19. Chapter 19
HIM
Back in Corey’s— my —musty office, I drew the shade and opened the window to let some light and air in. Blinking at the harsh sunlight, I closed the shade again partway. All the offices had a high-tech opaque screen that could be drawn over the glass paneling for privacy, but I couldn’t think of a better way to broadcast “I’m up to no good” to the entire building, so I left it alone.
I turned to the desk with a strange anticipation. Langer had said there was nothing proprietary in there, and I had no reason to doubt that. Honestly, I didn’t know what I expected to find by volunteering to do a menial chore, other than flashbacks to how I’d spent most of my life up to this point and the dubious opportunity to learn way more than I ever wanted to know about Corey.
A few minutes later, most of what I’d learned was that the dude was disgusting. The desk boasted a bobblehead of his college mascot and a couple of other pieces of tacky swag, plus a pair of douchey wraparound sunglasses and spare change, all mired in layers of sticky residue from whatever he’d been drinking—likely the bottle of cheap whiskey stuffed in one of the drawers—topped off with a pack of novelty playing cards with naked women on them, a gift from one of his classier friends, no doubt. Balled-up clothes that looked like he’d worn them to the gym. And cigarette butts because apparently, he’d been too lazy to even go to the window to surreptitiously smoke, let alone all the way downstairs. In the drawers and in a couple of cardboard boxes, I found untidy stacks of old gas station receipts, sales catalogs, and business cards. Obviously, the digital transformation didn’t seem to have made it here. What kind of so-called engineer doesn’t have a filing system, electronic or otherwise?
I quickly rummaged through the remaining drawers and shelves, scanning every page, front and back, to see if it was of interest before throwing entire stacks of paper and knick-knacks into a large garbage bag with the kind of vengeful satisfaction I’d never expected to get from cleaning. I supposed that would have to satisfy me.
And then, at the very bottom of the drawer, covered in papers from over a year ago, as if to make it look less conspicuous, was a tablet. I pressed the button, but it obviously needed a charge. Stuck on the other side, a sticky note read:
Hey, Cor, hope you enjoyed the lab tour! ?? These codes should help you next time. Feel free to bring some friends. I owe you one. - R.
She’d written two four-digit numbers on the back.
And under that , in what I now recognized as Corey’s handwriting, was a list of passwords.
HER
I had been surprised but not overly concerned when Erica had abruptly sent out a mass email canceling her office hours that day, or even when she hadn’t replied to the email I’d sent her from the throwaway account I’d made in the university computer lab, asking her when and where we could meet. Or even when one of Milagros’ fellow volunteer guides at the mirror telescope told me Milagros hadn’t been in for a couple of days. And yet as I hung around the library trying to study, and more hours passed without a reply, the more uneasy—and guilty—I felt that it had taken me so long to get in touch with them, especially after the urgency of Erica’s message asking me to call back re: Maeve. Then again, two days of wallowing in abject depression didn’t seem like too much to ask after that , and I thought even the professor, for all her single-minded devotion to the cause, might have at least a little sympathy for me. Not to mention, I no longer had a computer or a phone. But as I approached that now-familiar little adobe house near the university, that feeling I’d had on the walk over—dodging what I knew intellectually were probably not suspicious looks from passersby—had only grown.
As before, the windowsills were lined with potted succulents, and vines cascaded down from a trellis on the wall. But that wrought-iron iguana, which before had seemed friendly and almost welcoming, now seemed to wear an unseemly grin that made me want to kick it over. I paused, my hand hovering above the brass doorknob, listening for any sign of movement inside. When no noise came, I took a deep breath, turned the knob, and stepped inside.
Not even the echoing of my footsteps on the tile could break the silence that blanketed the lush living room. I could almost hear the plants breathing. Millie the cat meowed a greeting from the kitchen, but for now, came no closer. Her food and water bowls, just inside the kitchen door, were empty. Should I take a look around or wait until someone came back? I wondered.
No. Neither. Because I didn’t want to see it. I didn’t want to see the plants; didn’t want to see the cat; didn’t want to see the hammock or, God, the pool . I didn’t want to see them for the same reason I didn’t want to wake up in my own goddamn bed every morning.
Look, I knew I was the lucky one, not him. But one thing was for sure: wherever he was, at least his memories were only in his head.
