Chapter Seven Better Reluctant Allies Than Outright Enemies
Adelina
In the words of Admiral Ackbar: It’s a trap.
No matter what I do, no matter the different scenarios I play out in my head, I’m going to lose either way.
If I decline his oh-so generous offer to work with him, West will turn me over to the police.
I don’t know exactly what evidence he’s managed to collect, and there’s a chance it’s all circumstantial, but the last thing I want is for the cops to start poking around and asking unnecessary questions.
A glaringly obvious one would be: How have I been able to afford rent in one of Canada’s most egregiously expensive cities without a job?
But if I agree…
He could be a serial killer for all I know. Or a cannibal. Or, God forbid, a cannibal serial killer. He’s given me next to nothing, just an empty promise of fifty billion dollars and no apparent plan whatsoever. The less I know, the more danger I’m in.
There’s really one way to fix this problem, and that’s to get to work.
I stay up all night, click-clacking away at my desktop computer.
I triple-checked my apartment door’s lock when I returned from the restaurant.
No signs of forced entry. West really must have picked it open.
(It doesn’t surprise me that my landlord decided to go with the cheapest lock on the market, the stingy bastard.) Regardless, I’ve created a makeshift barricade out of dining table chairs to keep it sealed—just in case West really is a serial killer.
I’ve got a small can of pepper spray in my pocket too, because a woman can never be too careful.
It’s technically illegal to own pepper spray in Canada, but you can sneak anything into the country if you know where to look and who to ask.
The next time I check the clock, it’s pushing 4:30 a.m. The pale morning sun filters through the crack in the curtains roughly an hour later, and all I’ve got for my efforts is eyestrain compounded by a terrible headache. The third energy drink I knocked back definitely isn’t helping things.
Nothing. Zilch.
Even though I already have his banking information, the address on file, even his social insurance number, I can’t find a crumb of info on the guy.
No social media presence, no record of employment, not even so much as a parking infraction.
While the money in his account is most certainly real, the man who supposedly owns it is nothing more than a ghost.
It can only mean one thing: West Porter is a fake.
Identity theft isn’t my area of expertise.
I’ve obtained personal information, yes, but I’ve never gone so far as to actively masquerade as someone else.
Back in ye olden times before the dawn of the internet, all you really had to do was keep an eye on the obituaries and use the name of the recently deceased as your own.
There wasn’t a database to raise any red flags.
But now, it’s a matter of forging IDs: driver’s licenses, passports, and so on.
Not impossible, but definitely not as easy as it used to be.
It’s also entirely possible that West is more of a DIY kind of thief.
He’s already proven resourceful enough to pull something like that off.
Rubbing my fingers against my eyes, I take a deep breath. This is…not ideal. And with my twenty-four hours slowly counting down, I’m nowhere closer to deciding than I was last night.
On a whim, I check my phone. There are several texts from Lily waiting for me. A quick look at the timestamps suggests she messaged me shortly after I left dinner at Mom’s. My sister’s right. I’m terrible at answering my phone.
Lily: I’m so sorry, Addy. Mom was being a total bitch.
Lily: I really thought she’d be nice. Please text me back?
Lily: Can you at least let me know when you get home?
God, I’m such an asshole. Lily’s always been a worrywart, and here I am constantly ignoring her messages.
I send her a quick response that everything’s fine (it’s not) and that I made it home safely (home invader aside).
She doesn’t get back to me right away, and I don’t expect her to.
Not only do we share the same genetic code, but my sister and I also share a burning hatred for early mornings.
I reach into my pocket and fish out the hotel business card West gave me, running my fingers along the rounded corners.
I like to think I’m a good judge of character, but when it comes to West, I genuinely can’t tell.
A part of me wishes he’d been some tatted-up criminal with a mean mug.
At least then I could have written him off as an outright threat.
The fact that he was all smiles and teasing leaves me…
unsettled. Walking on eggshells. He could be a wolf in sheep’s clothing, tricking me into stepping into his jaws.
