Probably. Maybe.
Lilah: She won’t. She’s hoping you’ll all forget. I have super twin powers and can read her mind.
Dimitri: Get over yourself, Lilah. Everyone can read Izzy’s mind.
Me: You can’t.
Lilah: Okay well they should at least know who you’re sleeping with.
Declan: What the fuck. I don’t want to know that. Don’t sleep with anyone, Izzy.
Lilah: Too late. She slept with Caden Armanelli and thinks she can keep it from everyone.
Me: Why are you the worst, Lilah?
Dimitri: What in the actual fuck? I’m at work . . . I’m calling you in ten minutes, Izzy. You’d better pick up.
Declan called me first. I ignored him.
Me: No. All of you better stop calling. It was only a few times, and it’s over now.
Then Lilah called. I wanted to scream. Siblings were the worst humans in the world, even if I did love them and would die for them. Some days I wanted to kill them myself.
Me: I have to work.
Lilah: It’s 6 p.m. there.
Me: And I’m still working. We’ll talk soon. It’s over, it’s fine. Please drop it.
Then Lucas texted me too.
Lucas: Something’s wrong with you. We’re going to this mask party near Stonewood Tower tomorrow, so you can have a drink and tell me.
Me: I’m not in the mood, and I have a lot of work to do. Go without me.
Lucas: Just bring a hot dress if you intend to work late, and I’ll get you a mask. You’re going.
Me: I’m really not.
Lucas: If you don’t, I’ll literally follow you around all weekend like a sad puppy who needs their fun friend back. I can’t handle your sad hazel eyes all day.
Me: Fine.
I was such a good friend that I did what I was told. I picked a hot black dress and grabbed a makeup bag for after work. I knew I’d work late because I’d seen a hiccup in my region of JUNIPER the day before and wanted to dig in deeper.
The workday went the same as all the others, except that Cassie and Penelope breezed out early and most everyone else meandered out after them.
Lucas kissed me on the cheek and handed me a mask. “Text me when you get there. I sent you the address.”
I nodded, still focused on tinkering with my work. We were a week and a half out from the election, and I wanted everything to be perfect. My firewall was stable, withstanding various normal attempts of breaching, but this one small attempt was different.
“That’s odd,” I murmured as I dug into it. Thankfully I’d set up a system that alerted us to these weird site visitors because this one appeared to have a foreign setup.
One I recognized.
I followed the coding onto another site and hit the dark web for another ten minutes. It didn’t take me long as I hurried through codes and algorithms designed to distract most.
Months ago, Cade would have seen me digging, but now I didn’t think he bothered. Honestly, I only researched things for the election. I was past my undercover days, I realized. Maybe it’d happened at the retreat when I was distracted in a way I shouldn’t have been.