Luke Watanabe

Luke Watanabe, a character in the Crimes of Passion series, is your colleague and the "data guy" of the Ginovesi Private Detective Agency. He is first seen in Book 1, Chapter 1.

Appearance
Luke has short brown hair, light skin, brown eyes and a small beard. He has a piercing on his left eyebrow, an earring on his left ear, and wears glasses. He also wears a green khaki shirt and a grey bomber jacket with blue jeans.

Personality
According to Luke, he is surly and he hates his job. He also doesn't want to date someone like him. According to Ruby, Luke is also bitter and pretentious.

Background
Luke was a black hat, who was arrested by the FBI. He had discovered a scam at a major debt collections agency, where millions of dollars were being stolen from the country's most vulnerable citizens. Instead of just reporting it to the authorities, Luke also posted all of the CEO's most embarrassing messages on Twitter. Luke feels the FBI got lucky catching him and should be thanking him instead of busting him. However, that was not the case and Luke was convicted, also of illegally accessing the social media accounts of Dumani Pharmaceuticals. He was sentenced for an undetermined amount of time. Part of Luke's sentence was that he was only allowed to use computers in assistance of law enforcement, but due to a loophole in New York state law, private agencies also qualify for a means of employment. His probation is up in about a year, at which point he is free to go or stay wherever he wants to.

In his past hacker life, Luke had no friends outside of fellow hackers. According to his dossier, his mother died when he was 10 years old. Specifics about her death are not revealed, but Luke believes the healthcare staff/system "murdered" her instead of what was decided by the courts: medical malpractice. After high school, Luke went to study computer science at MIT, but dropped out to work as a hacker.

Book 1

 * Chapter 1: Cross Your Heart
 * Chapter 2: Follow My Lead
 * Chapter 3: Body Language
 * Chapter 4: The Royal Treatment
 * Chapter 5: Up In Flames
 * Chapter 6: Sleep When You're Dead
 * Chapter 7: Cold Call
 * Chapter 8: Forging Ahead
 * Chapter 9: The Rite Track
 * Chapter 10: Behind The Mask
 * Chapter 11: Reasonable Doubt
 * Chapter 12: Sabbatical (Off-Screen)
 * Chapter 13: A Stab in the Dark
 * Chapter 14: The Heat
 * Chapter 15: The Final Curtain
 * Chapter 16: The Heart of the Matter
 * Chapter 17: The Long Goodbye

Book 2

 * Chapter 1: To Catch A Thief
 * Chapter 2: The Price of Infamy
 * Chapter 3: Drakovian Intelligence
 * Chapter 4: Objection

Your Character
You are Luke's co-worker. You two appear on friendly terms, and you are aware of his interest in Ruby. If you mention it, he says he finds the insinuation extremely unprofessional.

Ruby Webster
According to you, Luke and Ruby have a "thing". Although Ruby seems oblivious to Luke's interest and Luke doesn't like his crushes being brought to light, they are friends. She knows he gets queasy if he looks at dead bodies.

In Chapter 17, you and Trystan can nudge Ruby and Luke together by playing Trystan's made-up card game called "The King Commands". Trystan creates its rules on the spot, stating that when either of them draw a king, they must kiss. Both Ruby and Luke are skeptical but play along and eventually kiss at the end.

Trystan Thorne
Luke meets Trystan when the latter comes to the agency and hires you to solve Sonja Dormer's murder. If you decide to grab lunch with the team, Trystan tells Luke that he's surprised that Luke doesn't work for himself or in Silicon Valley, and instead works for "the man" (the government / the police).

Epoch
Luke was involved with a fellow hacker named Epoch. He mentions that the way things ended between them weren't great, and by their anger and his remorse, it implies their break-up was due to something Luke had done. In Chapter 8, Luke asks them and Sartre for FBI case file G982B-4, which contains the locations or identities of parties involved in smuggled Azuran Iron. They give it to him as a favor, so that Luke owes them one.

Trivia

 * He shares the same name as Luke Harper from the Desire & Decorum series.
 * He shares the same surname as Sakura Watanabe from the High School Story series and Takeshi Watanabe from the Bloodbound series.
 * In Chapter 3, he is stated to vape. His current flavor of choice is Froot Loops.
 * With his dossier revealed in Chapter 8, there is a discrepancy about his conviction: if it involved a major debt collections agency or a pharmaceutical company, or both.