I think your apartment is bugged. We need to talk. It’s important. Bathroom is a safe place.
I look up at her. “Are you being for real right now?”
She snatches her phone from my hand. Yes, she mouths.
I look at Vaughn for help, and he just shrugs, hands out, palms up.
“What’s going on?” Julian asks.
Charly puts her finger to her lips and hands her phone to Julian.
He reads it and then mouths, Holy fuck. He hands Charly’s phone back to her, his eyes roaming over my living room.
Charly taps me on the shoulder and mouths, Bathroom. Now.
“For fuck’s sake.” I sigh. I could really do without this shit right now.
But I still get up from the sofa and start to follow Charly to the bathroom.
The next thing I know, Julian’s beside me, and then Vaughn’s on my other side. Apparently, they’re coming, too.
I shake my head with annoyance and walk quickly to my bedroom, wanting to get this shit over and done with as soon as possible.
When we reach the bathroom, Charly’s already inside.
We file in, and she shuts the door behind us. Then, she proceeds to turn on the faucets on the sink and the shower, leaving them all running.
“What the fuck are you doing?” I frown at her.
“If your bedroom is bugged as well, then they won’t be able to hear us over the sound of the running water.”
“Really?” Vaughn asks.
“Yeah. I saw it once on TV.”
“I think I’ve seen that, too,” Julian chimes in.
“This is fucking ridiculous,” I snap. “I’m going.”
I reach for the door when Charly barks at me, “Don’t you dare open that door, Gabriel.”
I look back at her. “And if I do?”
“Then, you’ll regret it for the rest of your life. Because I know for a fact that Ava didn’t sell you out. She was set up, and I know exactly how, why, and who did it.”
My heart starts to beat erratically in my chest. But I keep my expression calm.
I remove my hand from the door and turn around to face Charly. “Is that so?” I lift a brow.
“Yep.” She folds her arms over her chest.
“Tell us then,” Julian says eagerly.
I shoot him a look.
“What?” he asks innocently. “I’m just keen to know—for your benefit, of course.”
“Of course.” I roll my eyes at him. “Okay, Charly, I’m listening.”
“Okay, so your cleaner Sadie—”
“Who?”
“Your cleaner. You have two of them. They come twice a week.”
“Yeah, I know that, but I don’t fucking know their names.”
Charly shakes her head at me. “Whatever. Well, aside from you, Ava, your brother, and your PA, they’re the only people who have regular access to your apartment.”
“And?”
“And the conversation that you and Ava had was recorded.”
“By Ava.”
“No. Not by Ava. I believe that one of your cleaners, Sadie—well, actually, she’s not called Sadie, but I’ll come back to that—bugged your apartment.”
“This is ludicrous.” I sigh.
“Just hear me out.” Charly frowns. “So, when Ava told me that she couldn’t understand how your conversation was recorded and how her signature got on that contract, it got me thinking. So, I asked Ava if she’d signed anything recently. She said no, and then, actually, yes, she did. The other day, your cleaner, Sadie, asked Ava to sign this new form that her boss had implemented to prove that she’d done the work. And Ava, being the lovely, trusting person she is, signed it. Sadie took the form, and off she went.
“But something just didn’t sound right to me. Why would a cleaning company have people sign a form to say they did the job? It just seemed weird. So, I called up the cleaning company because I wanted to ask about the form, and I made up some bullshit story about how I was looking for a new cleaner and that Sadie had been recommended to me when the lady on the phone told me that Sadie no longer worked for them. She quit a few days ago. Alarm bells started ringing in my head. So, I asked about the form, and the lady had no clue what I was talking about.
“So, we have Sadie, who had Ava sign a form that she never needed to sign, and Ava told me that she didn’t really look at the form when she signed it. This is days before Sadie quit her job, and then your story breaks. It doesn’t seem like a coincidence to me.”
“Me either,” Julian says.
I ignore him and look at Charly. “So, what? You think the form that Ava signed was actually the contract giving rights to the story?”
“Yep. And then I started thinking that maybe she was a journalist who bugged your apartment to get the story and then sold the tapes to the highest bidder.”