Chapter 15: THE LIST

MIA

I sat there, staring at the list at two in the morning.

I couldn't sleep as I kept thinking about the way Yuna had looked at me before she left, almost as if there was something she wanted to say but couldn't because she was scared.

Who was she scared of?

So I opened a new note on my phone, made sure to put a password on it then wrote "Things That Don't Make Sense.” And started writing every weird thing Dante had done. I needed to keep track so that I wouldn't forget anything.

First coffee, then peonies… I kept going but the more I wrote the more something told me I shouldn't be using my phone for this but I shook it off.

By the time I was done the list had seventeen items. With a sigh, I locked my phone and stared at the ceiling until sunrise.

"I heard about this photography exhibit," I said to James during our client call the next morning. "It's opening next Friday at the Barton Gallery for contemporary portraiture and it's supposed to be incredible."

There was no exhibit. I had made it up because I needed to test if my phone was bugged.

"Oh yeah?" James sounded distracted. "Are you going?"

"I'm thinking about it. The artist is someone I've been following for years."

We wrapped up the call and I made a note in my calendar. If Dante mentioned the Barton Gallery or the exhibit or anything related to it, I'd know for sure now that my phone had been compromised by him.

The thought made my skin crawl and made me want to throw the phone across the room. But I needed to be sure before I acted.

I spent the afternoon searching my apartment for any wire taps.

I started with the obvious places as I looked behind picture frames, underneath furniture, inside lamps and cupboards. I searched for hours but came up with… nothing.

Either I was paranoid or whoever was watching me was very, very good at hiding their equipment.

I sat on my couch and googled "signs someone is stalking you."

The list made my stomach sink:

They know your schedule without being told.

They appear in places you didn't mention going.

They know personal details you never shared.

You feel watched even when alone.

They seem to anticipate your needs.

Someone said, “when I was stalked by my ex, my phone started acting strangely as my battery drained faster than usual. Almost as if someone else was using it alongside me. And then apps I didn't download started to show up. It was a crazy experience.”

Out of the eight things listed, I checked out six. And by what the website said, Dante was stalking me. I closed the browser and tried to think clearly.

The thing about being a photographer is you learn to see details other people miss. I started applying that lens to my life. I was scrolling through my phone settings, checking out apps that drain battery usage and then in the app list, I found an app that I didn't recognize.

Its name was “system update.”

It was a generic name with no icon, buried so well in the list that I wouldn't have noticed it if I wasn't taking my time to search.

I clicked on it then went through its permissions.

Camera: Allowed

Microphone: Allowed

Location: Always

Messages: Allowed

Contacts: Allowed

Photos: Allowed

Every single permission was allowed which granted it access to everything on my phone. I checked the date it had been installed and saw that it was six months ago before I had even met Dante.

I let out a sigh of relief because this showed that I was just paranoid about him for no reason when the real culprit was out there somewhere. That was how they had been overhearing my conversations with Dante.

That showed that he was just a good person. But terror still hit me at the fact that someone had access to my entire life for half a year.

I got up, got dressed then rushed over to Dante's door and knocked.

He answered in running clothes, hair damp with sweat. "Hey. Is everything okay?"

"Can you look at something?"

"Of course. Come in."

I followed him to the kitchen and handed him my phone. "There's an app I don't recognize or remember installing on my phone and I think it might be spyware."

He took it and scrolled to where I'd left the settings open. His expression didn't change but something in his posture shifted. He was just as concerned as I was.

"SystemUpdate," he read. "When was this installed?"

"Six months ago from what I saw but I swear, I never downloaded it."

He was quiet for a moment, going through the permission and when he looked up his face was serious. "This is definitely spyware. Someone's been tracking you."

"Can you tell who?"

"Not from this. But they've had access to everything. Your location, your messages and your photos." He handed the phone back. "You need to delete it."

"Will that stop them?"

"It'll stop this particular access point. They might have other ways in but this is a good start." He paused. "Do you know when this started? Six months ago—were you with anyone who might have done this?"

Ren. He was asking about Ren. Could he be the one? Given his mafia history, I wouldn't be so shocked. He says did come off as controlling. He was the one I needed to watch closely.

"Maybe. I don't know." I mumbled.

"Delete it now. Then we should probably factory reset your phone to be safe but back everything up first."

I deleted the app while he watched and saw it disappear from my phone.

"Done."

"Good." He pulled me into a hug. I felt his hand in my hair as he patted it and when he spoke, his voice was soft. "I'm sorry you're dealing with this. But we'll figure it out. I promise."

I nodded against his chest and tried to ignore the small voice in my head asking why he'd seemed unsurprised. Why his first question had been about Ren and not about who else might have had access to my phone.

I ignored it because I needed him to be safe. I needed him to be the person helping me instead of the person I needed help from.