Olivia Decoded

by Vivi Barnes

  “Think about why we came here,” I add. “No one should be able to decide our fate except us, remember? That’s what Nancy told us from the very beginning. Don’t you still believe that?”

  Micah’s eyes drop to the floor and he sinks back down on his bed. “I do. I just…I don’t know. Maybe we could talk to her.”

  “I already have.”

  He looks up at me, his eyebrows pinched. “So what do you suggest? And don’t tell me to do it behind her back,” he adds. Micah’s always been good at reading my mind. “I’m not going to go against Nancy.”

  “I wasn’t going to,” I lie. “But maybe you can help her see reason. Talk to her yourself. Maybe she could relax her ban a little bit. Like once a week or Saturdays only or even set a limit as to how much each month. Something. Think about it, okay? You could even make enough to get an apartment with Alec instead of some crappy dorm at UVa.”

  Micah barely nods, lost in thought. I leave him and head back to my room. Micah’s a pretty easy sell. He’s the one who loves hacking the most—besides me, of course. Being in a relationship could change that, but it also might make Micah realize he needs more money to be on his own. And if Nancy says no, I’m sure it wouldn’t take too long to convince him to work with me in secret.

  ...

  I put all thoughts of Liv out of my mind for the next couple days. School, home, repeat. My life.

  Nancy calls me to her office when I get home from school. She hands me a piece of paper—a scan of a receipt. “The jewelry store faxed over a copy of the receipt to my friend at the bank.”

  My jaw literally drops open. My name, or at least the name I use as Z, is written on the signature line, though the handwriting isn’t mine. “Nancy, I didn’t—”

  “I know,” she says, holding up her hand. “For one thing, you’re not stupid. Someone must’ve used a skimmer to get the data.”

  I’m familiar with the technology used to capture people’s credit card information so they can open their own card on your account, though we never used them ourselves. The fact that someone stole credit card information isn’t what unnerves me. “Why would they use my name?” I ask. “Thieves who steal card data don’t need the real cardholder name.”

  She shrugs. “Maybe they found your name on a receipt somewhere and thought it’d look legit. I don’t know.”

  I can’t help but laugh at the irony.

  Nancy raises an eyebrow. “I fail to see the humor in this.”

  “Poetic, don’t you think? We stop stealing and then someone steals from us.”

  “Maybe we’re getting our just desserts for stealing money all those years.”

  “Or maybe it’s a sign that we never should’ve stopped.” I make no effort to hide my irritation. “I know we need that money, Nancy.”

  “I know you know that.” She cocks her head, her eyes probing. “Interesting how a rather large sum of money miraculously showed up in our bank account the other day from an offshore account.”

  She taps her finger on the desk and stares at me, trying to intimidate me. It won’t work. I noticed how the pantry was full yesterday. Regardless of where she thinks the money came from, she used it, and I’m glad.

  Nancy sighs when I don’t say anything. “Are you aware of how lucky we were that we were never caught? We could’ve so easily been found out. It’s for our own good that Bill died. Now we can actually live like people are supposed to. Normal, honest lives.”

  “Yeah, normal, honest lives like all the other suckers out there who work seventy hours a week and have nothing to show for it.”

  Her smile is the worst kind of sympathetic. “I know this is hardest for you. But I think it’s not so much the money as the thrill of hacking you miss. You have this image in your head of the glory days of Monroe Street and how cool you were then. But it wasn’t cool. It was wrong. We were wrong.”

  She reaches across to take my hand but I jerk it away. “You are the one who pulled us into this life, talked us into hacking, and now you want us to just walk away? Forget it. I’m not going out and getting a job scooping ice cream or flipping burgers. Or turning into a corporate drone at some help desk.”

  “You say that like those are the only options. There are so many more opportunities for someone as smart—”

  “Are we done here?” I stand up to leave. It’s not that I like being rude to Nancy, but I’m not going to sit there and listen to how we need to start living productive lives. She makes hardly anything at the job she’s working at now, barely enough to live on herself, let alone with so many kids. That’s supposed to be my goal now? I’d even consider it if she’d at least let me help with the house expenses, but no, she wants us to save money for college. Which is in itself a complete waste of time.

