Page 140 of The Daddy P.I. Casefiles: The Second Collection
He holds up his hands. “I swear.”
I don’t believe him. “Asshole.”
“Asshole who isn’t charging you extra.”
“This isn’t about money. It’s about my privacy.”
“While you’re my problem, you don’t have any. Sorry, but that’s the way it’s gotta be. You’re in the security business, Maxie. You know true privacy is an illusion. Your eight fucking phones aside, there are eleven other smart phones in this building. They’re all listening, all the time. They might not be able to hear you when you’re in your apartment, ‘cause I notice you’ve got it soundproofed, but in the hallways, out on your fire escape, on the street? They’re listening to you. Might not be Big Brother, but it’s Big Data and it has your fucking number. I bet if you went on social media right now, it’d show you adverts for dog cages, organic honey, and stuffed animals. I’m far from the only person who knows your business. I’m just the one who won’t do anything fucking sinister with it.”
“Did you honestly just tell me you’re not sinister?”
He grins. “Let’s loop back to why confinement doesn’t work for you as a punishment.”
Him and his interminable interrogations. “Let’s not. I’m coding. I need to concentrate.”
De Leon sniggers. “Want a hot pocket?”
“Fuck off.” I pull out my headphones, make a show out of clapping them over my ears, and sink into the code.
De Leon trails me to class, where I introduce him to Lindy as an exchange student from England. Lindy crosses his eyes at me and I know I’ll owe him an explanation later, but he doesn’t object as De Leon slumps into the seat beside me.
Lindy lectures today, standing slouched at the podium with his hands dug into his jeans pocket. He makes eye contact with me every few minutes as he talks. Then his eyes drift past me to De Leon. Who looks back.
After twenty minutes of this, it finally pings. I got no little vibes off Lindy at all, but could he be submissive?
I yank my attention away from their flirtation and focus on the lecture. Lindy’s modeled three different ransomware attacks. I can tell the homework assignment’s going to be how we’d have stopped them. I tap notes into my laptop as I listen to him answer a question about the second model.
Beside me, De Leon shifts and I can see his laptop screen. He’s got Lindy’s page on the NYU faculty website showing. That terrible picture of him where he looks like he’s in mid-transformation to rat-man. I drag my eyes away from his bugging eyes to the lines of code on the whiteboard behind him.
Something clicks in the back of my head.
That’s my code. The code I gave to Ness to buy my way out.
Whatever expression crosses my face causes Lindy to frown on his next pass around the room. I force a burp, cover it with a cough. Lindy rolls his eyes at me before moving on to lock gazes with De Leon.
I slide the phone that De Leon gave me and never took back out of my bag, tuck it between my laptop and my stomach, and text him.
How do you feel about flirtation for a good cause?
I don’t see him take out a phone so his messages must be connected to the laptop he has open in front of him, on which he’s barely taken a single note, because his response pops up a second later.
De Leon: Fine by me. What good cause?
Sixth sense twitching. Invite Lindy out for nachos after class and flirt with him. I’m going to ask him some questions while you have him distracted.
De Leon: Is the nacho place defensible?
I think through the schematic for a moment, then nod.
Out of the corner of my eye, I see De Leon nod back.
I ping Logan, Manny, and Squid the change of plans so they don’t freak when my tracker doesn’t return home after class.
Lindy’s an engaging lecturer and I usually don’t have any trouble staying focused in his class, but after realizing he put my fucking hack up on a public site, I’m lost. I give up taking notes and write out a list of questions, starting with the vague and general and becoming increasingly specific.
De Leon reads my screen over my shoulder and grunts.
As Lindy wraps up the lecture, I delete my list of questions. De Leon’s seen them and knows where I want the interrogation to go. I don’t want anyone else looking over my shoulder. Not that the questions would make any sense to them.
