Numbers Never Lie (Crimson Romance)

by Shelley K. Wall

  “Okay.” She smiled over her cup and looked out the window. “So you’re not a mechanic. What do you do? And my name’s Sophie by the way.”

  “Nothing all that exciting. I’m a consultant.” Calling himself a consultant proved an easy tactic to use in most cases. People consult in almost everything. Use that one and a lot of people just go “ahhh” and leave it alone. Besides, if you said anything more specific, you risked a lot of questions that just got annoying.

  “Consulting in what?”

  He barely contained a sigh. Well, so much for that approach. Here come the questions. Come on rain, give me a break and stop.

  “Oh, technology. I’m an IT consultant.” No more questions. Please.

  “Really? I’m in technology, too. I work down the street at Benton & Stanley.”

  He already knew that. “No kidding? What do you do there?” The best tactic would be to get her talking about herself so that she didn’t ply him with any more questions.

  “I manage the financial applications staff, but I’m also pretty good on the network side, so very often I get pulled into other areas. Technology is one of those things that if you’re good at it, you want to do a little bit of everything.”

  “Yes, that’s certainly true. How long have you been there?” He knew the answer to that, too, but asked anyway.

  “Six years.”

  Interesting. Why would she lie about that?

  “That is if you count the three years I consulted for them before they hired me.” She gave him a smile, then looked out the window again at the tendrils of water rushing down the glass.

  Oh, okay, I’ll check on that part.

  “How do you like it there? Do they treat you pretty good?”

  “Sure, sure. Pretty much like any big company. Great benefits and lots of incentive programs to encourage productivity.”

  “That must be great. Are you working on any good projects right now?”

  He wondered if she’d mention anything about it, the reason he tracked her, even in a roundabout way.

  “Not really. Financial applications are pretty boring. Not a lot of excitement there.” She waved a hand as if to dismiss the topic. “But enough about me. It looks like the rain is letting up a little and I need to get going. So, I enjoyed meeting you.” She held out a hand. It occurred to him that he hadn’t given her his name at about the same time that she waited for it.

  “Trevor.” That was the name they wanted him to use on this one. Fortunately, it was pretty close to his real name and easy to work with. “Trevor Adams. And thank you for saving me from the lightning.” He winked and watched her pick up the mammoth red umbrella and head out the door before inserting the headphones into his ears and softly saying, “She’s on the run now, guys. I’d better stay here so she doesn’t think I’m stalking her. I guess someone else will need to pick up my spot on this one.”

  “You’re a jackass.” Good old Nate. Leave it to him to state the obvious.

  Trev picked up a paper from the stack on the table and started to glance through it. “Hey!” He jolted at the sound of the familiar voice. Damn, he wished she’d quit doing that. More importantly, why didn’t he ever see her coming?

  “Yeah?” He lowered the paper. A smile came to his lips on noticing the lip gloss applied to her mouth and the newly smoothed curls.

  “Send me your information and if we ever need anyone for any projects down the road, I’ll give you a call.” She handed him a business card, adding, “Sophie Henderson, by the way.” She shot one last comment over her shoulder before pushing out the door. “Drive safely!”

  Trev silently applauded himself. He knew her name, her birthday. Shit, he even had her dress size, but she had no way of knowing that. Under normal circumstances, he would ask her name and maybe even get a number, he didn’t think to do so. An error on his part, but it served its purpose. Maybe she offered the card because she wanted him to know who she was. If he evaluated it logically, there might be an opportunity to keep going with this. Yeah, the more he thought about it the more he imagined it might be fun. Nate sounded tired and muttered into his ear, “Let’s debrief on this tomorrow morning over at the office … say around nine? We’re obviously going to have to make some changes.”

  “No problem. See you then.”

  “Trev?” It’s a good thing Trev can be a nickname for my real name as well as my cover or things would be pretty confusing, he thought.

  “What?”

  “Don’t fuck this up. We’ve been working on this too long.”

