Page 65 of The Love Hack

‘Okay, you’re going to have to tell me, otherwise I could carry on all night.’

‘He’s a creature of habit. Like, I’ve only been looking after him a couple of days, but I’ve noticed. As soon as I walk in the door, he goes and jumps on the kitchen counter, because he did that the first time and I gave him treats. And he sleeps in the exact same places – back of the sofa in the mornings, your bed during the day, and so on. And he always washes his face with his left paw.’

‘He does?’ I was intrigued. ‘I never noticed that. Adorable – a left-pawed cat.’

‘Cute as fuck,’ Ross agreed. ‘But anyway, my point was, people have habits too. They might only last a couple of months before they change and move on, but for a while, you can depend on someone doing the same thing this Wednesday as they did last Wednesday.’

‘Like you going to Crossfit every Thursday lunchtime and buying a salt beef sandwich on your way back to the office.’

Ross looked startled, then a bit as if he might be going to blush again, but the light wasn’t good enough for me to see.

‘Yeah,’ he said. ‘A bit like that. See, you’re good at this detective thing. Anyway, my point is, if you can find out where Zack was after work six days ago, chances are he’ll be there again tomorrow.’

‘Good thinking. Only problem is, I don’t know where he was last Thursday night. Unless you have access to a time machine you never told me about.’

‘Don’t need one. You just need his social media.’

I tried not to roll my eyes. Did he think I was some kind of amateur? ’Tried that. He’s got LinkedIn and that’s it.’

‘Bollocks. Everyone has social media. What’s the point of having an attractive wife and a swanky apartment and a six-month secondment to New York if you can’t show off about it to the guy who got picked for the football team instead of you when you were fourteen?’

‘Honestly, he doesn’t. When he first started going out with Amelie I checked.’

‘You didn’t find it, that’s all. He’s probably got it set to private, with a name that makes it hard to find.’

I thought about this for a second and had to admit it made sense. When I’d initially looked for him on Instagram, I hadn’t looked particularly hard. I’d been mildly curious, that was all – and then when I’d drawn a blank I’d concluded he wasn’t on there. And then, when he and Amelie got serious and moved in together and later got engaged, it would’ve seemed weird and stalkerish to ask.

If only I’d known that, just a few months later, I’d be stalking the man for real.

‘Okay, maybe you’re right. But I can’t exactly ask now, can I? “Hey Zack, it’s your sister-in-law and I’d like to follow you on the Gram.” “You would? Why?” “Just, I’m here in New York and I want to know where you might be tomorrow evening so I can catch you out with another woman.” “Oh sure, knock yourself out. It’s @PhilanderingBastard.”’

Ross laughed. ‘Okay, fair enough. So you have to find someone who already follows him, and ask them.’

‘Yeah, that makes sense. Only Amelie follows about three thousand people. When she was planning her wedding she went mental on it. It would take me ages to go through them all.’

‘That makes it more challenging,’ he admitted. ‘But there’ll be a way. Leave it with me.’

‘Are you sure?’

‘Give me until lunchtime tomorrow, your time. I’ll call you then, and if I haven’t found anything, we’ll come up with another plan.’

My eyes strayed from his face to the clock at the top of my screen, and I realised how late it was. We’d been chatting for almost half an hour, so it would be nearly two in the morning, London time.

As if on cue, Ross gave a jaw-splitting yawn and said, ‘Sorry.’

‘No, I’m sorry. You must be knackered.’

‘I’m all right. I should probably get home to bed, though.’

For a second, I considered saying, You can stay if you want. Sleep in my bed, with Astro. Somehow, imagining him waking up in my flat made me feel less far from home, almost like I was there with him. Like we were going to get up together and get in each other’s way while we dressed for work, and have Astro tell bare-faced lies to one of us about not having had his breakfast when the other had already fed him.

But I couldn’t let myself think that way.

So I said, ‘Thanks for looking after the cat, again. And thanks for the chat.’

‘It’s my pleasure. It really is. Night, Lucy.’

‘Night,’ I said, and his face vanished from my screen as if it had never been there.

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