Vitamin Deficiency

The pool at the Hollywood Roosevelt was empty at 3 AM, which was exactly why Marcus chose it. He'd been camped in room 417 for three weeks, photographing a tech CEO's extramarital liaisons for a divorce lawyer who'd already spent more on Marcus than the prenup was worth.

The fourth-floor balcony door slid open behind him. A woman emerged, wrapped in a hotel robe that was too big for her frame. She held an orange juice carton in one hand, a cigarette in the other.

"You're the guy from 417," she said. "I'm the maid who keeps finding your camera lens caps under the bed."

Marcus stiffened. Every profession had its hazards, and carelessness was the cardinal sin of a corporate spy. "I'm a landscape photographer."

"Uh-huh." She perched on the lounge chair beside him, robe falling open to reveal a swimsuit the color of a bruised peach. "I'm Lena." Her eyes were sharp, assessing him with the precision of someone who'd seen too much and said too little. A fox, he thought. One of those clever, adaptable creatures that survived in any habitat.

"You're not really a maid," Marcus said.

"And you're not really photographing landscapes. Unless you count the back of some unsuspecting asshole's head a 'landscape.'" She gestured with her cigarette. "I know what you're doing. I also know you're taking those vitamin D supplements like they're candy. Sunlight deficiency, camera work, suspicious hours. You're a private investigator. Or corporate espionage. Probably both."

Marcus felt a strange relief in being seen. "What are you?"

"Corporate counterintelligence." She smiled, and it transformed her face from tired to something like luminous. "I'm the spy hunter, Marcus. And I've been watching you watch my target for three weeks." She held up a tablet, displaying real-time footage of him surveilling the hotel room across the courtyard. "Funny thing is, I'm pretty sure my client's spouse is hiring your firm to catch me doing something wrong. So we're both out here in the cold, eating vitamins and watching people who don't know we exist."

"Your client's the woman in 302?"

"The same one you're photographing through her bathroom window." Lena took a long drag of her cigarette. "You know what's interesting? The spouse who hired you? He's the one actually having the affair. With the husband of my client. It's a full circle of betrayal."

Marcus stared at her. The absurdity of it settled over him like a warm blanket. They were both mercenaries in a war that didn't exist, fighting on behalf of people who'd all already betrayed each other anyway.

"Why don't we just make something up?" he said suddenly. "Tell them whatever they want to hear. Keep the money, go home."

Lena looked at him for a long moment. The pool lights rippled across her face like underwater diamonds. "I was hoping you'd say that. I've got a bottle of whiskey in my room and a train to Mexico at dawn. We could disappear."

Marcus took the vitamin D bottle from his pocket and threw it into the pool. It sank without a sound.

"I'm in."