Read Online The Cipher by John C. Ford - Free Book Online Page A

“Guess you need to go.”
    He followed her eyes over his shoulder. Ben was standing at the side of the reception desk, flapping a card key envelope at his side with a pointed look of impatience. Sometime soon, they were going to have a long talk about the wingman concept.
    â€œErmm . . . yeah . . .” But before Smiles could salvage the situation, Erin had stepped to Sergeant Sherbet and Ben was pulling him down a hallway with signs that said CRYPTCON AHEAD . It looked like Walt Disney had designed the carpet in here, too.
    â€œWas that really necessary?” Smiles said.
    â€œYeah, sorry. I know you were flirting with that girl.”
    â€œFlirting? She was practically giving me a
lap dance
.” He sighed—Ben would never appreciate the astronomical chances of meeting a pixie sun goddess who was doing her best to throw herself at you inside of five minutes.
    â€œC’mon,” Ben said, checking the little envelope with the card keys. “Cedar Tower, room 537.”
    â€œWhat’s the big rush?”
    â€œThey said there was going to be a special guest at this opening session. I don’t want to miss it.”
    â€œOh, I’m sure it’ll be epic,” Smiles said as they followed a sign to the Cedar Tower through the conference-center part of the hotel. Turning a corner, they saw a registration table with a CRYPTCON sign and a line of people straight from Dork Central worming out behind it. Smiles cringed at the collection of short-sleeve business shirts, wrinkled dress pants, and old-man walking shoes—in some cases, all on one person. Would it kill these people to hit a J.Crew?
    Ben’s tiny bird shoulders slumped at the sight of the line. “Mind dumping this in the room for me?” he said, holding out the gym bag that doubled as his luggage. “I really need to get in that line.”
    Smiles grabbed the bag, happy to be loosed on his own. “Just call me Jeeves.”
    Ben handed him one of the room keys. “Thanks. So where can I find you later?”
    â€œThe poker room,” Smiles said. “I’ll be the one with all the chips.”
    â€œI’m sixteen. You know I can’t get in there.”
    â€œYou don’t have a fake ID?” Ben was worse off than Smiles had thought. “You promised you’d do some gambling.”
    â€œI just said that to get you out of my room,” Ben said, as if they’d been over it ten times already.
    â€œYeah, well . . .” Smiles paused. The pixie sun goddess had just passed by, engrossed in a text as she turned the corner. The surprising part was that now she seemed to be headed straight for the CRYPTCON registration tables. Then a wonderful thing happened. She swiveled and walked backward a few strides. As she did, her eyes turned up from her phone, lit on him, and seemed to say,
You coming or what?
    â€œActually,” Smiles said, “tell me about this opening session again.”

29
    JENNA BROOKE WOULD not shut up.
    â€œ. . . It’s like, oh sure, Stace, they’re totally natural—no way are those inner tubes that suddenly appeared inside your mom’s lips collagen injections or anything . . .”
    She absolutely would not shut up.
    They rode to Boston every Friday for their “Career Explorer” internship. Melanie’s dad had volunteered to host two Kingsley students in the Alyce Systems HR department, so Melanie had signed up (obviously she had, because her dad had half suggested it). It wasn’t a bad deal, except for the ride from Weston—on the commuter line, then switching to the T at North Station—which Jenna inevitably filled with analysis of people’s body parts and, if the subject of discussion was a girl, Jenna’s inevitable suspicions about her promiscuous ways.
    â€œ. . . not saying he isn’t halfway cute. Have you ever seen him in his baseball uniform?