  “Jack.”

  “Don’t call me that.”

  “Okay, then Z,” she says firmly. “You’ve got to stop blaming everyone else. You need to start being responsible, and being a thief isn’t going to land you anywhere except jail. You and whoever thought it was okay to steal money from us for a bracelet, of all things.”

  My hand freezes on the doorknob. “Bracelet?” I walk back over to look at the description that I somehow missed.

  “Yes. Two, actually, costing almost a thousand dollars each. I would understand more if it were something necessary, like food. Not jewelry. You okay?”

  I look up from the receipt and force the muscles in my face to relax. “Sure. Just surprised.”

  “Don’t worry, we’ve disputed the charge,” she says, thinking I’m concerned about the money taken when that’s not even on my mind anymore. “They see this kind of thing all the time.”

  I look back down at the swirling script letters A and P that begin the Abbott & Peterson’s name at the top of the receipt. I know I’ve seen those letters before. “Can I borrow this receipt?” I ask. “I’ll help you figure it out.”

  She hands me the receipt. “Let me know if you come up with anything.”

  As soon I get back to my room, I look up the jewelry company online. They don’t have any stock available online at all, but that A&P—I’m pretty sure it was on the jewelry box of the bracelet Liv tried to give me. The only way I can know for sure is to ask her for a picture of the inside of the box, but that’d be the ultimate dick move considering how we parted a couple days ago. Instead, I grab my helmet and keys and head over to Abbott & Peterson’s.

  Abbott & Peterson’s is a small jewelry store in a plaza, along with a grocery store, dry cleaners, and Chinese restaurant. The receipt had the name of “Robert” as the salesman, and since there seems to be only one person working the front area—a woman who’s already helping someone else—finding Robert might not happen today.

  I look around the long glass cases to find the bracelets, and even though there are plenty of styles, I don’t see one that has emeralds. I take a cautious breath of relief. Maybe it is a coincidence after all.

  The woman walks over to me. “Can I help you find something?”

  “I’m looking for one of the salespeople, Robert.”

  “He’s off today. Can I assist you?”

  “I was wondering if you carry a gold bracelet with diamonds and emeralds all around.” I make a circular gesture around my wrist. “I have the item number, if that helps.” I hand her a slip of paper with the item number and description written on it. I don’t want to show her the actual copy of the receipt in case she knows it’s being checked for fraud.

  She peers at the paper. “Hmm…yes, I believe I know which ones those were, but I don’t think we have any in stock at the moment.”

  “Do you have pictures of them?”

  She shakes her head. “We’ve been trying to get our inventory posted on our website, but Mr. Abbott says it invites thieves. He’s a little paranoid.” Then she looks up at a black orb in the ceiling, embarrassed. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have said that.” She leans over slightly. “Mr. Abbott’s on vacation but he likes to keep an eye on us
anyway.” She rolls her eyes. The door’s bell jingles with another customer, so I thank her and leave. But not before I note the Avatar Security sign on the door.

  I call Micah once I’m back on my bike. “Hey bro, can you hack into a wireless camera system?”

  “Probably. Can’t you?”

  “Yeah, but you’ll be faster. I need surveillance off a camera from a jewelry store called Abbott & Peterson’s. From about a week ago.” I read the date and time stamp from the receipt. “Looks like it’s a remote access system with Avatar Security.”

  “No prob. What am I looking for?” I can picture Micah cracking his knuckles, his expression going from bored to all business. He lives for this shit. Same as me.

  “Someone who bought two emerald bracelets, and the salesperson was a guy named Robert. That’s all I know. If you can just get in, I’ll sort through it. Need every angle they’ve got on the store.”

  “No worries. I was getting bored anyway. It’s kind of like the old days, huh?”

  I smile at the excitement in his voice. “Yeah. Just like them.”

