QED

Chapter 23 - Keira

Hope rising in her, Keira clicked the link. It loaded, then revealed a neat website with a large logo on the top. GlaskistaArchitectures. That was all she could read until a cookie pop-up blocked the site. She pressed accept all to let it disappear as fast as possible.

Simultaneously, she made a mental note to ask Isa for a cookie blocker. It probably wasn't the best when she just randomly pressed buttons in a secret part of a building.

Finally, she scrolled through the homepage. The architect, Lincoln Graham, seemed to be widely known. Except of the QED skyscraper, he had also designed some other quite spectacular ones. For example, there was a normal-looking house that had a large complex with elevators beneath. It looked kind of creepy.

However, he seemed to like complexes under buildings. Another example of that was a villa in the South Korean woods which had a cave system under it. At this point, Keira gave up wondering why there always was something beneath Lincoln Graham's buildings. People had much to hide, apparently.

She clicked on the Manhattan skyscraper and first looked though the pictures. Some depicted sketches of its early stages, some the final results. They all had one thing in common: Being exceptionally impressive. There was a close-up of the colorful chandelier that hung in the entrance hall next to the view from outside on the building.

Keira scrolled down, until she found another section. It was about the penthouse. Exactly what she searched. She really hoped to get better pictures out of this website, from Google Earth, she could recognize close to nothing of it.

She wasn't being disappointed. The first thing she saw was a gargantuan infinity pool. It apparently was on the lowest, but biggest one of four terrasses. The other ones were connected to one floor each, winding around the core building. It looked spectacular.

The next bunch of pictures was about the flat's layout. There were different sorts of stairs, rooms that went over two floors, a wine cellar into which one could look through a glass floor. That was just the beginning, though. She also found bedrooms with glass fronts so that one could directly look down on New York City. The bathrooms with luxurious interiors were quite impressive as well.

Unfortunately, that was when the pictures stopped. Even though the interior was what was of most interest for Keira, there wasn't much of it on the website. At least compared to the exterior. Keira could kind of understand it, though. If she were Alice, she wouldn't want to have strangers looking into her home this much, too.

That, however, let the question arise what Keira was. She wasn't a stranger, so much did she know.

"What's that?" a voice came from behind. It was, unsurprisingly, Freya. She was accompanied by Phoebe.

Keira went back to the building's general page and showed it to her friends. "Those buildings are insane, the architect is really good."

"I know, I looked it up yesterday as well," Phoebe said, while Freya grabbed Keira's phone and began scrolling herself.

"You did? Why?" A sting of jealousy suddenly appeared in Keira's heart. Had Alice taken the girl up into the penthouse? It didn't seem at all like something she would do, but...

Phoebe shrugged. "Ms. Caldera mentioned the architecture firm to me because of the chandelier. By the way, what did you want to tell us yesterday?"

"Hold on." Freya looked up from the phone. "She wanted to tell us something?"

"I did, but after Joanne's climbing tour, Phoebe vanished so quickly," Keira defended herself.

"Kind of understandable," Freya commented. "You could have called us, though."