“I’ll let her know she has a fan,” Alice remarked wryly. “She’d like that.” Then she caught herself: “At least the Ella I knew would have liked that. But I suppose all of that was fake.” She took a long sip of her drink, still not used to referring to Ella in the past tense—or thinking of her as anyone but Ella.
“I wouldn’t say that for sure…” Nathan paused thoughtfully, applying a liberal coating of ketchup to his burger. “Playing a long con like that, criminals typically keep a lot of the details true, to save them from having to learn too many lies or getting tripped up over the easy stuff. It was months she had you going, right?”
“Five months,” Alice confirmed. “But it felt longer. We all…” She trailed off, feeling foolish, but Nathan was waiting, so she pressed on. “Everyone who met her, they agree—it was like we’d known her for years.”
He nodded. “There are ways to do that. Tricks, to build a sense of camaraderie and make you feel you’ve been friends forever.”
“Wonderful.” She let out a long breath. Another manipulation to add to the charade. “I suppose I won’t get any real answers until you track her down. How does that work, anyway? The police have done nothing but send me paperwork.”
Nathan gave a sympathetic grin. “They do seem to be big on ticking all the right boxes. But finding someone—anyone—is a piece of cake. You track their card transactions, log any passport activity—even hotels or car rental places need ID of some kind.”
Alice felt reassured for the first time all week. “So you can find her?”
Nathan hesitated.
Her confidence slipped. “What?” Alice asked, confused. “You said it’s a piece of cake. And you never lie about pastry,” she added, recalling their banter at the party.
“Usually, yes,” he agreed, clearing his throat. “But I’ve run all my usual checks already, and, well, there’s nothing.”
“Nothing?” Alice repeated, sinking back in her seat.
“Which is incredible,” Nathan told her. “I mean, people have tried to disappear as a game, and they’re caught like that.” He snapped his fingers. “But Ella was using a false identity, so she just slipped into a new one the minute she was done. There’s no trace of where she went or when; not even a log-in to her email account to trace.”
“She was planning for this.” Alice realized: “All along, she had her exit strategy mapped out.”
Nathan nodded, finishing a mouthful. “I’ll look some more, see if she didn’t slip up somewhere, but I don’t want you getting your hopes up. Best-case scenario, I find your money through my banking contacts or even just prove she’s enough of a professional that the banks have to refund you.”
Alice slowly absorbed his words. “You mean, they might not?”
Nathan looked at her sympathetically. “Never underestimate what f**king ass**les they can be. Sorry, language,” he added. “Now you’re her friend, they’ll try and claim it’s your fault—that you were negligent with your details somehow. It gets them off the hook. You’ve got to love the small print.”
Of course.
Alice exhaled, stabbing at her lettuce. “Bastards,” she muttered, but even that was lackluster. All her emotion had long since been drained away.
“Stefan said he’s got a solicitor on the case, so I’m sure he’ll fix things eventually,” he encouraged her. “But from what I’ve heard, it’s not so much the identity theft that causes the stress, as trying to untangle everything afterward.”
There was silence for a moment, filled by the chatter around them. Alice should be one of those brisk women, she knew: back at work, with purpose and direction, but somehow, that drive eluded her. She was still deep in wallow. When Alice glanced up, she found Nathan watching her, thoughtful.
“What?” she asked self-consciously. It was a miracle, at least, that Flora had got her washed and dressed for the meeting, but Alice was still painfully aware of her lank, bedraggled appearance.
“It’s nothing.” Nathan paused. “I just…wonder what made her become friends with you. They usually don’t,” he explained. “Not close friendships, anyway. It’s more dangerous that way—more chance of them being caught out in one of their lies.”
Alice gave another dull shrug. It was just another question in a long list of things that didn’t make sense. “So she could get access to all my information, I suppose. I wasn’t a complete idiot,” she added. “I was cautious, at first. We met at cafés, or bars, and I don’t think I had her over to the flat for about a month or so.” When Ella invited her out for drinks after a long, tiring week, Alice had suggested that they stay in instead. Ella brought pizza, Alice rented Before Sunrise, and they’d spent the evening musing over the naïve hopefulness of first loves. Of course, now that she looked back on the casual evening, Alice had to wonder if Ella was snooping through her cupboards every time she left the room.
“Maybe.” Nathan nodded. “It would tell us how she got away with being so low tech. Most identity thefts are Internet hacking jobs—it’s why I don’t get involved. Nothing but code and passwords, and there’s nothing fun in that.” He caught himself and coughed. “Fun for me, I mean. Anyway, it doesn’t look like she hacked any of your passwords, for a start.”
“She wouldn’t need to, would she? Not once she had my helpful list of security codes and PINs. I locked it away!” Alice added quickly, noting the disbelieving look on his face. “I had a small safe in the back of my wardrobe.”
“Let me guess, the combination was your birthday.” The skeptical expression remained.
Alice bristled slightly. “No. My mother’s—which nobody would ever know,” she defended herself quickly.
“Unless they spent months secretly compiling a list of every significant number combination in your life.” Nathan finished, his tone sympathetic.
They finished their food in silence, but Alice barely tasted a thing. If Nathan—who didn’t seem the modest type—was doubtful about the chances of finding Ella, then what hope had she for answers?
“Can I get you a cab?” Nathan asked chivalrously when everything was cleared away. “I have to stick around here for a meeting, but—”