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“This is such a bad idea,” Amelia said, but she was grinning. Then it faded into worry. “Fred kept looking at me weird anytime someone asked a question about my band or our history.”
“He knows something’s up.” Leo moved toward her and put his hands on her shoulders. “I’m going to go up there, but you don’t have to come if you aren’t comfortable. I know this isn’t what you signed up for.”
Amelia rolled her shoulders and gave him a sharp nod. “I’m not letting you snoop on your own. We’re in this together, Leo. Let’s go.”
Amelia was almostcertain they wouldn’t win the scavenger hunt prize, which was a shame, but she knew she needed to prioritize. If they could find Nadia’s ring today, it would stop suspicion from falling on them. Not only was that more convenient for her, but she felt that it was important for Leo. He seemed to stand up straighter when he spoke to Fred. She hadn’t seen him do that silly, flirty smile he sometimes affected when he was surrounded by his coworkers. This job was important to him. Important enough to lie about having a fiancée to try to fix his image as the guy who started a chlamydia outbreak in college. Important enough to go snooping in a coworker’s room.
The way he’d kissed her last night had made her feel like there was more to Leo than met the eye. And, for better or worse, Amelia wanted to help him.
So that’s how they ended up creeping back into the hallway on the third floor of the guest wing, testing the doorknob to Ari’s room. Locked. ADo Not Disturbsign hung from his doorknob.
“He doesn’t want the staff snooping around his room,” Amelia noted, touching the edge of the dangling sign.
Leo’s eyes narrowed. He said, “We can’t jump to conclusions. Lots of people don’t want staff in their rooms.”
“Lots of people don’t steal a twelve-million-dollar ring and then run for the exit when the loss is noticed.”
“We don’t know he did it. If we convince ourselves he’s guilty, we might miss an important clue.”
Amelia tilted her head to the side, relenting. Leo was right.
“You got a couple of bobby pins?” he asked, glancing up and down the hallway again.
She pulled two out of her hair, and a hank fell down across her face. Tucking her hair behind her ears, she kept one eye on the hallway and the other on Leo’s hands. He bent the bobby pins open and knelt in front of the door.
“You know how to pick a lock?” Amelia hissed, half impressed, half horrified.
“My brother taught me,” Leo said, and a second later, the latch clicked. His smile was brilliant, and it sent a little lightning bolt burning through her middle.
“We have to be fast. If we only put one picture up on Signal, people will get suspicious.”
They entered the room and paused. It looked like a bomb went off. A suitcase had disgorged its contents onto the armchair and floor around it. The coffee bar was a mess of sugar and creamer pots. The bed wasn’t made, and the desk was covered in various papers and electronics. The bathroom was equally untidy, with a toiletry bag open, its items spread all over the vanity.
“Crap,” Amelia said. “We’ll never be able to put everything back the way it was if we move anything.”
Leo moved to the suitcase and unzipped one of the front pockets, running his hand inside. “It could be anywhere,” he said.
“We shouldn’t be here.”
They’d made a mistake. Snooping had sounded great in theory, but she’d let herself get carried away by the desire to help Leo and the burning curiosity about the missing ring. She hadn’t liked the suspicious gleam in Fred’s eyes last night. She was, at her core, an honest person. That’s why she liked numbers, and that’s what made this whole scheme so uncomfortable.
She could convince herself that pretending to be Leo’s fiancée was reasonable, but she couldn’t stand the thought of being accused of being a thief. If they could find the ring right now, it would solve a lot of problems. She went to the bathroom and looked through the bag of toiletries, unzipping every little pocket to check if a large pink diamond ring had been stashed there. Then she checked the vanity drawers, and even the toilet’s tank. Nothing.
“Needle in a haystack comes to mind,” she said when she reentered the main space.
Leo was at the bed, lifting one corner of it to check under the mattress. “Yeah. Let’s get out of here and post another picture. It’s taking too long.”
Amelia nodded and headed for the door. She turned to wait for Leo, who frowned on his way past the desk. He pushed aside the laptop and grabbed a stack of crinkled papers.
“What is it?” Amelia asked, heart thumping. They needed to get out of there.
“Names, contact details, and dollar amounts.”
“Well, put it back. We need to leave.”
Leo shook his head. “This is weird.”
Amelia wanted to scream. “Leo, we need to go.”
