She felt pretty good. She hadn’t even thought about Tamara.
Much. She would just go on with her work and wait for Tamara to decide what next. If she didn’t hear from her by tonight, she would make contact herself.
102
She was down to nearly three hundred files left to go when her desk phone rang. Without lifting her gaze from the numbers she was copying, she snatched it up and said, “Barrett.”
“One would think you hadn’t eaten last night.”
“Sorry, I’m trying to meet a deadline.” Tell me what you want, Kip wanted to say. Give me a clue, anything, so my heart can beat steadily again.
“I have some information for you. And before you ask, no, it’s nothing you can trust without question since I did it myself.”
“Could you tell me more about that, please?” Kip tried to use an ordinary tone in case any of her near neighbors could hear her.“Our keycard security was hacked, and I picked up a few traces of the programmer’s style. Just little things, the order of the steps, the coding of the workaround that kept the security protocols from issuing reports, but whoever did it probably learned their trade in North America.”
“You can tell that?”
Tamara’s answer was immediate and confident. “Yes, within a reasonable doubt. An Eastern bloc hacker does things one way, those out of southern Europe another, the Indonesian hackers have their own stamp too. It’s like accents.”
“That doesn’t narrow down our list much, does it?”
“Actually it does. There’s only three North American-based people who can do what’s being done at the banks, and I’ll assume this is all the work of the same person, given the security I had in place. Two are freelancers, and both have happily worked for various employers with ties to organized crimes.”
“The third?”
There was a pause, then, “That would be me.”
“Oh.” It’s not her, Kip thought. It just can’t be. “Was there anything else?”
“Yes. I have the lists of employees who weren’t supposed to be in the accounting file room but were. That list is distressingly long—nearly fifty.”
“Ouch.”
103
Tamara made a noise of displeasure. “You said it. Fifty people and not one staffer found it odd. I’m not happy.”
If this was the truth, and not all made up, it moved Kip substantially along her ETO. An outside-hire hacker and inside collaborator as a theory of the crime worked well. It would leave Tamara, in particular, in the clear. Except—oh why did there have to be an except? Except Tamara could still be responsible for the whole thing.
Just as she asked again, “Anything else?” a shadow fell across her desk.
Emilio leaned in, started to speak, then motioned he’d wait until she ended her call.
Kip knew she was blushing. He couldn’t know who was on the phone, but she felt as if he’d caught her red-handed. She put the mouthpiece against her shoulder. “Yes, boss?”
“I just wanted to say beautiful work on that job this morning.
Client’s very happy.”
“Thanks. It was pretty easy.”
He left her to her phone call and when she put the receiver back up to her ear, Tamara said, “That’s everything I have.”
“Thank you. I need to think.” It was absolutely true. The next steps would take a careful tiptoe act. That is, if she wanted to treat this new information as reliable.
“I understand. Tomorrow?”
“Yes, I’ll be in touch.”
She stared at her phone, brain ticking. She was stuck at the same crossroads. One road Tamara was innocent, the other guilty.
The “innocent” road was much easier. Much more plausible.
Decisions and swift action could happen on that road.
The other road was dark, difficult. It ended in betrayal and pain. She didn’t want to go down that road, not in the least.
But she still could not forget, no matter how much her heart wanted her to, that the dark road existed.
104
“You look like hell, Tam. Let me run out and get you a big plate of something hot.” Mercedes stacked several files as she picked them up from Tam’s desk. “Don’t think I didn’t notice you skipped lunch yesterday. And I’ll bet you’re going to work this weekend.”
Tamara smiled her gratitude. Mercedes’ stated job duties did not include Mother Hen, but she liked to play the role. And she was right. Other than meals with Kip and Diane, she hadn’t been eating properly. “Order something in for both of us and we’ll keep working on this report.”
Mercedes grinned with approval, having almost forgiven her for not spilling details about the rapidly fading bruise. “I’ll be right back. While I’m gone, you think of something relaxing to do this weekend. You need a break. It’s only Thursday. Not too late to get theater tickets or something else fun.” She was still making suggestions as she closed the office door behind her.
A moment later the intercom beeped. “Hank Jefferson is on two. Do you feel like cole slaw?”
“I’ll take it and I’d love cole slaw.”
Mercedes chuckled and hung up.
“What do you hear, Hank?”
“I hear things that are not too good.” Hank’s usually easy-going tone was noticeably absent. “I’m also sending you an expense claim you’re not going to believe. It took a lot of drinks and lunch at Morimoto to get Avery Jessup to tell me why Big Blue canceled.”
“I’ll sign it,” Tamara said. “What did you find out?”
“Well, I’ll just be blunt because this is all the biggest load of bull I’ve ever heard. You are stealing from the company to pay for a jet-set lifestyle including drugs, ladies like that model Cantu, plus gambling. You’re also an overbearing tyrant and most of your senior staff is on the verge of quitting.”
Tamara found she couldn’t swallow. She managed a couple of quick breaths, then said hoarsely, “Let’s take that from the top.”
“I’m not kidding. Somewhere someone started what is getting to be a viable rumor—it’ll be in the Journal’s ‘ On the Street’
105
column any day now. It’s bull. I told the client so, but he insisted he got it from a very, very reliable source. An inside source.”
Tamara closed her eyes. This rumor had to have something to do with the embezzling. The same person or persons. It was time to trust someone. She and Hank went back to the Bureau. They’d worked long hours together and she’d never been uncertain of his loyalty or ethics. If she couldn’t trust Hank, of all people, she was in deeper trouble than she knew.
“You there, Tam?”
“There’s more to this than I’ve told you,” Tamara began.
“Someone is stealing from us.” She succinctly filled in what Kip had unearthed.
“Wow,” Hank said when Tamara was done. “You think the theft and these rumors are related?”
“Yes—I think I am, or SFI in general is, the target of both.
Think about it. Why would someone who could do this think so small? And they’ve carefully avoided the trust accounts, which could borrow trouble with unexpected parties. It’s us—me—
they’re out to destroy.”
“If their goal is to destroy your credibility and take SFI out of the picture, this would do it. Is there anything I can do to help?”
“Start reminding your press contacts that there are some people who would stop at nothing to assassinate my character.