Chapter 10 #2
“When did you hire Melinda?” she asked, silently chiding herself for being childish enough to call her by the wrong name, but it felt so right. There was something wrong about that woman. She couldn’t put her finger on what, but she could feel it in her bones.
“Who?” he asked.
“Your CFO.”
“Oh, Miranda.”
She twisted to eye him. Was he smiling? “Whatever.”
“Uhh, I don’t remember the date, but you should be able to find it in her employee file.”
She stared at the date again. “I did, but the date can’t be right.”
“Why?” His eyes never left his screen. What was so interesting on it or was he simply avoiding eye contact with her.
“It says she was hired in 2013.”
“So?”
Was he being serious? “So, why didn’t she come up on our short list. She was an employee during that time.”
“Uhh, I don’t know.”
She narrowed her eyes at the screen, searching for information as she tried to parse through his nonchalance. Alex didn’t do nonchalant. What was his deal with this woman?
She read through Miranda’s employee record, finding that she’d started in another department and transferred to finance after the start of the problems. “Ohh, I see.”
“Hmm?”
“She wasn’t in finance. She was in another department. You pulled finance people only.”
“Mmm, well, I guess she’s still off the list because she wouldn’t have had access to those accounts to make any of these transactions until she transferred into finance.”
Her jaw flexed as he continued to insist on her innocence. “Unless she figured out your password and used your account to do it.”
“She didn’t do it, Avs. Look at the people actually on the list.”
She narrowed her eyes at him, still glued to his laptop display. Why was he so protective of this woman? “Someone’s certain?”
“I’m pretty certain.”
The words stung her more than she wanted to admit. Why was he certain?
A twinge of something she couldn’t identify flashed through her along with a memory of a lazy afternoon spent laughing on the couch as they played games.
It contrasted sharply with images her mind conjured of Miranda and Alex laughing in the same way.
It tightened her hand into a fist as she frowned.
It reminded her of another time she’d been this critical of a woman in Alex’s life. Shortly after they’d met, they’d been at a party together. Alex had introduced her to his date, a snooty glasses-clad, self-proclaimed geek.
She’d taken one look at Ava and asked how in the world they were friends.
Ava had spent the rest of the night picking apart her every move until she’d convinced Alex not to see her anymore.
He’d never brought a date around her again, and she’d felt guilty about being so hypercritical. But she was right back to that moment all over again with Miranda.
The next words spilled out of her mouth before she could stop them. “Are you dating her?”
She noted the sudden silence as his typing stopped dead and his posture stiffened. She did not like that.
“What?” he asked, twisting to face her.
She gave him a pointed glance. “Are you dating her?”
“No, Ava. Of course not.”
The answer gave her some comfort, but she didn’t know why. “Well, it’s not that ridiculous, Ace. She’s…” She paused, trying to come up with a compliment for the woman she didn’t like. “Relatively attractive.”
“Relatively?” he shot back.
She turned back to her keyboard, not wanting him to read anything in her face. “If you like that type.”
“It’s ridiculous no matter what type she is.”
She minimized Miranda’s file, keeping it to peruse later and opened another on the list. “Why?”
“Because I…” He didn’t finish his statement.
What didn’t he want to say?
She slid her eyes sideways toward him. “Because why?”
He turned away from her. “Uh…because it just is.”
He was avoiding something. What? Had something happened between the two of them?
“Why are you getting so defensive about this?”
“I’m not getting defensive.” He shrugged as he focused on his work.
“Why won’t you talk about it then?” she pressed. She needed to know.
“Oh, am I supposed to talk about it? Like you do? You won’t tell me anything about Builder Boy.”
She scoffed at the annoying statement. She wasn’t going to let him get away with this by deflecting to a conversation about her. She suddenly needed to know if they’d had a romantic liaison. “Are you serious? So, there is something going on between you?”
“Ava, there isn’t. I just am pointing out that you won’t talk about the Master Planner, but you want me to tell you everything that happened between Miranda and me.”
The way he said their names together made her gasp. Her mind vetted through scenario after scenario about went on between them. “Something did happen. What was it? Did you ask her out? Did she say no? No, she said yes, but she ghosted you. Or did you ghost her?”
“Ava!” he shouted with a wave of his hands. “I didn’t date her. I didn’t ask her out.”
“Did she ask–”
“No,” he said before she could finish.
“Okay, fine, so nothing happened. They why are you so certain she’s innocent?”
“Because the evidence doesn’t support her guilt. That’s it.”
Was that the only reason? Was there something personal between them even if they hadn’t dated? “Really, that’s it?”
He finally faced her. “That’s it. Obviously, I’ve never dated anyone because I have the perfect wife.”
She didn’t care of the comment was only tongue-in-cheek. The tension lifted from her. “Darn right, you do.”
His phone rang as she returned to her work, studying the first person on their short list. She found no red flags in their employee record. No reprimands in their file, nothing odd.
She moved on to the next person, double-checking the employment dates. Still no red flags.
With a sigh, she moved on to the next person. This file was a treasure trove of warning signs. She leaned closer to the computer, reading the list of complaints. It seemed that Jordan Hayes had been accused of multiple counts of unauthorized accesses to accounts he had no business accessing.
An interesting accusation given that multiple accounts had money missing from them. Following the unauthorized access attempts, there had been multiple unexplained absences prior to Mr. Hayes’s termination.
She studied the information with a more scrutinizing eye, a pattern emerging. It wasn’t just the accusations, but the timing. Some of the access violations occurred just before an unauthorized transaction. It seemed to be a smoking gun.
Ava leaned back in her chair, settling into the ultra comfortable back. Was Jordan Haynes their culprit? They needed to follow up on it. But with this record, they may have just their man. She may be home in time for dinner on Monday after all.
For some reason, they didn’t make her smile. Instead, a pang of sadness pinched her heart. Was she ready for this little investigation to be over?