Evie attends a dinner party with Ryan's close female friends and struggles to deflect their intrusive questions about her past.

Ryan and Evie attend a Derby party where they meet James's date, a woman claiming to be Lucca Marino.

Evie flees to the bathroom at the Derby party after realizing that Lucca Marino is actually her own real name.

Lucca is caught scanning credit cards at a fundraiser and released by a detective who hands her Mr. Smith's contact number.

Evie calls Mr. Smith about the imposter and learns the Lucca lookalike was planted as a test of Evie's loyalty.

Disguised as a man, Evie secretly drives to Ryan's East Texas trucking property to investigate his illegal activities.

Hiding in a bathroom, Evie witnesses Ryan and his associate interrogate and threaten an employee named Freddie for stealing.

During dinner with James and the imposter, Evie gets the Lucca lookalike alone and forces her to confess her true identity.

The morning after dinner, news reports reveal that James and the Lucca imposter were killed in a car accident.

Police arrive and arrest Evie as a material witness in the death of a woman named Amy Holder.

Mr. Smith admits arranging the car accident and threatens Evie with the same fate unless she delivers the Atlanta lockbox contents.

Evie provokes Cameron into furiously contacting Mr. Smith, allowing Devon to intercept Smith's communications through Cameron's bugged phone.

Evie overhears Ryan speaking privately with George at their motel and becomes convinced that Ryan may be Mr. Smith.

Evie opens the Atlanta lockbox with George watching, reveals only an origami swan inside, and hands George over to the Connolly family.

Evie returns to Ryan, confesses her true identity and mission, and eventually assumes Mr. Smith's criminal network as Miss Smith.

Evie Porter, a con artist, has moved in with businessman Ryan Sumner as part of a covert job assigned by the mysterious Mr. Smith. Her cover is shaken when a woman claiming to be Lucca Marino—Evie's real name—appears at a social event, and Evie traces this imposter back to Smith's manipulation. After investigating Ryan's illegal trucking operation and forcing the imposter's confession, Evie finds herself framed for a murder and threatened by Smith to travel to Atlanta. Evie outmaneuvers Smith by baiting his communications and assembling a network of allies, luring him to a bank vault where she exposes him to the Connolly crime family. With Smith neutralized, Evie returns to Ryan, reveals her true identity, and steps into Smith's role as the new puppet master, calling herself Miss Smith.

The core con: Evie infiltrates Ryan's life and dismantles Mr. Smith's criminal network.

Evie arrives at her entirely empty apartment and stages it with unpacked boxes to make it appear she has been living there.

Ryan insists on helping Evie finish moving, forcing her to re-box items she had only unpacked hours earlier.

At lunch with Ryan's friends, Evie fabricates a tragic backstory about her parents dying in a car crash to silence their questions.

Ryan visits Evie at the art gallery he helped her get hired at, and Evie afterward calls Rachel to arrange a private meeting.

Teenage Lucca steals and disassembles jewelry from wealthy homes to fund her dying mother's cancer treatments.

Evie returns to the PO Box and finds it empty, deciding against calling Mr. Smith's emergency-only number.

After running into James and the Lucca imposter at Home Depot, Evie invites them over for dinner.

Police question Ryan and Evie at James's parents' house, where Evie secretly recovers a Smith briefing document from among the imposter's possessions.

Evie meets Devon and agrees to alter key details of Ryan's shipping roster before handing it over to Mr. Smith.

Rachel shows Evie photographs linking her to multiple past aliases, all of which have been reattributed to the name Evie Porter.

Lucca, as Mia Bianchi, defies Smith's plan and instead uses sex workers to compromise powerful politicians gathered in Marshall's hotel room.

Evie visits Governor Andrew Marshall in Nashville and asks him to hold an unspecified future favor in reserve for her.

George intercepts Evie outside Marshall's office and pressures her to travel directly to Atlanta to retrieve the lockbox.

Evie drives to her hometown of Eden and uploads fabricated dental records onto a local doctor's office server.

Evie convinces Atlanta detectives that the woman in the hotel fire footage is Lucca Marino and names a famous footballer as her alibi.

This pool explores the tactical and personal moments that surround Evie's main operation, revealing the texture of her double life. From staging an empty apartment to deflecting hostile questions at lunch, Evie constantly manages the fragile architecture of her Evie Porter alias. Her backstory as a teenage jewel thief funding her mother's cancer treatment gives context to her life of crime, while key past jobs—including her bold improvisation at the Hilton Head conference—show how Evie quietly built leverage over powerful people. As evidence against her mounts and Smith tightens his grip, Evie uses Devon's intelligence and carefully constructed false records to stay one step ahead of both the police and her employer. By the time she walks into the Atlanta bank, each of these secondary maneuvers has been essential to the trap she has spent years laying.

The details behind the deception: aliases, allies, and the evidence closing in.

Evie moves in with Ryan after just two months of dating, immediately drawing suspicion from his tight-knit circle of friends.

Ryan's mysterious Thursday work commitment prevents him from helping Evie move, raising her curiosity about what he does in East Texas.

Evie learns from Ryan's friends that James once stole from Ryan, and distracts Ryan from the Lucca encounter by having sex with him in the car.

Lucca, as Izzy Williams, is caught searching a homeowner's bedroom; Jenny Kingston lunges at her, falls, and cracks her skull open.

After the Hilton Head job, Lucca confronts intermediary Matt and demands direct access to Mr. Smith, permanently removing Matt from their arrangement.

As Wendy Wallace, Lucca secretly warns a rising football star named Tyron about the dangers of accepting money from team donors.

Lucca and Devon deduce that Ralph Tate's valuable painting is concealed in a disguised laundry room and successfully complete the heist.

Evie searches Ryan's motel belongings and discovers her original intelligence report, making her suspect Ryan could be Mr. Smith.

Devon identifies Mr. Smith's true identity using communications intercepted through the bug planted on Cameron's phone.

As Regina Hale, Lucca breaks into Amy Holder's home searching for Connolly information, but Amy recognizes her as a plant and flees to a hotel.

Evie arrives at Devon's safe house and discovers that Amy Holder is still alive, having faked her death in the hotel fire.

After the Tate heist, Lucca and Devon discover that Mr. Smith eliminated nearly all his other employees, sparing only Amy Holder.

Evie reveals to the reader that she and Amy spent four years working together to slowly build the trap that lured Smith to Atlanta.

Devon confirms that Ryan's only connection to Mr. Smith was Smith's attempt to purchase and take over Ryan's trucking company.

Evie meets Ryan for the first time when he genuinely stops to help change her tire, and they bond over drinks afterward.

This pool traces the pivotal revelations and decisions that shift the balance of power throughout the story. From the opening disclosure that Evie engineered her own meeting with Ryan, to the late-game revelation that Amy Holder never actually died, each event reframes what the reader believed they understood. Key past jobs—from the Kingston incident to the Tate heist—reveal both Evie's growing moral ambiguity and her emerging ability to build trust with fellow outsiders like Devon and Amy. Devon's unmasking of Mr. Smith's true identity and the confirmation of Ryan's limited involvement with Smith transform the endgame, clearing the way for a genuine relationship. The pool closes with the scene of Evie and Ryan's very first meeting, recontextualizing the entire novel as a story about how a fabricated life can quietly become a real one.

The hidden machinery: discoveries, alliances, and the secrets that change everything.