Page 137 of Matteo

Little does he know that Matteo said the same thing to me about him.

“But why do you need to know?”

“I already told you, mala, I’m simply looking out for you.”

That doesn’t make any sense.

“That's not looking out for me, Vlad. That's spying. Stalking, even.”

Which is what Matteo said.

I think about how I left him in the hotel suite, sitting on the couch watching TV, all alone. And this after a nightmare flight. This trip hasn't started well for him, and here I am, sitting in a fancy bar talking to Vlad.

I'm starting to think that maybe I shouldn’t have asked Matteo to come with me. But now I’m starting to think that Matteo isn't the problem. Listening to Vlad tell me he already knows about Matteo, and him turning up at our suite unexpectedly makes me suspicious.

He’s helped me and protected me in the past, but this time he seems different, and I'm more uneasy than ever because I don’t know what his line of work is.

Yet, it's his wedding, and no matter how things seem to be. I just have to put on a brave face.

I try to poke a little. “What are you doing now? You're obviously doing very well.”

He leans forward and, using his finger, wipes away a line of condensation from the bottle of water.

I start to think he hasn't heard me. “Vlad? What are you up to these days?”

He stops and glances at me. “This and that.”

Talk about being completely evasive. It’s unfair, given that he knows so much about me.

“What exactly?” I push, refusing to give in.

“I help people avoid very expensive mistakes.”

“That’s not an answer.”

“It’s the only one you’re getting, mala.”

He’s talking in riddles, like he sometimes used to. It’s infuriating to pin him down. Impossible to get answers from. And yet he’s also morally principled—or used to be—which adds a layer of nuance that makes it difficult to figure out his motivations.

I recall how we met, online at first. How I lurked on a computer forum and posted a solution to a problem I'd been working on. A piece of code that exposed a flaw other people had missed.

A few hours later, I got a private message. I didn't know it at the time, but it was Vlad. He told me my solution was clever. Asked where I'd learned to code.

Nobody had ever called me clever before.

Nobody had ever looked at something I'd built and seen value in it.

We talked online more after that. Then more still. Looking back, I think he recognized something in me long before I recognized it in myself.

I was careful online. I'd encountered enough creeps, scammers, and people pretending to be something they weren't to know better than to trust anyone blindly. Especially as a young woman.

He lived somewhere in the States back then. He never gave away much personal information, but over time he told me about a small group he'd built. Talented people who were interested in coding, cybersecurity, and finding vulnerabilities that others missed.

“Still as mysterious as ever,” I murmur, taking a sip of my juice.

“My little sister has all grown up,” he says. “Running her own cybersecurity firm. How’s that working out?”

“It’s early days,” I say, because I’d rather not delve deeper into it.