by Dale Mayer
“Not at all,” she said. Seeing that the interview was almost at an end, she stood. “If you have any other questions, just let me know.”
“And I might,” he said. “It will depend on the outcome of the investigation that’s getting underway.”
She nodded in understanding, then walked to the door and said, “Thanks for not firing me.”
“No, just forgive me for giving you a heart attack, right?” And again he shot her a bright used-car-salesman smile.
She gave a small laugh. “Exactly.” And, with that, she slipped out and shut the door behind her.
She stood there for a long moment, letting her breath ease from her chest, not at all surprised when she heard him as he picked up the phone and called somebody. She couldn’t hear anything about the conversation, but, as she walked down the hallway, she wondered if Barlow was speaking with Edward or maybe even her section boss, James. She had no clue how her boss would handle her being here now. Would he be awkward, or would he be resentful? Or maybe he even would hate her for this. Whichever happened, not a whole lot she could do about it now. She’d lost the right to complain once she had called Kai and asked for help.
*
Johan looked at Galen. “Any luck?”
“Not yet,” he muttered. “I just took some updated training on IT stuff from Stone, not that I’m sure any of it stuck yet, but I can tell you that that guy’s magic when it comes to this shit.”
“He’s also at the end of a phone call,” Johan reminded him.
Galen looked up, surprised, then nodded. “I keep forgetting. Because we’re not back in Africa, I feel disconnected from the team somehow. And I forget that we have a team here.”
Johan nodded. “We do, indeed, and many of them are more into the techie stuff than we are, I think.”
“I am far more comfortable out in the field with a gun, but it seems like the weapons of today favor the electronic version,” Galen replied.
“I know,” he said. “So far I’m not seeing any irregularities with password log-ins or the timing when accessing files,” he said. “I’m just going through the basics at the moment.”
“Right. It’ll get a whole lot more complicated as we get further into it.”
“I know,” Johan muttered. “Because then we must consider who might have been working under somebody else’s access. Like Joy already warned us about with her computer.”
“And whoever might have put in a Trojan, so that it’s sitting there for them to access when they do log in, and they can worm their way into somebody else’s files under their names.”
“Yeah, so we gotta check out Joy’s computer for sure,” Johan said, staring at the computer in frustration. “I really want to blow apart our cover and the security by going in hot, delving like we normally do.”
“But we can only do that after the fact,” Galen said. “We can’t do it here and keep our footprints hidden.”
“I know. I know. But Stone could.” Hearing a phone dialing, he turned to look at Galen, who was calling somebody. Johan raised an eyebrow and asked, “Stone?”
Galen nodded. Johan grinned and went back to his work. With his phone, he sent an update to Levi, letting them know where they were, what they were doing, as well as their progress so far—which wasn’t a whole lot. They were hindered by the need to hide their real intent for being here. But Stone, going under the radar, could find a whole helluva lot more. Johan could hear Galen behind him, conversing with Stone over something that Galen had found. So far Johan hadn’t found much. When an internal chat window popped up, and the IT administrator, who turned out to be Pedro, asked if they needed anything, Johan wondered if something they had done had triggered that response. I don’t think so yet. Why?
The chat window came back up. Just checking in.
We’re doing fine.
He waited to see if the kid would come back with something else, but, when he didn’t, Johan figured that the kid had been watching them, tracking them in the system. Had the kid seen what they were looking at? Or that they were in incognito mode and had lots of ways of getting in and searching for stuff? Yet Johan didn’t know what kind of a hacker the kid might be, and that was always a bit of a disconcerting moment.
Just then a knock came at their door.
“Come in,” Johan called out.
Joy popped her head around the door. She smiled and said, “I was wondering if you guys wanted some coffee.”
He looked at her in surprise and then nodded slowly. “That would be great. Is there a coffeepot around?”
“It’s on the other end,” she said. “I’ll go grab two cups.” She stopped as she was about to exit, then turned and asked, “Black?”
“It’s the only way,” he said with a smile.
She grinned back and headed out.
Johan thought of Galen’s earlier words as she disappeared. She really was a sweetie. Not to mention gorgeous. It would certainly complicate his life to have a relationship over here. If it was short with no strings, that was one thing; but, if it got to be serious, well, that would stop him from going back to Africa, at least right away.
Maybe that was okay too. He shrugged it off as he delved a little further, wondering exactly what he was seeing.
When she returned a few minutes later, she carried three cups of coffee.
He immediately stood and took two from her hands, as she attempted to set them on his desk.
“I’m not very clumsy normally,” she said, “but these are big mugs.” She shrugged and added, “I figured, if I was making the trip, I might as well get a cup for myself too.”
They were also quite hot. Johan distributed one cup to Galen, who still talked quietly on the phone with Stone, while working on his laptop. Because Galen was talking, Johan didn’t want to disturb his partner, so he motioned to the doorway and asked Joy, “Can anybody hear us out there?”
