“I…” Talia’s palms started sweating.
If something like this was possible once, would it be possible again?
Or—oh god—had it already happened twice, three times, more… but no one had connected the dots yet?
Have I murdered people? Talia started hyperventilating.
Her panic seemed to egg Laura on. “Why didn’t Ideal Life take into account that the accused had restraining orders filed against her in the past for violence against her exes?”
“W-we have over a million users, and we don’t do background checks on our customers. We only ask… Everything they tell us is voluntary.”
“Don’t you think that’s irresponsible?” Laura asked.
Beyond flustered, Talia started pacing, counting to herself to slow her breathing and completely tossing out the window the role of calm, collected CEO.
“I’m sorry… what?”
“Don’t you think that’s irresponsible?” Laura repeated. “Not running thorough background checks?”
The reporter’s backward perspective shocked some composure back into Talia.
“No! It’s not irresponsible; it’s the opposite,” she said.
“We respect our customers’ privacy. This is a critical, foundational principle of Ideal Life.
We’re not scraping the internet for everything about them.
We promise to keep their data private and only use it to help them. ”
“And do you believe that this policy ‘helped’ Mr. Marques?”
“I…” Talia looked frantically around the room for someone to save her. But they were all busy drinking new rounds of sake and oohing and aahing over the desserts, which looked like sushi but were actually quenelles of ice cream topped with slices of colorful mochi.
In her pocket, her phone buzzed. But when she looked, it wasn’t a phone call that would allow her to excuse herself for a few minutes. It was her 11:11 wish alarm.
At the beginning of freshman year, Sam had been homesick and made a wish at 11:11 p.m. for a friend, not only one who was good for late-night college debates over soggy fries, but one who could last a lifetime.
Talia had knocked on his door a few seconds later because she had missed a lecture in Computer Science 106A and heard he was in the class, so she had hoped she could borrow his notes.
Talia and Sam had been making wishes at 11:11 p.m. ever since.
I wish I could rewind today, she thought. Then there might be a way to fix this, to add some kind of safeguard into Ideal Life’s programming to prevent the murder from happening. Or Talia would fly down to LA and throw herself between Rebecca Lawrence and Gabriel Marques if she had to.
But she knew the 11:11 wishes weren’t real. It had only been coincidence that she and Sam had met that way.
Talia’s hands shook as she stuffed her phone back into her pocket.
Laura cleared her throat. “Talia? Any further comment on this story?”
“Hey, hey, hey,” DeVon said, swooping in with three plates of mochi ice cream.
“Glad you could join us, Laura. I’m DeVon Robinson, Omni’s head of media relations; my office is where tonight’s party invite came from.
It’s great to finally meet you. So, what are you two talking about?
Anything I can help with from an Omni perspective? ”
Laura’s eyes glinted at the new prey. Or maybe it was a reflection from the sconces on the wall. Either way, it gave Talia chills.
“Great timing,” Laura said. “I’ve just received a report from the LAPD…”