“Jake’s at a meeting off-site and I don’t want anyone else to hear this,” he said in explaining his action. “I’ve heard a couple of things I thought you ought to know.”
Stan pushed dark hair off his forehead and sat down when she did. “Understand…some of this is second- and third-hand info, so I can’t be sure of it. One thing I am sure of, though. We’ve had an increasing number of intrusion attempts over the last couple of weeks. Jake and I both suspect word has gotten around you’re now working here. In the financial app development world, you’re a superstar and that means plenty of black hats targeting your efforts. Getting your code would be a heck of a coup.”
Julie sucked in a harsh breath and dropped the pen she held. She leaned over to pick it up. “It would be personal disaster for me.”
“I know. And so far, we’ve managed to fight off all the attempts. And even if someone does get in, your little surprises should make it impossible to steal.”
“Boy, I hope so.”
He nodded but hesitated a moment before he went on. “There’s something else, and this is the third-hand hearsay part, but since it concerns you… Rumor has it Spieler is looking to hire a developer who can handle the sort of coding you do. They’re specifically looking for someone with Python, Objective-C and C++ experience, and some knowledge of database structures, Java, and HTML 5.”
“All the tools I use for building applications.”
“Yeah. They’re trying to keep it on the down-low for now, but I hear they’ve contacted some employment firms and headhunters.”
“Who is ‘they’?”
He raised and lowered one shoulder in a half shrug. “Can’t say for sure, but Kris Thomas oversees HR.”
“Of course. I wonder if Dan knows?”
“No idea. She’s keeping her cards pretty close. Even Jake only heard about it in a kind of sidewise way when someone from HR asked him about the skills needed to maintain your apps. When he asked why they needed that info, he got a weaselly response—something about ‘developing a profile.’ We both read between the lines. Jake tried some light digging with HR. He’s pretty good at charming people, ladies especially. No one said so directly, but there were hints the company was searching for someone with those skills to bring on staff.”
Julie straightened her back. She’d suspected this might be coming, so it shouldn’t be such a shock to hear it confirmed. Maybe confirmed.
“I hate this!” Stan’s vehemence left no doubt of his sincerity. “It’s ridiculous and unfair.”
“But there’s nothing you can do about it,” she said, “except what you’ve just done. Try to warn me about what’s coming.”
He nodded.
“Does Jake know you’re telling me?”
“He mentioned it to me when we were alone and then pointedly told me he’d be out of the office this morning if I needed to hold any private meetings.”
“I see.” She smiled at him. “It stinks. But it is what it is, you know. One bright spot. It’s really nice to know I have the support of a couple of excellent colleagues, whose abilities I respect, and whose human concern and friendship go above and beyond.”
“Thanks. I know it’s not much help, really.”
“But it is,” she assured him. “I have a meeting with the bigwigs this afternoon to turn over stage three. And it’s much better to go in knowing this, rather than having them spring it on me. Or just stonewall on it. At least I’ll be ready if they tell me flat out they’re not doing any more contracts.” She rolled the pen between her fingers. “I already suspected it anyway. But I have a feeling they’re not going to cut me off until they know they have someone else. They’ll get someone. There are plenty of app developers around.”
“Probably. But they’ll have a hard time finding one as smart and creative as you are.”
“Then that’s going to be their loss.”
“One more thing,” he said as she stood to go. “Please keep this just between us. Don’t tell anyone I said anything about it.”
“You’ve got it.” She thanked him again before she left. Instead of returning to her desk, she headed for the ladies’ room, which took her past all the executive offices. Only Kris Thomas was in and Julie held her head high and swept past without a greeting.
The ladies’ room had no lounge area, seats, or benches, so she went into one of the stalls. She told herself she just needed a moment to catch her breath. This wasn’t unexpected. And it might be a blessing in disguise. She could sell her app somewhere else. And maybe get a higher price. There were other customers out there.
The only downside would be not seeing Dan at work every day. But then if she didn’t reject him, they’d continue to date and probably go on to getting engaged again before long. But if she couldn’t bring herself to trust him, they wouldn’t see each other again once the current app was done.
She’d be leaving Maureen behind, too, and she hated to do that, but the woman was good, and would no doubt help a newcomer get up to speed.
CHAPTER 16
Because she had the time and needed the moral support, she went back to her apartment and changed into the power suit and killer heels. The latter meant a cab ride back to the Spieler office.
Her outfit raised some eyebrows on her return, particularly Maureen’s. “I’ll explain later,” she promised as the two of them headed for Charles Quigley’s office. A small group already gathered there. She glanced around the room. Quigley was stone-faced; Kris looked smug; Dan’s expression was strained and concerned; Jake simply looked unhappy.
She and Maureen went through the demo for the app and it performed perfectly, doing exactly what she’d promised and working fast and efficiently. Julie had put the code on a flash drive, which she handed to Quigley along with an invoice for the stage completion.
