Chloe looked at Maluck, crossing her arms. “And you had better not think about making me that personal assistant.”

  Maluck blinked, feigning innocence. “But why? You’re already doing such a great job at it with the coins.”

  Chloe glared. “Because I’ll be busy with my other job. With my skills. You know, my future.”

  Maluck smirked. “Oh, your skills in the—”

  Chloe grabbed her milkshake. “Don’t you even think about finishing that sentence, or this is going in your face.”

  Maluck raised his hands, smiling. “I was going to say in the gym. Swear.”

  Chloe narrowed her eyes. “Good.” She took a sip of her milkshake, satisfied. “So yes, go find yourself a personal assistant then.”

  Maluck sighed. “Fine.” He looked at the others. “So this personal assistant would be working as a liaison between Soi, Cass, and me.”

  “That sounds about right,” Soi said.

  Cass raised an eyebrow. “Wait. Am I hired? That was it? That was the whole job interview? Shouldn’t you be doing a background check, paperwork, I don’t know, something?”

  Maluck shrugged. “Well, there’s one thing you should know, Cassandra. I’m a bit of a human lie detector.”

  Cass scoffed. “No way.”

  “Yep,” Maluck said, grinning. “That’s why I can hire you immediately—no doubts about your honesty.”

  Cass stared at him for a moment. Then, slowly, she leaned back. “Huh. Alright then. How much am I paid?”

  Maluck smirked. “Let’s start you at $100,000.”

  Cass’s eyebrows shot up. “$100,000? Wow. Alright, yeah. Works for me.”

  “Good,” Maluck said. “And don’t worry, you’ll be busy because we already have our first case lined up.”

  Cass’s eyes narrowed. “First case?”

  “Yep,” Maluck said. “I’ll tell you about that in a second—after I find myself a personal assistant. Because someone’s gotta handle this car registration and insurance crap, and it’s definitely not gonna be me.”

  “Nor me,” Chloe piped in.

  Maluck clapped his hands together. “Alright, team! Let’s put together a list of what we want for my personal assistant.”

  Chloe smirked. “Well, it’s your personal assistant.”

  Maluck hesitated. “Well… this person would be a buffer for the whole team, so wouldn’t they also be yours too?”

  Chloe grinned. “Oh wait, yes. My personal assistant too.”

  Maluck smiled. “Seeee? Our personal assistant. Now let’s make a list.”

  ***

  Chloe was mentally loving life. Just a few days ago, she had been stuck working a barely-above-minimum-wage job at a sleazy pawn shop run by a dirtbag named Ron. Now?

  Now she was living in a five-star hotel, training to be the world’s best thief, and about to get a personal assistant.

  This was awesome.

  She didn’t even know how much she was getting paid, but she assumed it was a lot. At some point. Probably.

  For now?

  She was sipping on a damn good milkshake and watching Maluck stress over hiring paperwork.

  Life was good.

  ***

  Maluck sighed, rubbing his temples. “Like I said, I don’t even know what I’d look for in a personal assistant. Do any of you?”

  Soi shrugged. “Not really. When I worked for the government, my personal assistant was basically a shared secretary.”

  Cass leaned back. “Same. I’m more of a lone wolf. I usually handled my own work.”

  Chloe just raised an eyebrow. “Yeah, the idea of a personal assistant is just new to me.”

  Maluck exhaled. “Okay, new plan. Let’s all throw in some suggestions—things we think we would want in a good personal assistant.”

  “Sounds good,” Soi said.

  Maluck grabbed a napkin from the table, pulled out a pen, and started jotting things down.

  Chloe leaned in. “You’re seriously writing this on a napkin?”

  Maluck frowned. “What? It’s efficient.”

  The narrative has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the infringement.

  Cass shook her head. “God help this assistant.”

  Maluck ignored them and scribbled, Must be organized.

  Soi nodded. “Yeah, and they should be good with paperwork.”

