Ficorpio
Chapter 1
My food deliveries had been stolen nine times in a single month.
I checked the security footage and knocked on every door on the lower floors, but I still couldn’t find the thief.
One resident rolled his eyes and complained, “Who’s so broke they’d steal someone else’s dinner? You’re making a big deal out of nothing.”
I was furious. That night, I placed another order and added a note in all caps:
MAKE IT HOT ENOUGH TO KILL ME.
An hour later, the eye-rolling neighbor’s kid was rushed to the hospital after eating something unbearably spicy.
You might not believe this, but for the past month, a food thief had been targeting me.
Nine deliveries had disappeared in four weeks.
I lived in Building 17 at Clearwater Apartments. A little over two weeks earlier, I’d ordered dinner the way I normally did.
Because I worked late, I always placed my order before leaving the office. By the time I got home, the food would be waiting downstairs, and I could carry it up with me.
Except that night, it wasn’t there.
I called the delivery courier. He pulled up the proof-of-delivery photo in the app and swore he had dropped it off.
I checked the picture. My order had definitely been left in the lobby.
Our building had fifteen floors and more than a hundred residents. For security reasons, the Property Management Office didn’t allow delivery couriers past the lobby.
The courier suggested that someone might have taken my order by mistake.
“Sometimes food sits there too long, and if somebody else ordered from the same restaurant, they assume it’s theirs and grab it.
“One of my coworkers had the same thing happen on a delivery.
“I’m sorry, man, but this really wasn’t my fault. I promise I left it there.”
He sounded sincere, and one meal wasn’t worth much, so I didn’t press the issue. I simply placed another order.
What I hadn’t expected was for it to happen again.
And again.
By that day, eight of my deliveries had vanished.
Determined to identify whoever was taking them, I asked building security to check the cameras. The guard told me the lobby security camera had been broken for six months.
We checked the elevator footage instead, but no one had carried my food upstairs.
That meant the thief probably lived on one of the lower floors. After all, someone living close to the lobby could take the stairs and avoid the elevator cameras entirely.
Once or twice might have been an honest mistake. But seven or eight times?
That was theft.
Property management finally took the situation seriously. That weekend, Ms. Evelyn Hayes accompanied me as I knocked on doors throughout the lower floors.
We explained what had been happening, but instead of showing any concern, one man rolled his eyes at us.
Chapter 2
“Are you two serious? It’s the middle of the day, and you’re disturbing everyone.”
Then he gave a dismissive snort.
“Who’s so broke they’d steal someone else’s dinner? You’re making a big deal out of nothing.”
I was livid.
Easy for him to say when it wasn’t his food disappearing.
Every day, I dragged myself home from work exhausted, wanting nothing more than to pick up a hot meal and eat the second I got inside. Instead, someone kept stealing my dinner and leaving me hungry.
Who could put up with that night after night?
Still burning with anger, I ordered a pizza that evening and typed four words into the special-instructions box:
MAKE IT LETHALLY HOT.
Then I called the restaurant and asked them to add every kind of hot sauce they had.
The employee hesitated.
“That much spice could seriously mess up your stomach.”
I smiled calmly.
“It’s fine. Put it all on there.”
“You’re sure?”
“I know what I can handle. I love spicy food anyway, and it’s hot out. I might as well sweat a little.”
He finally agreed, and I hung up feeling rather pleased with myself.
It would be best if the thief didn’t show up again.
But if they did, I’d start ordering spicy food every single day. Let’s see how long their stomach could handle that.
What I didn’t expect was for an ambulance to race into Clearwater Apartments an hour later.
Its siren wailed through the complex as the paramedics collected an emergency patient from downstairs.
Standing on my fourteenth-floor balcony, I looked down and wondered if the person who had stolen my food had actually been hurt by the spice.
After thinking it over, though, I decided that couldn’t be it.
They were adults, weren’t they? If someone couldn’t handle spicy food, why would they keep eating it?
But when I went downstairs to collect my order, the pizza the courier had left in the lobby was gone.
Again.
That made nine stolen deliveries.
I stared upward, utterly speechless.
No way.
Had I really sent the food thief to the hospital?
I barely had time to enjoy the thought before things got even more absurd.
My phone rang. The number was unfamiliar.
The moment I answered, a man roared into my ear.
“Are you Ryan Mercer? What the hell is wrong with you?”
I stared at the phone, completely bewildered. “Who the hell is this?”
“Are you Ryan Mercer or not?”
I frowned. “Yeah. So what? Who are—”
He cut me off. Now that he’d confirmed my identity, he launched straight into a tirade.
“What kind of monster feeds a kid an extra-hot pizza? You did it on purpose, didn’t you? My son’s at Clearwater General Hospital because of you! Get over here and pay his medical bills, or I’m calling the police!”
Chapter 3
For a moment, I couldn’t process what I was hearing.
Then it clicked.
This man was the food thief.
He had given my stolen delivery to his son, and the pizza had been so spicy that the kid ended up in the hospital.
This was beyond ridiculous.
Had I ordered that food for his son?
No. I’d ordered it for myself.
I wasn’t about to let him scream at me without fighting back, so I tore into him just as viciously.
The argument exploded.
He accused me of deliberately setting a trap to get revenge and demanded that I come to the hospital and pay for his son’s treatment.
Of course I refused to be his scapegoat. I told him exactly what kind of lowlife stole someone else’s dinner when it barely cost twenty bucks.
We were still trading insults when a vaguely familiar woman’s voice sounded in the background.
“That’s enough, Derek. Just call the police!
“There’s no point arguing with someone like him.
“He’s absolute trash!”
I froze.
The call ended, but I remained there with the phone in my hand, too stunned to react.
Unless I was mistaken, that woman sounded a lot like someone from the family who had mocked me earlier that day.
Could it really have been them?
Had they been stealing my deliveries all along?
Still needing proof, I took a cab to Clearwater General Hospital.
The person who had eaten the delivery was a child, and I was worried that the extra-hot pizza might lead to serious consequences. At the same time, I wanted to confirm whether my suspicion was correct.
Three people were sitting outside the emergency room when I arrived.
A married couple in their thirties sat together. The man was absorbed in his phone while the woman sighed repeatedly.
An older woman who looked to be in her fifties was making an angry phone call.
“Yes! The apartment is 1405!”
“Get over there and arrest him! That bastard ordered extra-hot pizza for my precious grandson!”
“Of course he did it on purpose! Otherwise, why would his delivery have ended up outside our apartment? He put it there deliberately!”
Just hearing those few sentences sent the blood rushing to my head.
What a talent for twisting the truth. This old woman could turn black into white without blinking.
When had I ever put my food outside their door?
Someone from their apartment had stolen it. That was obvious.
Furious, I stormed over to confront them. But the moment they saw me, they reacted like flies spotting meat.
“Honey! That’s him! That’s Ryan Mercer!”
The woman pointed at me. The man looked up from his phone, froze for half a second, then charged toward me in three hurried strides.
I hadn’t even had time to speak before he raised his hand and slapped me across the face.
“You actually came back, you son of a bitch!”
I stared at him in disbelief. “You hit me?”