Back at home, the lid on the thick white eggshell paint in the storage room had popped off, its contents gushed to all corners, as if someone had rattled the bottom shelf as hard as they could to get it to fall. It was going to be a bitch for the maid to clean up, and since I had about fifteen minutes to spare before I risked being late, I did the right thing and helped her with it. The wooden stir stick that had been used to write lay mired in the thick paint, next to the words:
When You Are Old.
And that was it. There was no hint to his location, no hint of anything , really. I couldn’t pretend I wasn’t crushed. I’d offered my heart and said the words. And as much as I didn’t begrudge him his fear—I’d never met anyone so equally terrified of love and being alone—it hadn’t been easy for me, either. And all he could think to write to me, as the last thing he might ever get to say, were four words about me getting old? Yeah. Getting old without him, it looked like.
I felt heat rush to my face. No wonder Erica and Milagros weren’t here. They had probably long since given up on getting any help from me and gone off on their own. And now, in Erica’s silent living room, with Millie’s tail swishing and the lacy drapes fluttering, here were the tears falling again. Right on cue.
Stupid fucking crybaby. What was I even doing here? His sister was stuck in some living hell and I’d promised him I would find her, and yet I’d done nothing but lie in bed and cry for the past two days. And I was surprised when he didn’t say he loved me? I was a joke. I was making things worse . I’d started fucking up his life pretty much right from the moment we’d met, and clearly, not much had changed.
Millie gracefully leaped from the top of the pillow-strewn sofa to the bookshelf as if trying to bring my attention to that spot. Another memory: his startled eyes tearing themselves away from the page, slamming the book shut, caught in the act of … reading poetry. As if that were somehow transgressive. Though for him, maybe it was.
Still, there was something about that memory in particular. Inspired, I ran my fingers along the spines of the old books, looking for poetry volumes, until I finally stopped at a thick one at the end. I grabbed and opened it, flipping through the pages until suddenly, I stopped dead and looked up. The air around me seemed to darken as if a cloud had passed over the sun, muting the birds and the distant street noises. The shadows of the room seemed to stretch and swirl as if a hidden figure stood just beyond the edge of my vision, watching my every move. And then the front door slammed shut.
HIM
After a month of trying, I was finally getting a glimpse inside the legendary 2481 Salt River Boulevard—and finding it a total bore. Lemaya had predictably been made the tour guide, her bouncy energy perfect for the job. At first, I followed her dutifully through the glass-paned doors of the lab—high-security and totally unmarked from the outside—where gleaming white countertops lined the walls and a collection of brand-new equipment hummed, more advanced than some of the stuff I’d used in Heidelberg, even. She moved swiftly around the room, pointing out each feature with care. But her words were predictably rehearsed, glossing over certain details, like where the other girls were who supposedly worked here and whether Resi was experimenting with microchips, the way Maeve—and later Erica—had suggested. And even though I hadn’t had time to charge the tablet or try any of the passwords, I already had a feeling the tour I was getting was very different from the “tour” Resi had given Corey.
In fact, all Lemaya would tell me was that “we all have different schedules” and that they were working on “cutting-edge technology” and that “it was all very exciting.” In other words, complete bullshit straight out of a marketing brochure. I tried every way I could think of to cajole her for more. Sure, I might be able to come up with an excuse to come back here in the next few days, but I couldn’t count on it, and I was fairly confident that the other address Erica had found—the one that used to belong to Max’s father—was not going to be on any tours Resi planned to give me. I had to do what I could right now. Half an hour later, though, Lemaya had had it. Even her bounce felt forced. It was almost as if she was telling me with her dark brown eyes: for both of our sakes, please, just shut up.
Langer, who’d been following along for the first five to ten minutes, had slipped out. That gave me an opportunity. Right now, I needed to get Lemaya acting—and talking—like a real person again. Luckily, that was my specialty.
“What do I think? I think that’s the most beautiful pipette I have ever seen in my life,” I said, directing my eyes toward the glassware she was holding with a teasing smile.
After a second, she giggled. “Isn’t it, though?” she said, gesturing elegantly to it like a showroom model.
“No, but seriously, I do have a question I know you can answer. So you know how it is when a light bulb just goes off in your head and it’s all you think about and you just have to get it down on paper before you forget? Is there maybe a quiet place nearby where I can go do that? Like, now?”
In a second, Lemaya’s smile went from charmed to slightly terrified. And it wasn’t just because Resi was hiding something, or just because I was Maeve’s brother.
It was both. And probably more.