“I gave Dan a list of the beta testers I generally use for the next stage. Other than some work on documentation, I won’t have much to do until I get the feedback from them, so I plan to start work on the next project next week. You have the basic preliminary information about that app. Since we haven’t discussed a contract for it, I won’t be working on it here or using any company resources, so I will feel free to offer it to others.”
An awkward pause ensued before Quigley said, “We haven’t made any decisions about the next project. We’ll let you know.”
“Of course.” She kept her words equally cool. “And if you decide you want it, and I haven’t accepted an offer from anyone else, we’ll discuss terms.”
She stood. “If that’s all, I need to set up the environment for the beta testers, so we can start sending it out to them tomorrow.”
Maureen followed her out of the office, leaving a silent group behind.
Neither of them said anything until they got back to their desks. Maureen stopped and turned to her. “There were all kinds of undercurrents going on in that meeting. I can’t even figure what all of them are. But I get the feeling they’re not going to buy your next app. Or is there something else happening?”
“I think there are other things but I’m not sure about those. A contract for the next app looks dubious at best. And I’m not sure how I feel about that. Also…” She debated how much to tell Maureen. She lowered her voice to just above a whisper so no one else could hear. “There’s always the possibility that I could be replaced here with someone who would be on their payroll. You know they don’t like me very much. I suspect that was the main undercurrent in the room and they’re not all in agreement about the answer.”
Maureen shook her head slowly. “Yes, I see.” Her expression turned thoughtful with an edge of unhappiness. “You know how I feel about the situation. I’d rather work with you than anyone else I can think of.”
“I know. And I’m keeping it in mind, but my options may be limited.”
Maureen frowned but nodded. “Understood.”
Julie started to set up beta testing and concentrated on that until Dan came by at four. “Dinner t
onight?” he asked. His expression said there was more than just a pleasant meal on the menu.
“Sure,” she said.
“I’ll be finished here in half an hour. Can you wait?”
“I have things to do, too. But I’m wearing the power shoes. No long walks.”
A brief smile lit his face and disappeared into the frown. “I’ll get a cab.”
The restaurant he chose was a particularly nice one with dark wood paneling, rich velvet seat covers, damask table cloths and napkins, and a small vase of live flowers on each table. The food was just as good as the atmosphere, though Julie’s stomach was doing worried flip-flops.
Once they’d ordered, Dan sighed lightly. His tone on the next words warned her he didn’t have good news. “After yesterday, I think some things are clear and we need to talk about them.”
Julie sat up straighter, sensing she wouldn’t like what was to come. “I’m pretty suspicious already. They’re not going to sign another contract with me, are they?”
He looked at her, his expression strained. “I don’t think so. I’ve told them it’s stupid and risking the company’s future to throw away the biggest asset we acquired in buying C&W. But I’m finding I don’t have much influence there anymore.”
“Because of our involvement?”
“Partly. Maybe mostly. But it doesn’t matter. I’ve been realizing a few things recently myself. For more reasons than one, this company is not my future. I’m not sure what it means yet and I hope you won’t tell anyone else I said that.”
“It’s just between us.”
“Good. Something else you should know. I got an idea from the last hacking attempt a few weeks ago, and I’m going back through the logs from three years ago to see if there are any clues there to what really happened. I’ve talked about it with Jake and he agrees he was so new to the company at the time he probably didn’t even know how to investigate the leak properly. He and I both think we can do a better job now. The problem is we don’t know the exact time frame and retrieving the old logs and searching through them is time-consuming. Jake helped me set up the search parameters and I’ve been using almost all of my off-hours to run those searches.”
“Holy smoke. I’ve run log searches before. That’s a huge job. Especially if you can’t narrow down your time frame very tightly.”
“Tell me about it. So far, we’re back about a week from when Jake thinks the leak happened and we still don’t have anything. But Jake swears it could have happened quite a while before it was discovered, since no one knew about it until someone else released an app with the same code. But he thinks we’re on the right track. There were intrusion alarms in place then and none of them went off, but the system we had then was less sophisticated. It’s possible someone inside was hacked, most likely in a way similar to what happened a few weeks ago.”
“That all sounds reasonable. But even so, you’re looking for a rather large needle in a humongous haystack. No wonder you’ve been looking so tired lately.”
“Don’t I know it. There’ve been a few late nights and early mornings.” He waited, watching her, as the servers brought their food. “I don’t know if this is going to work or how long it will take. Jake can verify we’re trying, but I know that doesn’t mean much and there’s no reason you should actually believe it.”
“There are all sorts of reasons I should actually believe you’re trying. I do.”
A smile curved his lips and lit his eyes, but they didn’t drive all the worry and unease from his face. He didn’t say anything more until he’d had a few bites of his smothered salmon. “There’s more, but it changes gears a bit.”
He stopped to take a drink of water. “On a personal level. The month we gave ourselves is more than half over and, frankly, I’m terrified of losing you. So, part of the impetus behind my search is my version of slaying a dragon to show you my devotion. Unfortunately, or maybe fortunately, New York is a bit short of dragons right now, but I’m trying to fulfill that quest you asked me to undertake when we first talked after Spieler bought C&W.”
