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Kay in the hotel lobby just after lunch last Friday. My heart lurched, like old times, at the sight of her. As much as I wanted to deny it, she still made my blood run hot. There was a part of me that wanted to show her what a big man I'd become. Not only physically. I was a frigging billionaire. I wanted to show off. I still had her number. So what the hell? Very few women could resist me now that I was a billionaire.
    I texted her, asking her for a drink. Two old friends catching up. No big deal in case she shot me down. Old insecurities died hard.
    Like a balm on my vanity, she texted back immediately. As if her thumbs couldn't fly fast enough to type a message back to me. She was impressed. Clearly. And I was high on it.
    She asked me to meet her at a bar up the street. She specified the time, seven p.m. Thinking back, I'd been euphoric. I was no longer the scrawny kid she remembered from college. I even fixed up. Combed my beard. Put on a decent shirt and some cologne. I waited, eagerly, impatient for her to show up. The minutes ticked by. Kay wasn't usually late. She didn't power-trip on guys like that, by making them sweat waiting for her.
    I was sitting alone at the bar, looking for a table to open up. A blond woman took the stool next to me. My memories of her were hazy. She reminded me of Kay, in a cheap, gauzy way. I could almost still smell her overpowering perfume. My stomach clenched.
    As hard as I tried, I couldn't conjure up a clear image of her face. Maybe I'd intentionally tried to forget her. It was clear now that her similarity to Kay had been intentional. She'd set out to con me.
    I clenched my jaw, suppressing my growing anger. How much did she know about Kay from her phone? What the hell had Kay stored on it? What could her impersonator use against her and us? Kayla seemed unconcerned. But shit, that woman had had her phone for hours.
    I stared at the phone in my hand, wishing I'd been able to get my hands on it earlier. My pulsed quickened at the thought of dissecting this thing. I hoped to see that imposter bitch's prints on it somehow. If not literally, then figuratively. Digitally.
    I'd already had Magda bag up everything I'd taken with me on my trip and give it to the PI to dust for prints. So far, nothing.
    Had the ID thief worked alone? Did she have an even greedier, more dangerous partner? Whatever the case, she was the only one who would have known to send that threatening text. I had to find her. Shut her down and keep her from talking.
    First, I had to string her along as long as I could. I had to erase any evidence of marrying a phony. Any evidence that the girl I'd married wasn't the sweet, beautiful girl in my bed. The one I could barely keep my hands off.
    I had to be sure there was no photographic or video evidence. No surveillance video of us anywhere. No way anyone could prove I hadn't married the real Kayla. I was reasonably certain my little thief was savvy enough to avoid as many cameras as possible. She was undoubtedly a professional. She would have kept her face hidden from the cameras.
    Storing surveillance video for more than thirty to sixty days, ninety at most, was prohibitively expensive. I had to keep this under wraps for a minimum of thirty days. String her along if I had to. Ninety days and I would be golden. Totally in the clear. Any surveillance video would be overwritten by then. No business stored it longer than that. Then it would just be Kay's word and mine against this whore's. I hoped that ID thief didn't realize the same thing. Just what kind of IQ was I dealing with? Not a genius. She'd already screwed up.
    But then, so had I.
    I shuddered. Just what the hell had I done with that woman? Had I slept with her? Was she laughing at my inexperience? Should I be checked for sexually transmitted diseases? Would she suddenly reappear claiming to be pregnant with my baby?
    Another month and I would be in the clear there, too.
    The thought of her being pregnant with my kid