Better throw some puppy-dog eyes in, too. “Ideas are sort of how I’m earning my keep here,” I said. “So if it slips away, Max’s not going to be happy.”
In a second, Lemaya’s smile faltered, her eyes flicking nervously around the room before settling back on me, the laughter gone. There was fear there, a subtle shift I almost missed. I wondered what instructions she’d been given and how often she’d been told the consequences for breaking them.
Or been shown them.
“I won’t let anything come back on you,” I murmured. It was a promise I might regret making, the kind I might not be able to keep but was always fucking making. And we both knew that was what it was, but we also came from the same place, so we knew that sometimes you had to make it anyway.
She chewed on her lip. “I disabled the cameras in here,” she explained, her voice low. “But still, you didn’t hear this from me. If Resi finds out I told you—“
“She won’t,” I said.
Reluctantly, she continued. “Down the hall, there’s a storeroom. It’s quiet, isolated. No one goes there much. You can work there, but be discreet, please.”
I nodded, keeping my voice even. “And Resi—“
Her eyes widened slightly, a silent plea. “Just … be careful around her. More than you think you need to be. I didn’t want to tell you anything, and I shouldn’t be telling you now, but I’m doing it for Maeve.”
“You taught her English.”
She nodded. “Tried. I—she was—is—my friend.” Her deep, dark brown eyes stayed fixed on mine. The eyes of someone that I could actually imagine my sister being friends with quite easily. No, I still didn’t fully trust Lemaya, but for a second, for Maeve’s sake, I was glad she existed.
“Do you know where she is?” I tried.
“I wish I did,” she said, slowly shaking her head. “Just like I bet she wishes she knew where I was.“ But she lowered her voice even further. “I’ll try to find out more.”
I nodded and moved quickly down the bright-white hallway and toward an open door leading to a side room. Inside was a smaller laboratory, filled with buzzing machinery, and an even smaller room branching off from it. And in that smaller room were two figures. After a moment, I recognized Langer and Resi, standing close together, almost touching in a way that could have been friendly or supportive—but could have been any number of other things, too. I crept around the corner of a stainless steel lab bench, pressing my back against the cold metal surface. Peering cautiously around the side of the equipment, I could see them. I ducked back down behind the bench and strained to make out the words.
“Wow, this place is fairly humming with activity,” Langer remarked sarcastically. “It’s a thrill to be in such a fast-paced and productive environment.”
So I was right. They may have lived at another address, but the other girls should be here now. And in their absence, the place was dead.
“All joking aside, if I were Keith Wainwright-Phillips,” Langer went on, “and had my entire fortune wrapped up in this project—not to mention having my name on the deed for this warehouse, thanks to a suggestion from you —I’d be starting to get a bit, I don’t know, concerned.”
“ That’s who you’re worried about?“ Resi asked, keeping her voice tuned to that sweet, innocent frequency I was beginning to dread the sound of. “I’ve seen him around you. He’s like a starry-eyed kid getting a chance to kick a ball with his football hero. I really don’t think you need to preoccupy yourself with him.”
“I wouldn’t underestimate him. When he was a CEO, it took him only five years to turn some bottom-of-the-barrel insurance provider into one of the most valuable firms in the West.”
“Yeah, by insuring companies whose slaves got hurt or killed on the job,” she scoffed.
What the fuck? What, was she against slavery for everyone except me ?
“He’s coming around,” said Langer, though he didn’t sound entirely confident. “And, sure, I thought he was an idiot, too, at first, and he may have gone off the deep end recently, but he’s not some neophyte, and he won’t wait around forever. He’s going to want to see some ROI, and soon.”
“I thought Rocket Boy was supposed to take care of that,” she sniffed, trying to regain her dulcet tones and not entirely succeeding.
“He will.”
The statement could easily have sounded ominous, but instead, it sounded … hopeful? Maybe even a little … proud? Weird.
“By the way, are you sure you never had his sister working over here? Never saw her? Never even met her?”
“Yes, and why?” Her voice bristled, all the sweetness gone out of it in an instant. “What’s he been telling you? I don’t trust him. He’s a snake.”
I was flattered. I had no idea Resi thought so highly of me.
“He’s not a snake. He’s a kid who’s worried because his sister is missing, and he can’t fucking do anything about it because he’s a slave. Anyway, I believe you, so calm the fuck down. This isn’t about him, anyway. This is about you and White Cedar, and what I promised Keith that it would deliver. That you would deliver.”