“Quest? You mean finding out who was behind the leaks?”
“Exactly. You asked me to help you figure out how it happened and who was behind it. I’ve been trying to do that ever since. But at this point, I don’t have any results for you and time is running out, so I have to ask you to trust that I’m going to keep at it until I get an answer. No matter what you tell me at the end of our month’s trial, I plan to continue digging until I either get an answer or there’s nowhere left to dig.”
“I haven’t exactly been doing a lot of work on that myself.”
“You couldn’t. You had a tight deadline on the app. And you don’t have the same kind of access to people and the internal systems I do. If you’d started asking to look through old logs, there would be all sorts of questions and suspicions raised.”
“And no one’s questioning you about it?”
“Not really. Jake understands my reasons. If Charles and Kris even know, they haven’t said anything. I doubt they’d realize what I was doing or why.”
“I see.” She wiped her mouth on a napkin and set it down. “I’m not—"
“Wait. Please.” He held up his fork when she started to answer. “I don’t want an answer yet. Not until this weekend. I want you to take time to think about this. Because if I don’t come up with anything before then, you’re going to have to trust me, believe I’m trying to do what you asked. Trust I’m not the man who betrayed you before and won’t do it again. You have to decide if you can do that. I have no other way to prove I’ve changed and grown up and will do everything I reasonably can to support you. And your time at Spieler appears to be running out, so I won’t even see you in the office after the next couple of weeks. I’m getting kind of desperate.”
His lips quirked again. “Julie, I want to marry you. The last few weeks I’ve done everything I can think of to show you how good it is between us. How compatible we are. I want a life with you. A family with you. But we can’t do it if your distrust is always going to be between us.”
She shut her eyes for a moment as a stab of pain worked its way into her chest. “Dan, I think—”
“No.” He held up a hand. “I don’t want you to think. I want you to know. And if you need more time to be sure, then we can discuss that. I can’t go on his way indefinitely, but I don’t want to cut off everything with an artificial deadline. Still, I’d prefer to get a definite answer. Soon. It’s not easy…being up in the air like this.”
She couldn’t think of anything to say to that except, “Okay.”
CHAPTER 17
She slept fitfully again that night. Words rolled around in her head. Trust and distrust, love, loss, and longing, grown up and child. He talked about how he’d grown up in the three years between their calling off their engagement and meeting again. But she had grown up, too. She’d been forced to learn several hard lessons about self-reliance and confidence in herself.
She’d learned other things as well, but they weren’t as clear.
No answers came to her before she finally drifted off.
Maureen noticed her distraught state almost as soon as she arrived the next morning, but mostly mistook the reason.
“You look awful, kid,” she said. “You worried about these guys kicking you to the curb? You shouldn’t, you know. You went through this once before and came out smelling like a rose. You can do it again.”
Julie shook her head. “No. Not that. You’re right. I don’t like it, but I’ll survive it. Something more personal.”
“Oh. Dan Foster. I haven’t got much for you there.”
“I know. Maureen… What does it mean to be a grown-up?”
Maureen gave her a puzzled look but then considered the question. “Wow, that’s not an easy one. Obviously, we’re not talking about drinking age here.”
“No.”
“I guess being a grown-up means you make your own decisions, and you’re responsible
for them, and for yourself, for who you are, what you are, what you do, what you say, and how you treat others. When you screw up, you own it and try to set it right. You don’t expect others to take care of you, unless you really need help. You don’t expect others to be responsible for your values or comfort or happiness.” She stopped abruptly. “That’s all I got. It’s one of those I-know-it-when-I-see-it things, though.”
“Okay.”
“What brought this on?”
“A decision I need to make. As a grown up.”
“Oh.” Maureen’s puzzlement gave way to understanding. “I can’t tell you what to do there. But one of the things grown-ups understand is that no one is perfect. Not even ourselves. Usually especially not ourselves. And since we’re not, we can’t expect others to be either.”
Maureen offered a rueful smile. “Probably not helpful. Dear Abby, I’m not.”
“No, that is helpful,” Julie said. Something was starting to take shape in her brain. An understanding that maybe she’d expected more of him those three years ago than she had any right to. He’d made mistakes, of course. But, so had she. He’d just made the one she couldn’t handle at the time. Looking back now, from the other side of the growing up she’d done in the last three years, she could recognize her demand for his complete and unquestioning loyalty was unreasonable. Especially in light of the situation at the time. He’d had to make a quick decision, based on the evidence he had. He was just a man and he’d made the wrong one, even though it would look to everyone like the reasonable and obvious way to go. But he’d regretted it later, after it was too late. She’d spent three years refusing to forgive him for that.
She didn’t want to poke those thoughts too hard just yet, so instead she sat at her desk and began the work of putting out the emails to the beta testers.
A loud, screeching siren from somewhere inside the office jerked her out of concentration on the work just a few minutes later.
Maureen bounced to her feet. “Fire alarm?”
No Time for Surprises (The No Brides Club Book 6) Page 14
