Chapter 15 #2
“It's not a big deal,” I manage to say, though my voice sounds shaky.
“It is.”
I wish he didn’t have this effect on me.
It would make doing my job so much easier.
The work itself is easy. It’s the emotional side that’s becoming a problem.
The feelings I have all tied up around this man.
The way I’ve started looking forward to seeing him.
The way my stomach flips when I realize that he’s in his office each morning.
“Helping out?” I shrug. “I love Arthur and Irene. They're like ... they're like family to me.”
Family.
For a second I can’t speak, because it’s true. They are. Not by blood, or obligation, just by showing up week after week, until they became part of my life.
I blink hard and look away. When I turn back, Matteo is watching me with an intensity that makes my heart ache. He nods, like something has just clicked into place.
I clear my throat, desperate to get us back onto safer ground. “You said we had another discrepancy.”
He pulls up the system logs. “Here. This is where it starts.” He sounds normal, in control.
Completely oblivious to the meltdown I’m having.
The irrational thoughts hovering in my head.
It’s just me and him, alone in the server room, the only ones in the tech lab. The thought alone gives me goosebumps.
“This is what I was talking about.” He points at the screen. “The backup completed successfully, but the numbers don't match.”
I lean closer. “I saw the screenshots. Show me last week’s report.” My attention finally shifts away from Matteo and onto the monitor.
He pulls it up and I scan both reports side by side. A few seconds pass. Then a few more. Suddenly I see it. “That’s odd.”
“What?”
I point at the figures. “The discrepancy.”
His brow furrows. “What about it?”
“The numbers are different, but the gap is almost identical.”
“Meaning?”
I scroll between the reports. “The backup thinks it copied data that the live system can't account for.”
“Can software do that?”
“Sometimes.”
“But?”
I hesitate. Because this is the part I don't like. “Software glitches are usually messy.” I tap the screen. “This isn't messy.”
“What is it?”
I zoom in on several entries. “It’s consistent.”
His jaw tightens. “You think it's connected to the other incidents?”
I nod slowly. “I think the odds of all these anomalies being unrelated are getting smaller.”
“How small?”
I blow out a breath. “Small enough that I'm starting to worry.”
Matteo folds his arms. “The backdoor?”
I glance at him. “I still can't prove it exists.”
“But?”
“But this is the second time I've seen unrelated anomalies leading back to the same area of the system.”
His expression darkens. “You think it's related.”
“I think it's possible.”
“What are you saying?”
I point to the screen. “I'm saying that if there is a backdoor, it wasn't created by accident.”
He scratches his jaw, and I note the dusting of stubble across it. Matteo is usually clean shaven. Messy bed-head hair, but smooth skin and clean shaven. Just the way I like him. His gaze snaps to mine.
“I'm saying whoever built it understood this environment extremely well.”
His jaw tightens.
“Someone from inside.”
“Maybe. Or someone who used to have access. I don't know yet.” I glance back at the screen. “But we’re not dealing with a glitch, Matteo.”
“Doesn’t seem like it,” he agrees. “How bad is it?”
I stand beside him, facing the monitor, but I can’t focus on the screen.
All I sense is him; his nearness, his scent, the heat coming off his body, despite the cold chill of the server room.
Every nerve ending feels oversensitive. The dull hum of the servers fades into the background until all I’m aware of is Matteo standing too close.
“If I’m right, it could give someone access to your internal systems as well as your corporate data. They could manipulate financial systems, sabotage deals, spy on executives, wreak absolute havoc. There’s no telling what they could do.”
He looks like a man carrying the weight of the world on his big, broad shoulders. My gaze slips to the tattoos on his arms again. Does this man always have to have his sleeves rolled up?
“Who the fuck would do this?” he asks, turning around, his eyes meeting mine.
“Someone who doesn’t want to be found. Someone who wants to piss you off. Not you, personally,” I add quickly.
“But who would do this?” he murmurs, almost to himself. He’s so engrossed in the problem, whereas I’m so engrossed in him.
“That's something only you can answer,” I say, distracted.
“It’s someone smart, techy, savvy.”
He looks at me, and my insides turn to ice. I wait for him to elaborate, but when he doesn’t, when he leaves those words hanging, dread fills my stomach.
Does he suspect me?
I tell myself that my paranoia is blinding me. He doesn’t know. He can’t know. Paul doesn’t know otherwise I wouldn’t be here.
“It could be someone in your current team, or someone who worked here previously and left. It could be contractors. They tend to come and go.”
“Someone like you?” he asks, cool and casual.
He does suspect me. He knows something. He can see through me. “You really think I did this?” I cry. “And then somehow your father hired me? How does that make any—”
“You? No!” He cries, and I breathe again. I always expect the worst. That’s just me. I realize now that he’s stressed and he’s lashing out at whoever is closest to him, which right now happens to be me. “I don’t know what to think. I don't know who to trust.”
I feel as if a boulder has been lifted off my chest. “You can trust me because your father hired me.” I flash a wide and hopefully annoying smile at him.
“Don't keep reminding me.”
“Well, he did hire me. Are you going to hate on me for that?”
“Hate is too strong a word.”
“You're annoyed that I thought you were a maintenance man.”
“Let’s focus on the task at hand, shall we?”
This brings me to reality faster than a bucket of cold water thrown over my head. “I think we’re dealing with deliberate sabotage. I’m about halfway through the audit, so maybe I’ll find more things.”
“Don't mention this to anyone. Just keep this between us,” he cautions.
“Don’t you want to tell Alex, or Sonny, or Joel?”
“If it's an inside job, as you say, it could be anybody. Although now that I’m thinking about it, we let go of a couple of people over a year ago. That sticks out because people don’t leave here much. We also had an intern over the summer, and a contractor. I’ll look into them.”
“People with college degrees are meant to be smart, so maybe look into the intern first, though it seems like a long shot.”
“Meant to be smart?” he asks, brow furrowing.
“I've met people with computer science degrees who couldn't think their way out of a paper bag.”
A smile tugs at Matteo's mouth.
“And where did you learn?”
I shrug.
“From people who were already doing it.”
“What people?”
I think of Vlad.
“Friends. Mentors. The internet. You'd be surprised what you can learn when nobody's willing to teach you the conventional way.”
“Tell me.”
I shrug. “One of my mentors used to say curiosity was worth more than a degree.” I fear I’ve said too much when, luckily, his cell phone starts to ring.
“We don’t tell a soul,” he says, staring at it but not answering. “You haven’t mentioned this to anyone already, have you?”
“I haven't said a word. I’ve only told you now.”
“This stays between us.”
“Between us.”
He lets out another heavy breath, like this was the last thing he needed. I think I understand. Dealing with a faceless, nameless villain is easier in some ways than knowing that the threat came from inside.
That someone you trust is behind this.
“I’ll see you on Monday,” I say, as he answers his phone call.