“Advice on what?” she had asked, still timid as she got out of the car, but Aaron had merely smiled, held out a hand, led her inside apartment 303. The REO-he’d explained it was one of the bank’s-was still partly furnished. “Just came to us,” he said. And after about, oh, who knows how many glasses, he confessed to her what he was doing.
Or maybe she had asked him? It was all kind of a jumble.
Exactly as she suspected, he’d been renting empty foreclosed homes to students-I know when they’ll be available, he said, he’d unbuttoned his shirt, she barely knew where to look, and real estate brokers can show them no matter who’s there, right? He was proud of himself, she could tell.
“Are you afraid you’ll get caught?” she dared to ask, couldn’t resist. She’d quickly calculated how much money he could make-with say, three thousand dollars per house, per month, and even with a few dozen houses? With the bank paying utilities and maintenance? It was potentially incredibly lucrative. Not to mention tax free.
“We’re not Bank of America,” he’d said, dismissing her “concerns.” “A bank like ours? When you’re a big fish in a little pond, you can do anything you want.”
Which she knew. All too well. But still…
It was wrong, it was illegal, it was-her first reaction, and her second, was to tell him to stop. He could go to jail for fraud, and embezzlement, and theft, and a million other criminal charges. If her father ever found out… She paused, smiling, imagining her father being surprised.
She took another sip, then another, attempting to understand Aaron’s logic. Could you say Aaron was helping people? Same as she was? Kind of. Helping students who needed homes. Protecting the housing stock and the economy. Leveraging resources the bank would never miss. Same as she was. Kind of.
He was making money from it, of course, and she wasn’t. But still. Kind of.
And then, in a rush and a flurry of words, she told him everything she’d discovered, everything, about Mo Heedles and Maddie Kate, and the leases now in her top desk drawer. Why was her memory so fuzzy?
“You’re so smart, Miss Lizzie,” he’d said, drawing one finger up her bare arm, into the hollow of her collar bone, giving her goose bumps and who knows what else. “That’s why I trust you so much.”
She’d been on the verge, the very verge, of telling him about her system, but at the last moment, something in his face, or something in her heart, stopped her. She needed to keep some things to herself. She’d been alone, essentially, for most of her life. It was probably time to let someone else in. But not yet. Not here.
He’d almost carried her upstairs, not quite, and here they were now, together, and he was offering her even more champagne. The blue ribbon from the splayed open Cinzano’s box was tied around one of her wrists, he’d tied it there like a silken bracelet, and he’d fed her the creamy chocolate chip pastry from inside it, holding the confection with the rustling waxed paper, morsel by morsel, sitting on the edge of the duvet cover, making her lick his fingers to get every bit of the custard.
“Don’t you want one?” she’d asked, and he’d said, “I’m hungry, but right now, only hungry for you.” So the other pastry remained untouched. Touched, she thought, thinking of his hands.
Aaron had slid away from her. She patted the warm spot where he’d been. He was using the downstairs bathroom, he explained, the one up here was-whatever it was. And wouldn’t her father be surprised? Wouldn’t everyone be surprised?
Lizzie closed her eyes for a moment. She yawned, wide and reckless, feeling every cell in her body expand, feeling the downy pillow; her skirt and top were rumpled and wrinkled, but who cared, her suit jacket and watch and purse and everything in a crazy pile where Aaron had placed it. Keeping it safe.
Just like their secret. He’d made her promise not to tell.
She settled into the pillows. Aaron would be back soon, then… then… she floated for a moment, trying to think.
This is what real people did, people who had a life outside of work. And now she did, too, and she could still love her work but would never look at the world the same way again.
She was… happy? Was this happy?
Where was Aaron? Her brain felt fuzzy, happy-fuzzy, and the bed was so soft, and the chocolate chip pastries were so delicious, maybe she could tuck one in her purse. As a reminder of this delicious night.
“I can’t freaking believe it.” Aaron started talking before Ack even had the front door closed. “She knows the whole freaking thing. At those houses today? It was her. She actually freaking went to the freaking houses.”
Ackerman arrived at the condo as they’d planned, and now Aaron had to watch him pace through the sparsely furnished living room, muttering and critical, as Lizzie lay clueless in the upstairs bedroom.
Aaron was so not going to take the fall for this. And the only way to make sure of it was to spread the responsibility. Make sure all involved were equally entangled as he was. “Ball’s in your court now, bro,” Aaron said.
Lizzie was certainly-he hoped-out cold now, all that champagne followed by all the crumbled pills he’d added to the gooey filling. She’d have no idea they were down here discussing her future.
Ackerman and his nasty questions worried him.
Yes, he told Lizzie the deal, Aaron admitted, but only after it was clear she was already on to it, as they’d suspected. No, he had no other choices, only whether to deny the whole thing, or spill enough to shut her up while he knocked her out. How much of a choice was that? When she had access to all the bank records? And she’d already… damn it.
Ackerman came around the stubby coffee table for the third time. Now his conversation consisted of mostly “asshole” and “ridiculous.” As far as Aaron was concerned, Ackerman was the ridiculous asshole. The rental thing had all been his idea. Aaron had just gone along with it. Happily, sure, and psyched to be included in it-bankrolling his new wheels and a whole lot more. But now, suddenly, it was Aaron’s responsibility? Not a chance. Aaron was not the asshole. Even more important, not the fall guy.
“Listen, I’m out there, every day,” Aaron whispered. He glanced upstairs, verging on nervous Lizzie’d show up at the top step, naked and questioning. But that was impossible-that chocolate chip thing had enough stuff in it to keep her quiet until they decided what to do.
“I talk to the tenants.” Aaron pointed to his own chest, his shirt still open. At least his khakis were back on. The rest of his clothes, including his shoes, were upstairs. For now. He pointed again. “I arrange the site visits, I talk to the brokers, I arrange the showings. Front man, you called it. But you guys, you’re back in your offices, counting your damn money. And stop pacing. You’re driving me nuts.”
Ackerman stopped, shoved his hands in the pockets of his pants. Boat shoes with no socks, like he’d just gotten off the boat from the Vineyard. Glared at Aaron, in a smirky way Aaron did not appreciate.
“Tell me again how the bank president’s daughter got the keys to your REOs?” Ackerman’s voice was almost too loud to be safe.
“Shut up,” Aaron said. Of course this was looming disaster, but he sure as hell wasn’t going to let Ackerman shove the blame on him. Even though in a kind of way, because of the dumbass key thing, he deserved it. But that was the past. “I get it, hell, it’s my bad, whatever. Let’s go from here. Move on. Let’s take care of this.”
“By ‘take care’ you mean like on Waverly Road?”
Aaron still didn’t like the look on Ackerman’s face. What happened to his big “it’s a sure thing” and “we’re all in it together, that’s what makes it so lucrative”? Ack had also promised “no one gets hurt,” but that was obviously way out the window.