“Possibly,” she said. “I don’t know what’s in the other rooms.” She looked over at Galen, then frowned and asked, “Who is he talking to about our system?”
Johan just gave a shrug, not committing to anything.
She eyed him carefully and then said, “I’m not supposed to know, am I?”
“It’s better if you don’t,” he said gently.
She sighed and nodded. “I wanted to tell you about a strange meeting I just got called up to.”
His eyebrows shot up, and he pulled her back into the room and closed the door. He sat her down in the chair beside him and asked in a low voice, “What happened?”
She told him about the visit with Barlow, who was the original creator of the company.
“Now that’s interesting,” Johan said slowly. “Obviously the upper echelon of the company is hearing about us being here.”
“Barlow said he talked to Edward,” she stated, by way of explanation. “And also that my section boss, James, had talked to Barlow about what I had found.”
“Well, that’s good, I would think,” he said quietly, cautiously.
“Yes,” she said with half a smile. “A hierarchy’s in place, and we go up from one level to the next to the next, like I did by going to James first.”
Johan chuckled. “I don’t think anything is quite so normal here anymore,” he said. “When it looks like a shakedown will be happening, people start jumping as high as they can to save themselves.”
“I get that,” she said. “Barlow did ask me about my previous jobs and the work I did, but I didn’t quite understand where he was coming from.”
“Keep an eye out,” he said, “because it’s hard to say.”
“Right.”
He stopped, looked at her, and asked, “Did you consider the fact that maybe he was offering you a better job?”
She gave him a wry look. “If that’s what he was doing,” she said, “I’m just wondering …” And she hesitated.
He looked at her seriously. “If you have any doubts, or if your instincts are telling you that it’s something othe
“He was friendly and all,” she said slowly, “but I did wonder if maybe he wasn’t dangling something in front of me.”
“And, if he was,” Johan said, “was it a reward or a bribe?”
“That’s what I was afraid of,” she said, her voice dropping to barely above a whisper. “Because I don’t want to deal with that.”
“The previous company you worked for, did you have any trouble with them?”
“No, none,” she said. “Once we realized I had a talent for it, I went in to help other companies relieve the pinch points in their processing, or whatever it was they were doing. And you know what? All three companies I worked with alleviated some major kinks in their systems. But, when I got here, I needed a job to pay the rent, and so this is what I ended up applying for because I couldn’t land a job that I preferred.”
“Yeah, process engineering is not exactly an easily marketable skill,” he said, “but then maybe a recruiter could have helped you with that.”
“I was pretty unconcerned about it at the time. I was just delighted to be away from the Boston winters and was enjoying traveling around and being part of Texas,” she said. “Eventually reality set in, and I needed a job because the rent had to be paid. This job offered me an opportunity to do that, so I accepted the position.”
“So you took it while you could look around for something better,” he said, noting her wry expression at his words.
She nodded. “Let’s hope James and Edward and Barlow didn’t figure that out too,” she said.
He laughed. “Doesn’t matter if they did or not. Corporations all over know their prize employees are prime targets for headhunters. You try to keep the good employees. You obviously have skills, and you are smart enough to do what you need to do,” he said. “So whatever they figure out doesn’t really matter.”
“That’s true enough,” she said, “but I still have that pesky rent to pay.”
He grinned. “Yep, I hear you.”
She stood and said, “I need to get back to work too.”
“Well, if anybody says anything about you being here,” he said, “just tell him—or her—that I needed information.”
“And you did,” she said with a smile as she left.
He watched her go, only to hear Galen beside him. “What was that all about?”
He turned to look at his buddy and quickly explained what she just told him.
“Interesting,” Galen said. “Definitely suspicious.”
“Yet innocent enough on the surface. Smart even because, if she has a skill that they could use, of course they would want to bring along someone they’ve already got on board and make better use of those skills.” He looked at Galen’s laptop. “Did Stone help?”
“Absolutely,” he said.
“Good. I might have to give him a call a little later too.”
“I saw how you were looking at her, by the way,” Galen said, a smile in his voice.
Johan shot his friend a disgusted look. “She’s pretty, so how else can I look at her?”
“No way. I saw that look,” Galen said smugly. “Which is a whole lot more than just about her being pretty.”
“Well, in that case,” Johan said, “that is your answer.”
Galen looked confused for a moment. “To what question?”
“As to whether I’m interested or not,” he said. “So now she is off-limits for you.”
Immediately Galen’s face fell.
But Johan just laughed out loud, delighted with himself.
Chapter 4
The rest of the week was a repeat of Monday. She came into work, buckled down to the stacks of paper she had to go through, got up with her clipboard to double-check various things that needed checking, and wandered past the men working in the next room, and, most of the time, found them there. When they weren’t there, she stopped and wondered where the hell they were. But nobody talked to her about it. She had no more strange meetings. No more strange anything really, just the sense of being part of a conspiracy against the company. And that felt wrong too. Her section boss never called her upstairs anymore, and the other two women just kept working at her side. Nobody made any comments about anything.