But what choice do I have?
“Fifty billion dollars,” I mumble, my whisper somehow too loud in the space of my lonely little apartment. Turning the number over and over again in my head, I try to formulate a contingency plan.
If I’m going to do this, I need to stay one step ahead.
Sneaking into a hotel is surprisingly simple.
All it takes is an empty pizza box pilfered from my own fridge and a general expression of fatigue.
It may be cheap as far as disguises go, but it’s incredibly effective.
I need to even the playing field with West, and I’m most definitely not above a little fraud and a skosh of impersonation.
I stride up to the front desk and pretend to look out of sorts. “I’ve got a delivery for a Mr. West Porter?”
The receptionist doesn’t really look at me so much as she looks through me.
The phones are ringing off the hook, and it seems like she’s struggling to respond to all the emails piling up in her inbox.
The lobby is busy, full of irritable hotel guests that I’ve unapologetically budged in front of.
For whatever reason, she’s the only one on duty.
“Just leave it here. We can bring it up.”
I take a measured breath. That won’t do.
“Instructions say to deliver it to him in person.” I talk quickly on purpose, allowing my words to run into one another to give the illusion of urgency.
It definitely helps that I’ve got a trustworthy-looking face.
Unassuming might be a more accurate term.
“He probably doesn’t want a whole bunch of people touching his food.
Could you tell me his room number? I can’t remember what it was.
I can just pop up and get out of your hair. ”
The receptionist, flustered and probably considering handing in her two weeks’ notice, nods distractedly and types something into her computer. “Room 501. The elevator’s around the corner.”
“Thanks,” I say, and scurry off before she can think twice about all the privacy laws she’s just breached.
When I locate West’s door, I promptly pull out my phone and hold it near the electronic card reader. All modern hotel chains use RFID readers to lock their doors. It’s more secure than a run-of-the-mill key, and the average person doesn’t have the technical know-how to hack into one.
At the risk of sounding like a complete ass, I’m a bit more than average.
There’s no need to bridge wires, no need to break the lock into tiny bits.
All I need to do is confuse the chip reader into believing I’m in possession of a legitimate key.
Before I came, I spent a couple of hours writing a mimicking software and downloaded it onto my phone.
I was stumped for a bit on a particular line of code, but there’s nothing I can’t achieve with the power of a helpful YouTube tutorial.
(Who knew there were entire channels made by lock-picking aficionados?)
When I bring the phone up to the reader, the little light blinks green; this is followed by the metallic click-thunk of the mechanism’s release.
How James Bond manages to do all the cool shit he does and not act like a giddy schoolgirl is beyond me, because holy crap I feel like a total badass right now.
The room is empty when I arrive. West’s small black suitcase is tucked away neatly by the end of the bed, which tells me he hasn’t left yet.
There’s still three hours before his deadline is up.
He must have figured I’d run out the clock and took the chance to sightsee.
Maybe he’s on that food tour he mentioned earlier.
That’s his mistake.
I toss my empty pizza box and high-vis vest aside and casually make my way over to the mini fridge.
I pry the door open and survey the absurdly expensive snacks and drinks within, helping myself to a bag of M&M’s, a Toblerone bar, a can of pistachios and a bottle of Diet Coke before grabbing his suitcase by the handle and tossing it onto the bed.
It’s unlocked. He probably didn’t expect me to arrive early and snoop through his things.
There’s little of interest. A couple shirts, a knitted sweater, a few pairs of pants, socks and boxer briefs.
I take special care not to touch his underwear because that would push me over the line into Creepyville.
No rope or handcuffs or weapons, so it’s safe to assume he truly has no plans to hack me to bits.
No wallet or phone, though. He must have taken those with him.
What I do find, however, is his passport inside one of the small inner pockets.
It has a burgundy cover with a golden emblem embossed onto the front. At the top it reads: Union européenne République francaise.
I raise my eyebrows. He’s French? I never would have guessed. His American accent is immaculate.