Page 64 of For Better or for Ransom

“Of course!”

After a deep search of internet materials, Sol was satisfied Leonardo Pascual looked exactly like himself in the photograph she’d unearthed of him attending a television festival a couple of years before and posing on the red carpet. She handed it to Divya.

“Stay here,” the Mancunian said, and she stood up to go talk to the waiters at the other end of the bar.

“So…” Luke said, the moment Sol and he were alone. His eyes were firmly set on her face. “Can I hire you on a permanent basis?”

She blushed, blinked several times. Why was it that she hadn’t ordered another piña colada yet? She most definitely needed it.

“Are you asking me to be your other detective partner? Or to be your wife?”

His grin was smug. “I’m asking you to consider collaborating with me and Divya in a more official capacity going forward, yes. For the wife thing, I’m still waiting on a firm proposal from you—when you’re not drunk. You know I take consent extremely seriously.”

She swallowed. Hard. Now she was glad she hadn’t ordered that second drink.

“Sol, oh my god!” Divya startled her. She’d appeared behind them. “Could you perhaps consider working with us more often? Not just as a translator but a proper investigator.”

“I was just asking her that.” Luke’s voice was honeyed.

“Your freaking idea was genius. One of the waiters saw Leonardo here yesterday.” Divya was ecstatic. “In fact, it sounds so obvious. I really don’t know why we didn’t think about it.”

“Because sometimes we’re still too used to following our previous agency’s methods and forget that fieldwork doesn’t necessarily mean always surveillance and not calling attention to ourselves,” Luke said, and his eyes still hadn’t left Sol.

The mention of the former agency where both Divya and Luke had worked, met each other, and then left, brought Sol memories of how she’d gotten to know both of them.

“Luckily, Sol here was able to think straight,” Luke added.

She was technically drunk. But sure, she was thinking straight. And absolutely delighted at the idea of Luke and Divya wanting her to help them more often.

“So, what did they tell you?” Luke asked Divya, finally losing his hold on Sol’s eyes and permitting her to relax—a little.

“The two waiters remember Leonardo being here yesterday. The bar was pretty empty but they insisted they’d be able to recall him even if it was a packed night. Apparently he looked hooooottttt.” Luke was about to ask Divya something else but she didn’t let him. “No, they haven’t seen him at the bar before or since. And he wasn’t alone.”

“Another lover?” Luke cleared his throat, though the thrill was obvious. He was enjoying the solving of the puzzle—and finally not mad at Divya for the interruption with a side of late-night outing.

“They didn’t get that vibe,” Divya dismissed. “Apparently it was a very unremarkable chap, and Leonardo was totally—and I’m quoting here—out of his league.”

“What does it mean that this chap who was with Leonardo was unremarkable?” Luke asked, still in chasing mode. “What did he look like?”

Divya and Sol glared at him, then Divya said: “It means they have no clue what the other chap looked like because they only had eyes for Leonardo, mate.”

Luke rolled his eyes. He wanted to find the actor, but Sol was starting to wonder if he’d ever liked Leonardo.

“But this is where things get interesting,” Divya said. “They don’t believe Leonardo was here of his own accord.”

36

Thursday, March 21, 2024

Luke

We need to figure out what happened to Leonardo once he left the cocktail bar the other night,” Luke told Divya and Sol over breakfast at their hotel the following morning. “What did the waiter tell you again?”

“That Leonardo looked well-rested, tanned, utterly divine, young even. But also somewhat uncomfortable, especially towards his companion,” Divya said.

“His unremarkable companion,” Luke quipped. He was still a bit sore that the two waiters had been so fixated on Leonardo’s beauty they couldn’t even offer a descriptive element of the person who’d been with the actor that night.

Divya rolled her eyes, checking her mobile phone. “His unremarkable companion. Tomàs just texted me.”