  “Kiss my ass.” If the guy weren’t his best friend in the world, he’d probably hate him right now. He just didn’t know when to shut up.

  • • •

  Sophie hurried away from the coffee shop, her big umbrella offering protection from the rain. A slight chill coursed through her. Oh, how stupid! She’d left her jacket on the back of the chair! Oh well, there was no way she’d go back in there again — she already felt foolish for giving him her business card. Going back a third time would simply further the awkwardness. She didn’t really like that jacket, anyway. Sure, it had sentimental value but pride overshadowed sentiment at the moment. The well-intentioned gift was one she certainly wouldn’t have bought herself. It didn’t look all that great on her — it was time for something different. She hugged herself tightly under the umbrella and headed to the parking lot where her car sat alone waiting for her to rescue it from this gut-splattering downpour.

  “Interesting,” she said to herself two hours later as she sat at the kitchen barstool in her apartment looking at the reports she’d tucked into her satchel before leaving the office. “These numbers don’t make sense.” She sipped from a steaming hot cup of tea as she peered at the papers in front of her on the counter.

  Sophie noticed the differences between the data in the old financial system and the reports out of the new one yesterday but thought she’d made a mistake in running the reports. They weren’t yet ready to pilot the new software and the official migration was still a ways off, but she’d attempted a data conversion on her own two nights ago just to see how it would run. She should have waited for the vendor to be there and work with her. Sophie’s hardheaded reputation about technical things was well earned; she always wanted to try as much as possible on her own so she fully understood it and prepared for any problems. According to the documented plan from the vendor, the conversion process went easy, but the reports she ran to reconcile it to their old system didn’t match at all.

  She printed copies of all the financial reports from each system so she could go over them and see what she’d done wrong. She probably just didn’t select the report correctly.

  She set the sheaf of papers down in order, side by side, old next to new, and highlighted the discrepancies so she could find a common denominator. At eleven o’clock, she gave up and went to bed. She would call the vendor tomorrow and ask if he could take a look.

  • • •

  Two days later, Sophie was standing in line at the deli near her office when her cell phone jolted her back to reality. Her thoughts had been diverted to work, as usual, and how she’d forgotten to call Jim Doyle, the account representative from Futurenet Finance, about the report discrepancies. Maybe it didn’t matter since he’d be here next week anyway.

  The display on her phone indicated the call forwarded from her desk phone to her cell. “Sophie Henderson,” came her standard greeting.

  “Ms. Henderson, this is Trevor Adams.” When she paused for a moment trying to place the name, he continued, “You brought me in out of the rain the other evening.”

  “Oh, yes … yes. Sorry, my mind was on work and I wasn’t paying attention.” She smiled into the phone.

  “You left your jacket on the chair at the coffee shop and I thought I’d drop it by for you if that’s okay.”

  “Oh.” She really wished he hadn’t noticed it. She already decided to write the jacket off and get something else. She laughed a little nervousl
y. “Man, you know, I just can’t seem to get rid of that ugly thing. My friend bought it for me last year. I keep leaving it lying around, and it just keeps finding its way back to me.”

  The silence expanded between them as if her comment caught him off guard. Surely he possessed a sense of humor somewhere? He laughed an easy, untethered chuckle before responding. “Well, I could toss it in the trash if you like and we can just pretend I didn’t call.”

  “No, no. My friend would probably never believe my excuses and then she’d be insulted that I don’t wear it anymore. Since I don’t have a lot of friends, I don’t really want to tick her off.” Honestly though, she warmed at the sound of his voice. She wasn’t sure why — he seemed a little strange. He was more serious than she liked. Sort of a moody, somber — or perhaps angry? — kind of guy. But then, first impressions weren’t necessarily accurate, especially with the torrential downpour they’d endured.

  “I’m not at the office right now so if you want to drop it by and you’re in the neighborhood, just leave it at the reception desk and I’ll get it when I return.”

  “Actually, I’m at lunch down the street from your office, which is why I thought I’d check. I’m leaving in a bit and should be able to get by there on my way back.”

