I turned the phone over in my hands and found the smarmy billionaire staring back at me, his smile glowing white and his face wrinkle-free. I cringed as I remembered him flirting with me and fought the urge to smash the jeweled smile off his face.
Instead, I ran my fingers across the precious diamonds that made up the picture and held the phone up to study it closer.
It looked exactly like the one I’d replaced it with. Only, this one was real, while the other was not.
“Yowza,” Ollie said as the diamonds shimmered in the bathroom light. “Definitely an upgrade from my phone.”
“Yeah, but yours doesn’t make me want to gag,” I said, turning it off so we couldn’t be tracked.
“So what next?” Ollie asked as I reached back into my pocket and started pulling things out and placing them in front of us.
A roll of tape.
A compact of loose face powder and a makeup brush.
A pair of latex gloves.
“I need Miles’s fingerprint to get into his treasure room,” I said.
“And we’re going to get that by…putting on makeup?” he asked, watching me curiously.
“Beauty is key,” I responded, snapping each of the gloves as I secured them on my hands.
I picked up the compact and dipped the makeup brush into it gently. I held the brush up for Ollie to see before blowing the excess powder into his face jokingly.
As he sputtered, I leaned back down and lightly ran the brush and powder over the screen of Miles’s iPhone until it was covered. With another gentle blow, the excess powder flew away, leaving a bunch of smudged prints.
All except for…bingo!
There was one perfect thumbprint.
Grabbing the tape dispenser and ripping a piece off, I carefully lowered it onto the now-visible print. With a slight tap of my finger, the sticky side of the tape did its work, and I stood back up with a perfect duplicate of Miles’s thumbprint.
“So cool,” Ollie said, squinting at the final product.
“Right?” I said. “Who knew makeup could be so useful?”
I took another piece of tape and enclosed the print so it wouldn’t smudge before I could use it. Then I placed it back in my pocket.
Finally I pulled off the gloves and picked up the compact, displaying both to Ollie like a magician showing off for his audience. Then, with more flourish than was needed, I dumped the rest of the powder inside one of the gloves and tied it off in a knot at the top.
“What’s that for?” Ollie asked, looking confused as I shoved the empty compact and brush back into my pocket along with the tape dispenser and the single empty glove.
I could’ve tossed it all in the trash, but you never leave behind evidence of any kind. Much safer to dispose of it all later, when it can’t be tied back to the crime.
“Most people think a print is all you need to pass a fingerprint ID, but they’re wrong,” I explained. “What people don’t realize is that the fingerprint-recognition technology wants more than that. It wants the finger, too.”
I held the latex glove up to show him that when it was filled with the powder, it resembled a real live hand.
“The scanner would know if we just put the piece of tape down with the print. It’s smart. It would know there was no finger backing it up,” I said. “But attach the fingerprint to this…”
I placed the piece of tape with Miles’s fingerprint on it on top of the thumb of the glove and held it up for Ollie to see.
“…and suddenly you’ve got what will pass as the hand that the fingerprint belongs to.”
Ollie gave me an impressed look and started to clap slowly.
“This is why you’re the master,” he joked, bowing to me grandly.
I curtsied in response before placing the powder-filled glove in my other pocket.
“Okay, wish me luck,” I said, giving him a smile as I reached for the bathroom door. “I’ve got a secret room to break into.”