“We need to talk.” She spat the words at him.
Watt stood there dumb. He couldn’t quite process her presence here. But Derrick seemed more self-possessed, or maybe he’d just had less to drink. “Hi. I’m Watt’s friend Derrick,” he said, stepping forward and holding out a hand. “Nice to meet you …?”
Derrick trailed off, waiting for Leda to provide a name, which she failed to do. “We need to talk,” she said again, looking at Watt. “In private. It’s about Nadia.”
The mention of Nadia was like a dash of cold water to Watt’s face. “Derrick,” he said slowly, turning to his friend. “I’m sorry. Can you …”
But Derrick was already on his way out, past Leda and out into the hallway, where the lights had lowered to a soft evening glow. He turned back and mouthed, Who is Nadia? but Watt ignored him, opening the door wider so Leda could step inside.
“Why don’t you come in,” he said, shuffling her to the living room, with a nervous glance back toward the darkened apartment. His parents would freak out if they knew he had a girl in here.
“Looks like I interrupted something,” she said, wrinkling her nose at the whiskey bottle and disposable cups on the cheap coffee table. But there was something off about her usual haughtiness—a tremor in her voice, and a quick darting nervousness to her movements that Watt hadn’t seen before. She looked wound so tight that the slightest touch would shatter her into a million pieces.
“Can I offer you a drink?” Watt asked. It was funny, really, the thought of Leda Cole drinking whiskey with him on the 240th floor. To his surprise she nodded, and sat down. He poured her a cup and refilled his own, settling on the couch as far from her as he could. She looked expectantly at him, but he gave a drunk little nod as if to say, Ladies first. He was too intoxicated to trust himself to speak right now. He needed her to make the first move so he could determine exactly how much she knew.
“I know you’re Nadia.”
Watt opened his mouth to protest, though he had no idea what he would say, but Leda kept talking over him. “I already figured it out, so don’t bother denying it.”
Nadia. He needed Nadia’s help. Quant on, he thought, and felt reassured by the soft beep of Nadia waking up.
“What makes you think that?” he asked carefully, neither confirming nor denying anything.
“Please. I knew something was off about you the first time I saw you, at Eris’s party.”
“I didn’t even talk to you that night!” Watt protested, but Leda just shrugged.
“You were acting funny, staring at everything just a little too long, slinking around like you didn’t belong there. Which you didn’t.” She narrowed her eyes at him. “Plus, you wear contacts, but I never saw you giving them any verbal commands. It’s kind of freaky, to be honest. Like you’re not even using them.”
Watt couldn’t believe Leda had picked up on that. Of course he didn’t talk to his contacts; he thought all his commands through Nadia. “But I still don’t see how you knew that I was Nadia,” he pressed.
Leda’s red mouth curled up in a smile, and Watt realized he’d just inadvertently admitted it. “For a so-called ‘information services expert,’ you aren’t very careful. You said ‘As you wish’”—she raised her hands to make little quotation marks in the air—“all the time in your messages, and then again in person, at the gala. It just took me a little while to figure it out.”
He couldn’t believe he’d been so stupid. If you hadn’t turned me off whenever Avery was around, I could have warned you of this, Nadia reminded him.
“How did you know where I lived?” Watt asked, ignoring Nadia’s I-told-you-so.
“It wasn’t hard to figure out. You’d already told me you went to Jefferson High. I just pinged your school and pretended to be a mom who’d lost the online directory link.” She tossed her head impatiently. “Not every problem needs to be hacked, you know. Sometimes simply talking to people works just as well.”
Her instincts weren’t bad. “Sounds like you didn’t even need to hire me in the first place,” he said, stalling. Get out of this situation. It’s extremely unlikely to end well, Nadia kept telling him, but Watt didn’t listen.
“I wish I hadn’t, since you suck at your job—”
“I’m the best on the market!” he said defensively. “Hacked all those flickers for you, found Atlas in the Amazon—”
“Not to mention that you’re a completely terrible person,” Leda went on, undeterred. “I can’t believe you pretended to help me, took money from me, all so you could try to sleep with my friend.” She rolled her eyes. “I mean, how stupidly clichéd is that? You know how many guys have tried to sleep with Avery? None of them get anywhere. She’s a total prude.”
“You call me a terrible person, but you talk about your best friend that way?”
“I have my reasons,” Leda snapped, and knocked back her whiskey. She held the cup out for more, and Watt wordlessly refilled it.
“Just to be clear, I didn’t even know Avery existed until after you hired me.” He wasn’t sure why he felt the need to defend himself, but he kept talking, fueled by the whiskey and some restless instinct. He hadn’t been able to talk about Avery with anyone, or at least anyone who knew her. “And yeah, I thought she was pretty and tried to get to know her. So what? I didn’t do anything wrong.”
“Tried ‘to get to know her.’” Leda snorted. “Tried to get into her pants, is what you mean.”
“At least I’m not obsessed with a guy who’s in love with someone else!”
Leda’s eyes narrowed, and twin spots of color appeared high on her cheeks. “You’re pathetic,” she snapped. “And incompetent. That was the one thing I asked you to figure out, and you couldn’t even manage that. Some hacker you are.”
Except that he had figured it out. Watt flinched, the thought of Avery and Atlas together making him ill. He drained the last of his whiskey to cover his uneasiness. The room started spinning disconcertingly.
Leda was watching him, her gaze strangely calculating. “She broke up with you, didn’t she?” she said softly, scooting a little closer to him. Watt was confused—but also, a part of him found, not displeased—by her sudden nearness. He could smell her rose-scented perfume, dusky and rich.
“Yeah.”
“I’m sorry. If it’s any consolation, Atlas broke up with me too. But I’m sure you already know that, with all your hacking.”
“Like I’d keep tabs on you anymore, now that I’m not paid for it,” Watt said sarcastically.
Leda laughed, as if that were the funniest thing she’d ever heard. She searched through her bag a moment. “Want one?” she asked, holding out an array of pills in various shapes and colors.
Nadia sent alarm bells to ring in Watt’s head. “No thanks,” Watt said wearily. “I’m more of a booze guy, you know?”
Something flashed across Leda’s face for a moment, and then it was gone. “Of course.” She tucked the pills back into the bag and leaned over the table, busying herself refilling their drinks. When she pressed the cup of whiskey into his hand, Watt realized that a few of the pearl buttons of her school blouse had come undone. He could see through to her delicate white bra underneath.
“Here’s to us,” Leda said. “Both rejected by the Fuller siblings. But we’ll survive it, won’t we? Cheers.”
She held out her cup expectantly. Watt clinked his to it and then drank the whiskey in a single gulp. The bottle was closer to empty than full.
“Thanks.” Leda stretched her arms overhead and then leaned back on the couch, stretching out as if she’d always belonged there. “It’s nice, not being alone right now,” she murmured.