“I am delivering,” she said, her voice heightened. “And I told you I could deliver it faster if you’d give me access to the books.”
“And I told you you’re crazy. Do you think I need the revenue service on my ass? I’m already paying a slave cash under the table, and that’s just for starters. The last thing I need is you fucking around in the books for no good reason.”
“But … but …”
I could swear Resi was about to cry. She even gave a sniffle. It was all a sham, I was sure. She was a better actor than I was. And all of a sudden, it hit me like a shelf full of beakers falling on my head. Resi could manipulate Max. Not only manipulate but maybe even lie to him.
Well, shit. I’d really have to kill her now because I wanted to be the only one doing that.
“I just feel like sometimes you don’t trust me,” she went on. “Sometimes I wonder whether you even care about me.”
“Care about you?” Langer’s voice bore an entirely different tone than I’d ever heard from him before. Wait, this guy could actually be sensitive? Caring? Sure, it was far from the most surprising part of this conversation, but it was certainly close. “Do we really have to talk about how many times I’ve bailed you out of trouble? Kept you from becoming a slave again? Kept you—”
Another long sniff as if she were feigning dabbing at her eyes or wiping her nose. “I know.”
One thing Resi had told me was true: there was history here. History that went back a lot further than the hush-hush bailout in Belgium that Erica had discovered. History between the two of them alone, history I could only begin to guess at. In any case, it weighed a lot, as history often did. And whatever it was, it seemed to have sparked a level of trust in Resi that was completely irrational for Langer and dangerous for everybody else.
“Don’t lose sight of why we’re doing this, Schatzi ,” said Langer. “This is about so much more than money.”
Resi didn’t respond, but a moment between them passed, a moment I couldn’t see but only guess at. A hug? Something else?
“I need better security at the lab and at the house,” Resi spoke up in a slightly more robust voice. “For the past two nights, the cameras have picked up someone prowling around out there, and to top it off—” she cut herself off as if she’d suddenly decided she didn’t want him to know about whatever other problem she’d been about to describe. “Never mind.”
But it was enough. Dread hit me like a pair of soft, cold female fingers on the skin of my throat. I knew instantly who the prowlers were—well, not their names, but pretty much everything else. These were Erica’s people, the ones that “specialized in this kind of thing.” And whoever they were, I had no doubt that Resi had the means to trace them back to Erica—and by proxy, Louisa. Maybe she already had.
But, like so many times before when someone close to me was in danger, I was helpless. My nails dug into my palms with the kind of frustration and rage I knew tragically well.
Fuck Wainwright-Phillips , I thought, not for the first time. My master wouldn’t think he was so clever when his daughter ended up dead because the one person who could warn her had been rendered incapable of contacting her.
What’s more, I now knew Resi was lying to Max about Maeve. But still, where the hell is Maeve?
“Who do you think the prowler is?” Langer asked.
Resi paused as if she knew. “It doesn’t matter. Leave that up to me. But if you want ROI, then please make it so I don’t have to waste my time playing rent-a-cop anymore.”
Langer sighed. “I already got you Obadiah. What more do you need?”
“Everything—everyone—you can get me.”
“Consider it done. In the meantime, what can I do to take care of the immediate problem?”
“Nothing,” Resi replied softly. “I’m taking care of it now.”
HER
I dropped the book on the floor. Instinctively, I knew it was just the wind that had blown the door shut. But my heart was still racing, and I recalled enough bad movies to know I should run straight out of there. But before I could, I forgot about the door. Because suddenly, from the pool area, came a faint sound, and it wasn’t Millie.
Fuck. All of a sudden, Erica’s message from two days ago came rushing back with a new and horrifying clarity. Maybe it hadn’t been news at all. Maybe it was a warning. I never should have come here alone. What if—
“Erica?” called a thin, foreign-sounding female voice, at once so familiar—and unfamiliar—it set me trembling from within, like a response to the echo of some distant dream.
I ran as fast as I could out to the pool. There, curled up in the woven hammock, pale skin dappled with watery sunlight, lay a thin, petite, bleary-eyed girl with a blood-soaked bandage on her arm. As she raised her bruised body, her pixie-ish golden hair was pressed flat against her cheek as if she’d been sleeping on it for days.
Mother of mercy. That face. That hair. Those eyes .
“You are Louisa, yeah?” Maeve asked in slow, careful, halting English. “Where is my brother?”
Well, friends, it seems I’ve done it again. Sorry.