Page 56 of Cruel Riches

“This might take a few minutes,” he said.

I nodded and slowly chewed on one of my pastries as he worked. When I started on the second one, Harry looked up.

“You were right,” he said. “Whoever gave you this phone has been tracking you.”

“Can you see who’s receiving the data?” I asked, even though I was almost certain it was Nate.

Harry shook his head. “No, sorry. It’s masked. But basically, whenever the phone is on, it uses the GPS to transmit your exact location to them.”

“Great.” I let out a sigh. “Time to get another phone, I guess.”

“That’s not all.” He held up a hand. “There’s a keylogger on it as well.”

“What does that do?” I asked, furrowing my brows as I leaned forward.

“Every keystroke you make is recorded,” he explained. “So every text and email you’ve sent from this device is accessible to whoever set this up. Every search you’ve made on the internet, too.”

I swallowed hard. “Shit.”

“I’m not done. I’m assuming you logged straight onto your email account when you got this phone so that you could import all your contacts and other stuff from the cloud?”

“Uh-huh. My stuff is all stored on Chrome through my Gmail account.”

Harry sighed. “Well… whoever gave you this phone isn’t just tracking you and reading your messages from this device. They have access to your email account, apps, internet bookmarks, and your entire search history as well. From before you got the phone, I mean.”

I put my head in my hands and rubbed my temples. “Oh my god.”

“I would suggest you log out and change all your passwords right away. And obviously, like you said before, get yourself a new phone. One that only you have ever touched.” He leaned back and scratched his head. “There are no decent phone stores in Arcadia Bay, so I’d suggest Cellmate in Avalon City. They have the best range.”

“Okay.” I stood up. “Thanks for all your help. I’ll head up to the city now.”

“Wait. Don’t you want this?” Harry pulled my cable and phone away from his laptop and held them in the air.

I took the cable, but I left the phone on the table.

“You can keep that. Do whatever you want with it,” I said.

Harry’s forehead wrinkled. “But it’s almost brand new. You could wipe it and sell it to someone for two grand.”

I smiled thinly. “I hate to sound like a dick, but I don’t need the money. Not as much as I need to mess with the person responsible for this shit.”

Comprehension dawned on Harry’s face. “Oh. I see. If I hold onto it, they’ll think they’re tracking your movements, but they’ll be tracking mine instead. That’ll confuse them.”

“Exactly. Keep it logged in for now, too, so he doesn’t get suspicious and realize the jig is up right away.”

“All right.”

I thanked him again and headed out of the bakery. The drive up to Avalon City was quiet without my phone playing my favorite music through Spotify, but it was a small price to pay for privacy.

The store Harry recommended was in a mall in a nice neighborhood, across from a large park with a lake. I bought myself a new phone and quickly imported my contacts from the cloud. Then I texted my sister.

Hey, it’s A. Had to get ANOTHER new phone. Will explain later. Anyway, I’m in the city, at Sherman Mall. Are you free right now? I desperately need some retail therapy. It’s a nice day, too, so we could go for a walk in the park afterwards if you want.

Sascha replied a few minutes later. Would love to, but I’m at an artist workshop thingy. Sorry!

Even though she couldn’t make it, I decided to do a bit of shopping by myself. The shoe sales at the mall were too good to pass up, and I needed to do something fun after all the shitty stuff I’d endured over the last few weeks.

When I was done, I went into the underground parking lot and dumped everything in the back of my car. Then I decided to go for a walk in the park across from the mall, like I suggested to Sascha earlier. It was still nice outside, and I wanted to savor the good weather while it lasted. It wasn’t often that Avalon had sunny days like this in October.

---