On Friday, Johan stopped at her doorway and asked to speak with her for a few minutes. Surprised, she stood and walked toward him. “Is there something I can help you with?”
He motioned her out into the hallway and said in a low voice, “Come out for lunch with us.”
She checked her watch and nodded. “I have lunch with me today,” she said, “but I guess I can have it for dinner tonight. My lunch break is in about five minutes.”
“We’ll wait in the parking lot for you,” he murmured before he turned and walked away.
She headed back in to find the two women staring at her. She just shrugged and didn’t say anything. She sat back down to her work, but she only had a couple more minutes before she left again. One of the ladies, Doris, got up to go, leaving just Phyllis here.
“You got something going with that hunky investigator?” Phyllis asked.
Surprised, Joy looked at her and blushed. “No,” she said. “I don’t.”
“Well, you should,” she said. “You definitely should. He’s perfect. Real dream material and he’s interested.”
“Maybe so,” Joy said, “but that doesn’t mean he’s available.”
“Who cares?” Phyllis said carelessly. “Have a night’s romp and enjoy it. If he’s got a wife back home, it’s not like you’ll be hurting her.”
Joy hated that attitude but kept the smile pinned to her face. It never did any good to make enemies in the office.
Phyllis stood and stretched, then said, “I’ve got another half hour before I go to lunch,” she said, “but I have to take a pee break.” With that, she rushed from the office.
Joy wasn’t sure if Phyllis really was going to the ladies’ room or not, but, regardless, it was Joy’s lunchtime now. So, logging off her computer, she grabbed her purse, slung it over her shoulder, and walked to the nearest exit. She didn’t pass anybody on the way, but, for days now, she had felt like she was being watched.
Outside, she walked to the large parking lot, unsure where the guys were. A truck pulled up, and, seeing Galen in the passenger seat, Joy hopped into the back, and they quickly drove away.
“Will anybody see me in here?” she asked, leaning forward.
“Won’t matter. We’ll change the vehicle after lunch,” Galen said.
“You realize that, since you guys showed up, it feels like I’m being watched all the time?”
Johan, who was driving, caught her gaze in the rearview mirror. “Seriously?”
“Yes. At first, I kept turning around, and the women finally snapped at me because I was bugging them. But it just feels wrong.”
“And it’s from behind you in your office?”
She nodded. “And, yeah, I did look but didn’t see any cameras or anything terribly obvious.”
“Interesting,” they murmured.
“Other than that, it’s been really quiet,” she said. “Almost too quiet.”
“In what way?”
“Normally I would have meetings with my section boss once a day, or every couple days at least, just touching base to see what’s happening with my work, that type of thing. James has avoided me entirely this week.”
“Well, today’s Friday, so it will be interesting to see what he’s like next week.”
“I don’t know,” she said. “Something just feels wrong.”
“Good point,” Johan said. “We’ll be doing some work in the office over the weekend.”
“They’re letting you in?”
“Well, we do have a pretty high security clearance,” he said, “but we’ll be doing a lot of it through remote access.”
“That makes more sense,��� she said. “Did you guys have a reason for bringing me outside the office for lunch?”
“We would wait until the end of the day,” he said, “but we figured we’d start now.”
Not liking the mysterious way they’d explained it, she said, “Well, I hope I get lunch at the same time.”
They burst out laughing. “We’ll go to a restaurant up ahead,” Johan said, pulling into a restaurant parking lot.
They hopped out. It was one of those casual café places and kind of noisy. She was surprised; obviously they wouldn’t be talking about anything to do with work in this place.
They quickly ordered lunch, paid for it, and headed for a table at a far corner, where it was quieter, carrying a little wooden card with a number on it. They placed it on the table so the server could find them when their order was ready.
She glanced around and said, “I don’t know this place.”
“Not a surprise if you haven’t had much time to get out yet,” Johan said.
“Since I started working, there hasn’t been any time at all.”
“What do you do when you go home?” Johan asked casually.
“Laundry and cooking,” she said promptly. “Grocery shopping too because I never seem to get enough at once, and I’m still trying to find stores that carry some of my favorite foods. By the time I get home, I’m usually too tired for much else.”
They nodded, and a long silence ensued.
Finally she couldn’t stand it any longer. “Did you guys find anything?” she whispered.
“Yep,” they both said.
“But it goes deep,” came the response from Galen.
She sagged in her chair. “I was so hoping that you wouldn’t find anything, that it was all just a clerical error.”
“But you also knew it wasn’t,” Johan said, “and that’s why you contacted Kai.”
“Yeah. I should call her. I think I’m due for a girls’ night out.” She reached up to rub her temples. “Will I have to look for a new job?”
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