  “Oh, that’s great! I’m at Joster’s Deli, which is — ”

  “Yep, I know the place. I eat there quite a bit myself. Even better. I can be there in ten to fifteen minutes, if that’s not too late.”

  “Okay, I’d intended to take my lunch back to my desk but I’ll just wait here.”

  “Great. See you in a bit.”

  • • •

  Trevor hung up the phone and turned to Nate. “Okay, I guess we see where this goes, but I still think we’re looking in the wrong direction with her.”

  “Probably so, but we won’t know until we try. If it’s not her, then it must be someone close to her. See if you can get a reader on her cell phone while you’re there.” Trevor wasn’t sure how he’d possibly get that done. Installing a reader required replacing the battery with one of theirs. Theirs were made specifically for tracing not just calls, but also text messages. The reader stored it, then transmitted the data file to their server when the communication ended. Getting hold of her cell phone long enough to put in a battery, restart it, and return it without her knowing would be interesting.

  Unlike on the day of Trevor and Sophie’s first meeting, the sun today was blindingly bright and there were barely any clouds in the sky. Not that it mattered — it was unlikely one would really see the sky a lot from downtown Houston anyway.

  It took a while for Trevor’s eyes to adjust inside the deli, so he stepped away from the door to keep from blocking the path while the dark room came into focus. The food here was pretty good. The atmosphere stimulated the draw, though. Very fast-paced, lots of noise. It always smelled like bread and grilled onions. He wasn’t much on the noise, but loved the aroma. Casually, he surveyed his surroundings. Yep, there she was in a booth near the wall. He didn’t smile when she saw him with the jacket in his hand. He just acknowledged her wave by lifting his head a little in her direction, then he worked his way through the crowded tables.

  “How’s the car?” Sophie asked.

  “Fine. Fine. Good as new.”

  “Did you call a tow?”

  He looked around for a chair. Due to the lunch hour rush, seating space was limited. He observed the exceptionally small gap in the booth next to her, thanks to a really huge guy at the next table, and hesitated. He didn’t see any chairs.

  “Nope, it ended up being nothing at all. How’s your day going so far?” He squeezed into the small space, pressing against the big guy in the booth a bit more than was comfortable.

  “Sorry. It’s a little tight,” he apologized.

  “No problem. There really wasn’t anything else available when I came in or I would have grabbed a table.”

  “Works for me but you probably are getting squished.” This felt awkward, his hip pressed hard against hers, bone against bone, and if he looked up, he would be right in her face, within inches. He didn’t look up. She seemed a little uncomfortable, too, as she stared at her half eaten sandwich.

  “Are you hungry?” she asked.

  “No, I just ate, and besides I kind of need to get going.” The words came out sharper than he intended. This was not going to work — they were way too close to maintain a decent conversation. Her hip and rib cage burned into his. He couldn’t put his arm down — the only place it could go would be around the back of the booth behind her and, well, that couldn’t happen. If he turned his head, his nose would be in her hair. Did her hair smell like the perfume he’d noticed the other day? Like her jacket did. It looked soft.

  What the hell shoved that thought into his head? Trevor cleared his throat and looked around the room. There was nowhere else to move to right now. The bony hip felt good though, he admitted.

  “Oh.” Sophie’s eyes shifted to his hand wrapped around the coat. She reached across him, her chest grazing his arm, and took the jacket from him. “Well, thanks for returning this.”

  He adjusted himself to get more comfortable in the seat. “You know,” he hesitated, “I thought about throwing it in the street and letting a couple of cars run over it before bringing it back. Maybe even a truck or two. Then you’d have a good reason not to wear it.” He grinned and looked sideways at her.

  The big, macadamia nut eyes crinkled up a little and she choked out a giggle. “There’s a nice thought. What stopped you?”

  “I didn’t want to cause a wreck.”

  The giggle blossomed now and the teeth came out, full and white, in a laugh. “Well, that was probably smart. I’d hate to see you explain that to your insurance company.”

