Sleep well.
Will I ever?
With what I’m about to do, probably never.
I stand in the foyer until the sound of his bike fades into the night. A sudden sense of loneliness creeps up on me, catching me off guard. The feeling is foreign. I’ve never felt alone because I’ve always had my mom, but this isolation is different. It reaches deep into my soul and rips away something I didn’t know I had, leaving me with despair. A feeling of loss overwhelms me. Not even the loss of my mobility had been this profound. This goes even deeper, like something I’ll never be able to repair. Maybe it’s the loss of my innocence, the shreds of goodness I’ve been clinging to. To protect my mom, I’ll finally lower myself to Elliot and Gus’s level. By turning myself into a thief, I’ll become one of them. It has to be this causing the havoc inside me, because I can’t consider the alternative. I can’t already be mourning the loss of a man I have no intention of falling for.
The emptiness follows me down the hallway. Weirdly, it’s amplified between the confines of the walls. Longing for company, any company, to expel the isolation, I walk to the kitchen, but the room is dark. Opening the connecting door to the garage, I peer inside. The Maserati and the Landcruiser are there. Elliot’s BMW is missing. He must be out.
I go upstairs in search of my mom and pause in front of her bedroom door. I’m about to knock when I hear the grunting.
“Gus, please,” my mom says.
I’m not sure if she’s begging him to carry on or to stop, but I can’t listen to the loud thumping. She doesn’t deserve this. She may be a free spirit, but she’s not a whore. I’m the reason she became one.
Turning on my heel, I go downstairs and get into the Lexus. I don’t know if it’s the intention that’s churning inside me, but my hand shakes when I push the ignition button. I don’t think about where I’m going. If I do, my courage may fail me. I drive to the office and park in the deserted lot.
The night guard looks up from his phone when I approach.
“Hi,” I say with a wave. “I forgot something. Can you turn off the alarm? I won’t be long.”
“Sure, Miss Starley,” he says, jumping at attention.
A few seconds later, I’m inside, breathing hard with fear as I flick on the lights and use Elliot’s key card to open the control room. It’s cold in here. Goosebumps run over my arms. I’ve never been inside the room, but I easily locate the control station Elliot described. A big screen shows all the rooms in the building apart from the bathroom and kitchen where there aren’t cameras. He explained how to override the camera feed. My heart pounds in my chest as I plug in the USB key that he gave me, which contains a prerecording of the building. A message pops up when I type in the command I memorized.
Override?
Holding my breath, I press enter and wait. The real-time images blur on the screen. A split-second of blackness follows, and then the images are replaced. I don’t relax yet. Going to the corner, I step in front of the camera. My face doesn’t appear on the monitor. It’s working. I blow out the air in my lungs, but my stomach is still drawn into a ball as I go to the basement.
The ceiling lights flicker on when I enter. The glaring illumination is like a flashlight shining on my crime. Ignoring the fear and guilt, I hurry to Leon’s desk and sit down in his chair. The notebook with his password is in my bag, but I remember the sequence thanks to the story I created in my head. My fingers tremble when I switch on his computer and wait for the screen to come to life. The cursor blinks next to an icon with his initials.
I hesitate. If I think about what I’m about to do, I won’t be able to go through with it. Pushing all other thoughts aside, I only think about my mom when I enter his password. In a second, I’m in. I insert the second USB key and take my notebook from my bag to type in the commands Elliot had given me. It all looks like Greek to me, but I follow his instructions step by step until a program opens. Typing with two fingers and taking way too long, I enter the characters. An instruction to copy appears with a question mark. My finger hovers above the key. My doubt only lasts for a few seconds, but when I think about the sounds that came from behind my mom’s bedroom door, I press enter.