  I hang up, then stare at the receipt. If these are connected, and anyone in the house finds out about Liv’s bracelet—considering it was my name on the signature line on that receipt—they might think it was me who skimmed our account. I’d be screwed.

  Royally. Screwed.

  Chapter Nine

  LIV

  Mrs. Bedwin tells me I’m out of sorts. In other words, I haven’t talked much to her or my grandfather in the last few days. This card she handed me when I got home from school today didn’t help.

  The red envelope in my hand has no return address, only a postmark from Richmond and a small heart drawn on the back. The card inside should make me happy, but it doesn’t. It doesn’t sound like Jack at all—not the cutesy picture of the boy kissing the girl under an umbrella nor the verse inside:

  No matter how much time passes

  You are always on my mind

  And this Valentine’s Day

  I want you to know

  My love is yours

  Forever.

  The word Forever has a heart around it, hand-drawn with a red pen. Nothing else, not even a signature, is included in the card. Not to mention that it’s days past Valentine’s Day.

  Nobody in Richmond sends me cards—except for the one I received at Christmas from Bernadette and Marc, the foster parents I lived with before I moved to live with the Carters. That one had been forwarded to me from the Child Welfare agency in Richmond.

  And Jack…he’d never send me a card out of the blue. Especially after we left things the way we did.

  I video chat with Emerson to tell her about the creepy-ass card. “I think you should tell your grandfather you have a stalker,” she says seriously when I hold it up to the camera.

  “I don’t know.”

  “Why not? I don’t get how you’re so calm about all this. I’d be freaking out, big time.”

  I stare at the card, biting my lip. “My grandfather would probably overreact and never let me out of the house.”

  “It takes a lot to get you out of the house on a normal day. That’s not it, is it?” She waits, but I don’t say anything. What can I say? One weird thing on top of another, and I still don’t know who sent me the bracelet.

  She frowns, sitting back in her chair. “Just one more thing you don’t want to tell me, huh?”

  I must look like such a jerk to her. I’ve had friends before, but only the shallow kind, where you eat lunch at school together and talk about homework and boys and that’s pretty much it. Not the real deal.

  Why she’s friends with me, I have no idea.

  I know she’s frustrated, and for the hundredth time I wish I could confide in her. She knows nothing about my life before coming to live here. In the beginning, I was too skeptical. And even now, knowing Emerson has such a huge, kind heart, I can’t tell her. What would she say about my being abused? About being abandoned by a mother on drugs? Would she feel sorry for me? Be disgusted? Think I’m some hapless kid from the foster-care system?

  Not to mention the secret I still have to keep about the Monroe Street gang of criminals and the fact that I was naïve enough to get caught up in their scheme.

  And fall in love with one of them.

  “I suck at friendship, I guess,” I finally say.

  She sighs. “No, you don’t, and I’m sorry I made you think that. I think you’ve just been burned a lot, am I right?”

  “No, I—I’ve just never had a friend where we tell each other things. I don’t know how to do that stuff.”

  She tilts her head. “Ever?”

  “Ever.” I did with Jack, though it was different with him. We were two lost souls with little in common except a shitty past.

  She sits up straight and clasps her hands together, all business. “Okay, so here’s how it works. You don’t have to tell me anything if you don’t want. You only should tell me what you want to tell me. Things that are burning a hole in you and you feel like you’re going to explode if you don’t tell somebody.”

  “What does that do?” I ask, my voice sounding stupidly small.

  “It shares the problem so it’s not just yours. Helps relieve some of the pressure. Well, it does for me, anyway. Try it. Tell me something that’s been bugging you that you haven’t told anyone. Even something small.”

  Something small that bugs me, except there’s nothing that fits that description. It’s more like huge things I’m terrified of. The list is way too long, and most of them I can’t tell her at all. “Okay. So that guy I liked back in Richmond—he was here a couple days ago.”

  Her eyes widen. “Your Richmond boyfriend was here? Liv, how could you keep that a secret? I’d be freaking out!”