  “Yep, that would probably be pretty hard to explain. Well, I need to get going. Nice talking to you again.” He worked his way out of the tin can between her and the big guy and stood up, turning and extending his hand to shake hers.

  Sophie set the sandwich down and took his hand, holding it briefly and tugging it up and down once. “You, too. Hey, just curious. Did your iPod dry out okay?”

  He held up the earphones in his pocket in response and backed away from the table, smiling at her. “Of course, these things are indestructible.” He plugged the earphones in his ears, turned and left the deli, but not before he registered the look on her face — disappointment?

  “Smooth, real smooth,” Nate snickered in his ear. “Now what are you going to do?”

  No clue, man. Trev thought it but didn’t say it. “I’ve got it covered,” he responded.

  It occurred to him that he’d never really surveilled someone like Sophie. Most of the women he’d watched were career criminals and he’d only done so because they associated with someone else he’d tagged. In fact, he didn’t think he’d ever tagged a woman initially … but thanks to Sophie’s Good Samaritan act the other day, he moved to front and center on this one. The meeting with his team solidified it. They harassed him for getting too close, but in the end, everyone agreed it might make it easier for him to get more information.

  Nate had made a wisecrack that Trev was the worst person to charm information from someone like Sophie, and suggested that he should take over. Trev responded with something about Nate’s interest not being associated with the job and that he’d better put his brain back in the driver’s seat.

  All joking aside, Trev felt a sudden sense of dread. He was probably out of his league. Maybe she hid the career criminal part of her personality and he was just too stupid to know it by looking at her. She sure didn’t look the part, though. Nor did she act it. And he had always been pretty good at spotting the signs. Shit, he really had to pay attention on this one or he’d screw it up. The bureau didn’t accept too many mistakes. It was time to go back to the office and do some additional research. Based on the meeting the other morning, they were expecting things to move faster. He wanted to see if he could get more det
ails. Her lunch hour wasn’t sufficient for that. He also knew that a barrage of questions too fast would likely scare a suspect. So much so that they might disappear or avoid contact. He didn’t want to give her the “stalker” feeling. He’d leave her alone for three or four days while he gathered more information. That should be an acceptable amount of time to wait before he casually “bumped” into her somewhere. Right now, she was their lead suspect. Even though it didn’t make sense.

  Back in his office, Trev dropped the file with Sophie’s details on the desk. He had gotten it from a box that contained files on most of the employees that had potential to be involved. The FBI task force was currently only following her and the head of the accounting department at Benton & Stanley, as they seemed to have the highest level of access. So far, none of the others had been given much attention. He decided to go over the file again, to see if he’d missed anything.

  Sophie Henderson was the daughter of Brianna Henderson, a black woman from Chicago. Brianna met Sophie’s father in college. He was white, and while the interracial thing didn’t matter to them, their differences in aspirations were significant. According to Sophie’s neighbor, her parents split up when Sophie was a toddler. Her mother didn’t like the city life very much and ended up going back to her hometown after the breakup. Sophie and her mother lived in a small town outside Chicago. Her mother spoke very little of Sophie’s father but the neighbor said he was now some big shot in New York. Trev shrugged. Sure. He knew the statistics — 72 percent of children in urban black communities are raised by single mothers. This was the norm. Sophie’s family proved no exception.

  According to the file, Brianna was diagnosed with Stage IV breast cancer three years ago, and died nine months later, leaving Sophie alone.

  Sophie graduated with a bachelors in computer science and then went on to get a masters in information technology. Her mother was extremely proud of her and everyone in town knew of Sophie’s success. The details went on; nothing stood out. “Blah, blah, blah,” Trevor muttered under his breath. Faceless, unemotional facts. Wasn’t it interesting how someone’s life could be reduced to a non-personal itemized group of details that could describe any number of people? The file listed the stores she frequented to buy clothes, groceries, even music. It had a short list of her routine schedule, the days of the week listed at the top and the places she went on those days. There wasn’t anything new.