  Maluck added, Can deal with annoying government forms.

  Cass tapped her fingers on the table. “They should also be good at handling unexpected situations.”

  Maluck jotted down, Can survive working for me.

  Chloe snickered. “Oh! And they should be good at handling stress.”

  Maluck wrote, Can put up with my bullshit.

  Soi smirked. “They should have a strong attention to detail.”

  Maluck scribbled, Won’t let me accidentally commit tax fraud.

  Cass sipped her coffee. “They should be able to schedule and plan things efficiently.”

  Maluck wrote, Keeps my life from turning into a disaster.

  Chloe tapped her chin. “And they should not be afraid to tell you when you’re being an idiot.”

  Maluck sighed, then wrote, Will sass me, but respectfully.

  Cass glanced at the napkin, then at Maluck. “You realize you’re basically describing a stressed-out babysitter, right?”

  Maluck grinned. “Yeah, pretty much.”

  Soi sighed, rubbing his temples. “Fine. I’ll make an actual job posting based on this.”

  Chloe smirked. “Make sure to put ‘must be able to tolerate high levels of nonsense’ at the top.”

  Maluck nodded. “That is the most important part.”

  ***

  Maluck rubbed his probability charm again, squinting in concentration as he burned another 5 LP when Soi posted the job listing.

  Nothing.

  He frowned. Stupid probability charm. It only boosted chances by 10%, which apparently wasn’t enough to summon the world’s best personal assistant out of thin air.

  Fine. Time to lower his standards.

  Mentally, he adjusted the parameters. Instead of “the absolute best assistant money can buy,” he went with “a really good assistant who would work really with me.”

  Another 5 LP down the drain.

  “Soi, post it on a couple more sites.” Maluck sighed. “And everyone else—just start spamming it everywhere. Forums, job boards, social media, random flyers in coffee shops—I don’t care, just put it out there.”

  Chloe raised an eyebrow. “You want me to post a LinkedOut job listing right next to my thief training exercises?”

  “Yes,” Maluck said.

  Cass chuckled. “Man’s desperate.”

  They all started posting, trusting in the sheer nonsense of their boss.

  And then?

  They sat there. Waiting.

  Chloe drummed her fingers on the table. “This was way faster when we hired Cass.”

  “That was a once-in-a-lifetime fluke,” Soi muttered, scrolling through his phone. “There’s no way this will work again.”

  He gestured at Maluck’s napkin of nonsense. “This isn’t a magical hiring ritual.”

  Maluck crossed his arms. “Oh, so now you’re doubting the napkin of nonsense?”

  And that’s when Maluck’s phone rang.

  Everyone froze.

  Chloe’s eyes widened. “No. Way.”

  Soi stared at the phone. “You’ve gotta be kidding me.”

  Cass smirked, sipping her coffee. “Huh. Guess it is a magical napkin.”

  Maluck grinned, answering the call. “Lucky Star Ventures—how can I help you?”

  ****

  Maluck put the phone on speakerphone mode.

  The person on the other end of the line sounded breathless, like they had either just run a marathon or survived a high-speed foot chase.

  “Uh—hi! Hello! I’m calling about the personal assistant job?”

  Maluck raised an eyebrow. “…Did you just outrun a debt collector?”

  “Maybe!” the voice chirped. “Anyway, I’m Theo! Theo Mercer! I saw your listing and, wow, you guys posted everywhere. Like, literally everywhere. “LinkedOut, job boards, a Redditorium thread arguing about whether billionaires should exist, and—uh—I think you also posted on a local buy-and-sell page?”

  Soi frowned. “Wait, which buy-and-sell page?”

  “Used couches and suspiciously cheap GameStations.”

  Everyone just looked at him.

  Maluck nodded. “What? I was casting a wide net.”

  Theo cleared his throat. “So, anyway! I wanted to throw my hat in the ring because, well… I’m kind of amazing.”

