“A full ten on the new scale,” he said. “Which would be like a fifty for anybody else, but we have to keep it at ten so they don’t feel bad. Not everyone can live up to your standards.”

I grinned. “Well, that would be fair. Oh, and your questions earlier. My tattoo is the Marvel Avengers’ A, you know, but in black, grey, white, and purple, like the ace flag. Kind of like my superhero shield. It looks better than it sounds. It’s on my chest.” I pointed to my heart. “And I went to Nepal before my final year of uni. I had two months off, and I knew once I graduated, it’d be competitive, and once work started, my next vacation would be in ten years. So I spent five weeks travelling from Vietnam to Cambodia, Thailand, Myanmar, Northern India, then Nepal. It was crazy but incredible. Best five weeks of my life.”

“That sounds amazing. You went with friends?”

I shook my head. “Nope. My travel agent lined up a guide from Vietnam, paid him a year’s wages, which wasn’t much by comparison. He had an old Jeep I’m pretty sure was left behind from the war. The suspension was shot, but it was all part of the experience.”

“You went on your own? Oh my God, I would definitely end up in a bathtub of ice missing a kidney or something. Or I’d end up in the Bangkok Hilton because the customs guys would probably think my non-stop talking was a sign of drug use. It’d be a disaster.”

I chuckled and broke off a piece of the lángos. “Here, try this. It’s amazing.”

He took it, tasted it, and groaned. “Why have I never been here before? I think we’ll need to come back and try every single thing on the menu.”

“Deal.”

He ate a bit more, set his fork down, and sipped his water. “So what have you got on at work this week?” he asked. “You mentioned closing off one of your biggest contracts. I mean, I don’t even know what internet ninjas do.”

“Yeah, there are things I can’t tell you. You know, being an internet ninja—” I winked. “—means there are things I can’t tell you.”

“So you are an undercover cop or a secret agent?” He narrowed his eyes at me. “I knew it!”

I laughed at that. “Definitely not a cop or a secret agent. But I deal with classified information. Big companies, corporations, and the CEOs trust me with passwords and encryption codes. If I wanted to, which I don’t, but if I was so inclined, I could take down some pretty big companies.”

“So you have access to all of their information?”

I nodded. “Names, addresses, tax-file numbers, bank accounts, offshore accounts, wire transfers. You name it, I can see it.”

“Wow. That’s kinda scary.”

“It is a bit.”