  I half laugh. “Yeah, I sorta did, but it wasn’t that kind of visit. I mean, he was here with a friend and came by to see me because I had texted his friend about the roses I’d gotten and so he was worried about it and came here and it turned out it wasn’t from him but we aren’t, like, seeing each other anymore so it doesn’t matter and, you know…”

  We’re both silent for a moment, then both of us break into laughter. “Wow, when you spill, you spill,” Emerson says.

  “I’m sorry. I told you I wasn’t good at this.”

  “No, you’re perfect at it. Let’s go back a bit.” She pulls her blond hair over her shoulder and purses her lips in thought. “Okay. So your ex-boyfriend was here and you guys broke up—wait, I thought you were already broken up. Did you break up again?”

  “Well, we kind of were. Long story.”

  “And he lives in Richmond, so he probably sent the card.”

  “I don’t think so.”

  “There’s only one way to find out,” she says. “Call him.”

  “But that’d look weird. Since we’re not together anymore and all.” I pick up the envelope to shove the card back inside, but it catches on something. I fish around and pull out a small square picture.

  Emerson is saying something, but the words don’t go through to my brain. This picture—this was taken at the restaurant on Valentine’s Day. I’m smiling across the table at my grandfather. It’s close enough where it looks like whoever took it is either sitting at the next table over or farther back with a high-power zoom lens.

  What the—

  I flip it over, but there’s nothing on the back.

  “Liv!” Em says. I look up quickly.

  “Huh?”

  “Are you okay? You look freaked out.”

  I shake my head. “I have to go,” I whisper. “I—I’m not feeling too good.”

  “Oh. Okay,” she says. “But call him. And then let me know.”

  We hang up, and I stare at the picture. It could be Natalie, the girl I awkwardly waved to, but then no…this is a different angle. And the envelope was postmarked Richmond.

  Screw this. I pick up my phone to call Jack. It goes straight to voicemail, his recording short and to the p
oint. When it beeps, I start babbling: “It’s Liv. I’m wondering if you know anything about this, um, card and picture that someone took of me that I got in the mail. The postmark is from Richmond. You and Sam are the only people I really know there. You don’t have to call me back, just text me yes or no. Okay, thanks, bye.”

  Immediately, even before I hang up, I regret the call. I wish there was a way to delete the recording. Jack would never in a million years do this. What is he going to think?

  Roses, jewelry, now a weird card and an extremely creepy picture taken of me. I open my bag and take out the box with the bracelet, running my finger over the gold A&P initials imprinted on the interior white satin. I do an online search for an A&P jewelry store. Nothing comes up. I search for jewelry stores that start with A in Norfolk, but nothing shows up. Gritting my teeth and already knowing what I’ll find, I do the same for Richmond and find an Abbott & Peterson’s Jewelers. In the same swirling font. Of course.

  I jump as my phone buzzes. Jack’s name lights up the screen. At the same time, Mrs. Bedwin taps on the door and calls to me, so I flip up the automatic response window and send Jack a text saying I can’t talk, then turn the phone over on my lap. I don’t need Mrs. Bedwin to hear me talking to him.

  “Dinner, sweetheart,” Mrs. Bedwin says, opening up the door a bit.

  “Okay, thanks,” I tell her, trying to keep my voice calm.

  “Your grandfather is already downstairs, waiting for you.” She waves for me to hurry, then pulls the door closed behind her.

  The last thing I want to do is go act normal and happy at dinner. But unless I want to pretend I’m sick and have Mrs. Bedwin ferret out the truth, I have to go. I quickly change from my sweatshirt and jeans into a simple blue dress and join Grandfather downstairs in the formal dining room. The room only gets used when we eat together; otherwise, I eat my dinners at the breakfast table in the kitchen or up in my room. Lately, he’s been so busy at work that he ends up missing dinner at home. I wish this were one of those nights.

  “You look lovely,” he says, standing to pull out my chair. He glances at my wrist. “And I see you’re wearing your mother’s charm.”