  Chloe snorted. “Oh, I like him already.”

  Cass smirked. “Cocky. Let’s see if he backs it up.”

  Maluck leaned forward. “Alright, Theo. Impress me. What’s your background?”

  Theo took a deep breath. “I used to be a personal assistant for a very high-maintenance, extremely rich lunatic.”

  Maluck nodded. “Go on.”

  “I worked for Oliver Devereaux.”

  Soi choked on his coffee. Cass sat up straighter. Chloe blinked.

  Maluck frowned. “…Who?”

  Soi wiped his mouth. “Oliver Devereaux. The eccentric billionaire? The guy who built a mansion in the middle of a forest but refuses to install plumbing because he ‘likes the struggle’? The guy who once fired an employee for bringing him the ‘wrong kind of cloud cover’ during an outdoor brunch?”

  Theo sighed. “Yeah. That one.”

  Cass whistled. “And you were his assistant?”

  “For three years.”

  Chloe gasped. “You lasted three years?”

  “Yep.”

  Maluck leaned back, genuinely impressed. “Damn. So, what happened? Why’d you leave?”

  Theo exhaled sharply. “Because I failed to charter a private jet to fly a specific breed of French duck.”

  There was a beat of silence.

  Then Chloe cracked up. “A duck?!”

  Theo nodded, dead serious. “A $30 duck. And he wanted me to spend $250,000 flying it over on a private jet.”

  Cass squinted. “…For a duck?”

  Theo threw up his hands. “Not just any duck, Cass. A distinguished duck. A duck with ‘a refined European bloodline,’ because, and I quote—‘local ducks lack the necessary refinement.’”

  Chloe wheezed. “No. No way.”

  “Oh, it gets worse,” Theo muttered. “He wanted the duck to fly first-class. With its own seat. He expected the flight attendants to provide it with a curated dining experience. He also wanted me to fly there to escort the duck back.”

  Soi was pinching the bridge of his nose. “I hate that I believe this.”

  Cass was horrified. “And you refused?”

  “I literally couldn’t go to France,” Theo groaned. “Because I was banned from entering the European Union.”

  The table went dead silent.

  Maluck raised an eyebrow. “…Dare I ask why?”

  Theo rubbed his temples. “About a year before Duckgate, my boss wanted an exclusive private tour of the Louvre. Problem was, the Louvre was already booked for some diplomatic event. Totally out of my control. But, of course, that wasn’t an acceptable answer.”

  Chloe leaned in. “Oh my God. What did you do?”

  Theo sighed. “I may have… accidentally implied that my boss was a foreign dignitary.”

  Cass choked on her coffee. “You what?!”

  “Look, it worked! We got the tour. My boss never even cared. But then he started demanding more VIP treatment, and before I knew it, I had half a dozen high-end European hotels thinking he was some kind of minor royalty.”

  Soi stared at him. “And no one questioned it?”

  “Oh, they definitely were suspicious,” Theo muttered. “But money talks, and my boss spent so much they didn’t care. It all fell apart when he tried to commandeer a parade route in Spain because the ‘peasants weren’t moving fast enough.’”

  Maluck was wheezing. “No. No way.”

  Theo nodded. “Spanish authorities were not amused. They investigated, realized my boss was actually a nobody, and traced it all back to me. Boom—permanent EU travel ban.”

  Chloe looked horrified. “You got banned from an entire continent.”

  “Yep.” Theo slumped forward. “And that’s why I couldn’t fly to France to pick up the stupid duck.”

  Cass shook her head. “And your boss fired you for that?”

  Theo scoffed. “He didn’t give a crap that I got banned from Europe. He fired me for ‘lacking dedication to the duck’s well-being.’”

  Maluck grinned. “Well, good news. No ducks here.”

  Theo exhaled. “Thank God.”

  Maluck clapped his hands together. “Alright, Theo. Meet us at Charlie’s Diner. Let’s see how you fit in.”