Page 23 of Big Bad Bully
I’m not sure why she’s calling me rather than Jan, but I pick up.
“Hey Jamie.”
“Don’t use my name,” she utters urgently into the phone.
I have to press my ear to the receiver to hear her over the noise in the train. “What’s going on?”
“We can’t text anymore. I think I’m being watched.”
Alarm bells go off. No wonder I got a weird vibe earlier. “Shit,” I mutter. “What makes you think that?”
“I saw a guy across the street just sitting in his car. I can’t meet in person again. Listen, I looked through the hard drive, and it has all the pirated artwork still in the folders, but the email chain where we were ordered to pirate the artists’ work isn’t there.”
I wish Jan were in this conversation. “Well…it still might be enough, right? Have you talked to Jan?”
“No. I know where to find the stuff on the server. I have a hacker friend. If he can get access to the server room, he can install a backdoor entryway for me.”
“A what?” I’m imagining a back door carved into the side of the Sentience building.
“Like…a way into the servers.” Jamie sounds like she is too impatient to explain the technical details of the plan. “He’s willing to break into the server room to do the job, but it’s on the lower level–sub floor 3, and he’ll need a keycard to get in there.”
“You gave me a keycard–”
“Mine won’t work anymore. I need a new one.”
A new key card. This is getting complicated. I don’t like that she’s involved another person in our conspiracy, even if he is a hacker willing to help us. And now I have to steal another keycard?
“I finished the mural already. I mean, we have the grand opening gala, but I’m not there after hours anymore.”
“Can’t you say you have to put a top coat on it or something?”
I swallow, hard. My heart thuds as if I’m the one being watched. “Um, maybe. But even so, how will I get this new keycard?”
“I don’t know. But without the email chain, they could just say I was the thief. The risk you already took would be for nothing. If you can just get a keycard, I can take care of the rest.”
Fuck.
“Okay,” I say. “I’ll arrange to get back in there this week.”
Except it’s midterms, and I’ve now agreed to paint two murals in a billionaire’s penthouse.
Well, Billy White can wait. I’m fighting for justice here.
When I get off at my stop an hour later and climb up the stairs, a sleek cobalt blue electric Porsche is double parked across the street. It’s blocking traffic and cars are honking at it.
“Move, asshole!” a taxi driver yells out his window.
Some guy is behind the wheel looking my way. I remember what Jamie said–that a guy in his car was watching her.
Am I being watched, too? My heart rate kicks up again.
I stop walking and stare, and the car suddenly zooms off, making gooseflesh rise on my arms.
Except the guy looked like…Nah.
Couldn’t be.
Someone bumps into me from behind, and I start walking toward our…I mean, my apartment, shaking my head.
