Ken held up a hand, stemming Demetrius’s fury. ‘Burton, how do you know that? And when did you know that? And why didn’t you tell us immediately?’
Burton blew a frustrated breath straight up his forehead. ‘I didn’t say anything immediately because I still don’t know where Reuben is. I found the car about thirty minutes before coming to this meeting, but I can’t see that he actually booked any flights, and he’s not checked in at the hotel. Not unless he’s done so under another name.’
‘You haven’t yet covered how,’ Ken said coldly. ‘Define how you found the car.’
Burton blew out another breath, this one through puckered lips. Calming himself. ‘Reuben had trackers put on any mode of transportation owned by anyone who worked at this company.’
Demetrius’s dark skin grew impossibly darker. ‘Anyone? As in everyone? As in me? And Ken and Joel?’
Burton chanced a nervous glance around the table. ‘Yes, sir.’
Ken’s fury nearly geysered to the surface. He was barely holding on to his self-control. I monitor the leadership of this company. Only me. Reuben could track the employees all he wanted, but the leadership team . . . That had never been included in his job description. ‘He dared to do that? To invade our privacy? Who actually put these trackers on? Was it you?’
Burton shook his head hard. ‘No, sir. Not on your vehicles. The leadership team’s vehicles are maintained by Reuben. I take care of everyone else. But please understand that he put a tracker on his own cars too. He did it so that he would be able to find us in the event of just such a disappearance. He is the head of security, sir. He takes your safety very seriously. And he wasn’t spying on you. He would have only used the tracking software if one of you went missing. I didn’t have the passwords to see the leadership team’s tracker history. I had to find them. That’s why it took me so long to locate his car.’
Ken swallowed his rage, mollified only slightly by Burton’s explanation. It did make sense for someone to be able to find them should they be attacked or arrested. But that someone is me. He had specifically told Reuben that the cars for the leadership team were off limits. His head of security had defied him behind his back.
If they found Reuben alive, Ken was going to fire his ass. After he beat the ever-living shit out of him. ‘How did you find the passwords?’ he asked Burton.
‘Reuben has a safe where he keeps a notebook with passwords and other confidential data. I knew that he keeps the safe combination written on a sheet of paper taped to the underside of his nightstand drawer. He told me about the combination in the event he went missing. The combinations and passwords were all encrypted, of course.’
‘Of course,’ Demetrius said, looking very much like a bull ready to charge. ‘Since you were obviously able to de-encrypt them, you’ve had access to our whereabouts too.’
To Burton’s credit, he didn’t flinch. ‘Today was the first time that I accessed the tracking software.’
Demetrius shook his head. ‘So you say. Even if we believe you, what was to stop you or anyone else from selling the passwords to the highest bidder?’
Which, Ken thought reluctantly, Reuben might have done. He was at the airport, after all. At least his car was. If they believed Burton. But so far the younger man had given them no reason to disbelieve him.
Ken took out his phone and, making sure that no one could see his screen, sent a text to Alice. Go to the hotel at the airport. See if Reuben’s car is there. ASAP. Keep this to yourself. A few seconds later, he got Alice’s reply. Give me a moment to shut down my workstation. It would take her forty-five minutes to get to the airport, but at least Ken would know then whether Burton spoke truth. And if Reuben’s car was at the airport hotel? Then they’d have to figure out why.
Meanwhile, he’d been monitoring the brewing confrontation between Demetrius and Burton, who was now shaking his head vehemently.
‘No, sir, I have not had access,’ he insisted, ‘and even if I did look at the passwords, it wouldn’t matter. The software has an auto-change feature that resets them. There is no set schedule. It happens every time the program is accessed or at some random frequency if the software goes unchecked. If I had the passwords and sold them, they’d only be good for a short time and then they’d reset. An email goes to Reuben when that happens.’
‘So he knows we’re looking for him,’ Demetrius murmured.
‘If he’s alive,’ Joel added quietly. ‘He wouldn’t have just run. Not Reuben. He’s got as much at stake in this company as any of the rest of us.’
That would have been true of the man Ken thought he’d known, but Reuben’s defying him, even allegedly for their own safety, was too startling to ignore.
Burton cleared his throat. ‘Assuming he is still alive and can access his email, yes, he will know we are searching for him. But that was the point – that if any of you went mysteriously missing, we would know where to locate you so we could bring you home. One way or the other.’
Ken let out a breath. ‘All right,’ he said to Burton. ‘I want you and Sean to find out where the hell he went. If he left his car at the hotel airport and he’s not checked in, then he went somewhere. I know you’ve checked flights and rental car companies at the airport under his own name, but he could be using an alias, so make sure you check any of the names he’s used in the past. Also check the used car dealers in the area, hospitals and the morgue. How are your forensic investigative skills?’
‘Like riding a bike,’ Burton said grimly. He’d been a cop once. A very long time ago, he’d reported to Reuben when both were with the Knoxville PD. ‘It’ll come back to me. I’ll collect Reuben’s car from the airport and we’ll go over it with a fine-toothed comb.’
Ken shook his head. ‘I’ll send a flatbed truck for it. You can go over it when it arrives.’
Burton’s eyes narrowed. ‘You don’t trust me?’
‘No. But don’t take it personally. I don’t trust anyone.’ He glanced at Demetrius. ‘Do you have anything more?’ he asked.
Demetrius shook his head. ‘No. Except I want that damn tracker off my damn car right this damn second.’
‘That goes double for me,’ Joel added.
‘Unanimous,’ Ken said. ‘Sean, can you test our vehicles and make sure they are tracker-free? Good,’ he said when Sean nodded. ‘Burton, tell the men you have watching Anders’s house to bring him in.’
Burton grimaced. ‘They aren’t very experienced. They don’t have finesse. I can’t guarantee they’ll bring him in without rousing suspicion from the neighbors.’
Demetrius rolled his eyes. ‘What the hell kind of ship is Reuben running anyway?’
‘We’re a bodyguard short with Decker working in Accounting while he’s on medical leave,’ Burton said tightly. ‘And we lost two team members last month. Reuben hasn’t found anyone to replace them yet.’
The man and woman who’d been lost had been transporting a shipment from Miami when one of the cargo had charged them with a knife. Both of Reuben’s people had been stabbed, the bus they’d been driving smashing into a median strip. Luckily they’d been almost home, which allowed Reuben to reach the wreckage before it had been reported to 911, narrowly averting a major crisis.
Their cargo had been severely dealt with. They’d have punished the bodyguard who had been tasked with searching for weapons in the first place, but he was already dead.
‘Fine,’ Ken said. ‘You go. Take Decker with you. He can’t run as fast as he once did, but he can subdue any of the chicken-shit in that family. I want Anders, his wife and daughter delivered to me unharmed. I want to know how his property got free of him and why he didn’t think it important enough to inform me.’
‘And if he doesn’t tell you?’ Demetrius asked, a predatory gleam in his dark eyes.