“I’m not wearing sunglasses inside like an idiot.” He tucked them into his shirt instead. “Let’s go.”
Simon activated the camera jammer in his pocket, eyes peered at the few spots around the main entrance where he knew the surveillance cameras to be. Fine, so maybe he was a bit of acriminal, but only because Everett forced his hand. And was it really a crime if he was jamming his own security feed?
Hunched down, they sneaked past the massive chrome sign with the company name and down the driveway to the building complex. Simon punched in the front door’s code.
The screen flashed red, starting to count down twenty seconds.
“What did you do?” Chris’s whisper was accusatory, like he was a toddler found playing with poop in the park.
When would it finally stick in his mind that three years had passed? They changed the code every six months. “It’s fine, I’ve got it,” he said, racking his brain for the current one. The changes followed an algorithm, so he should be able to figure it out. Three years—six changes, plus the seventh one, which would have been a month ago. He murmured the numbers under his breath, punching in the new code.
The countdown stopped. A shortbleeplet them know the door was unlocked.
Inside, all was quiet. The lobby looked exactly as he remembered. The polished wooden and glass reception desk with a tasteful, stylized mural of the Golden Gate Bridge behind it. A few plants, light gray sofas, a sensor-based water cooler … it was like he had never left.
“This way.” Simon led Chris down the hallways toward his office, quietly moving from shadow to shadow. The offices appeared abandoned so far, but one never knew if they’d installed additional security, or somebody was pulling an all-nighter. He glanced nervously toward the surveillance cameras peppered along the hallways, hoping the jammer was doing its job. How did criminals do this? It was way too stressful. And to think he’d brought Chris along, too …
He didn’t want to endanger her with more questionable activities, but she’d insisted on accompanying him until he cavedin. He could use someone to watch his back, and he admitted it felt less daunting coming here with a partner.
California Girlsstarted playing from somewhere—muted, as if far away, or … in Chris’s pocket?
She pulled out her phone and canceled the call. “Sorry,” she mouthed.
“Turn that off just in case, yeah?” A thought about the song nibbled at the fringes of his memory, but he couldn’t remember what it should be. He shook his head and led them up the staircase, then further down the hallway, until they reached his office, with his secretary’s desk looming in the half-darkness outside.
“Here.” He pressed on the doorknob.
It didn’t give in.
“Are you sure you’re smart enough to have started your own company?” Chris said.
“In my defense, I’m not used to being locked out of it,” he argued in a whisper.
Chris only shook her head, as if disappointed in him, and pushed him out of the way. She kneeled down, took off her cross earrings, and got to work on the lock. A minute later, she opened the door.
“I won’t even ask,” Simon said. “Will you keep a lookout? I’ll check the computer.”
“Sure, boss,” she responded in her flat tone.
Before he could get to the computer, though, Simon paused, taking in the office.That bastard.He’d switched his sofa! And he took down the pictures on the wall. He wasn’t sure whether it was Everett or his impostor, but he assumed Everett, in preparation for his takeover. Simon didn’t mind the obnoxious magazine covers gone, but the rest of the pictures were with his dad at graduation, and Simon in front of the first Aries building… He slid his fingers over the empty wall, the lighter spots of where the pictures used to hang still visible.
He pressed his mouth into a firm line. Everett didn’t know it yet, but these were his last days of freedom. Simon was getting his office back.
He sat down at the computer. This time, he wasn’t too surprised his old password was wrong; it had undoubtedly been changed at least a few times. But who’d have done it last—Everett, or Simon’s impostor? Everett, surely, if he’d also rearranged the office. Simon guessed possible passwords for five minutes until he remembered that stupid password Everett once told him about.
He wouldn’t. Surely not …
But he typed in4EVERettanyway.
The computer unlocked.
“And that’s whyyou’re not the CEO,” Simon whispered.
At least, while changed, the files on his computer were still neatly organized. If only he knew what to look for. Everett might have bad ideas for passwords, but he still wasn’t dumb enough to leave evidence lying in the open. Simon checked various company files first to reassure himself Everett hadn’t been messing with the finances, but everything looked in order. Then he switched to emails; through this computer, he could monitor the employees’ emails, including Everett’s, but if Everett had done anything suspicious there, he deleted his traces well.
Simon swung back in the chair. “What did you do, Everett?” he murmured.
“Hey,” Chris barked. “Someone’s coming.”
