Santa's Pet

by Rachelle Ayala

  “I’m not going there with my hat in my hands, an invalid. He has to admit what he did was wrong.”

  “It’s not wrong to marry again after being widowed,” Ben said, swallowing bile. After all, hadn’t he also blamed his father for remarrying so quickly?

  “You don’t know all of it,” Grandpa said. “Let it be. Now, tell me what’s going on with you and Brittney.”

  “You hurt her feelings.” Ben fixed his grandfather with a fierce stare. “You made her cry. Did you know she thought of you as a third grandfather? That you and Santa were the same? Why’d you turn on her?”

  “For you, Bennett Lee Powers, my grandson. I’m sorry I made her cry, but she had it coming. It’s about time she grow up and learn that babies don’t always get their way.”

  “I really don’t get the hostility toward her. I thought you liked her, maybe even loved her as your own.”

  Grandpa wiped his forehead and closed his eyes. “If she thought of me at all, she would not have gone after you.”

  “So you’re hurt. Is that it?”

  “I’ve always thought of the Reeds as family. They should have spoken to us before lobbing those wild charges—sexual harassment and indecent exposure. It’ll ruin you. Ruin everything you worked for.”

  Ben took his grandfather’s hand and rubbed it lightly. “We both let our lawyers run away with this. Brittney never meant any of it. She and I talked. My lawyer trashed her reputation.”

  “Has she called off her attack dog? Are you free of the charges?” Grandpa sat up straighter. “Because if you are, I take everything back and apologize.”

  “I’ve called off my lawyer.”

  “But she hasn’t?”

  “I don’t know. I’ll go by and ask her parents.”

  Grandpa’s lips flattened and he shook his head at Ben, the way he’d always done to show his disappointment. “Better watch it. She betrayed you already. It’ll only get worse.”

  Chapter Nineteen

  ~ Brittney ~

  “This is not the end of the world.” Michele Song, Shopahol’s corporate counsel marches around the conference table. “Mississippi.com already has a clause protecting itself from computer glitches and data leaks in the customer agreement terms and conditions that everyone who signed up has accepted.”

  I squeeze the pen in my hand until my knuckles whiten. It might not be the end of the world for Shopahol and the big guys, but for me, it’s a disaster. I’ve wracked my brain over and over, gone through all the code and the remote access logs, dumped every electronic trail onto my personal laptop and put them through an anomaly detection system—turning up nothing.

  Dave Jewell, CEO of Shopahol, sits at the end of the table with a deep frown. “Are you saying the lawsuit is without grounds?”

  “No, of course not. Mississippi could turn around and sue us, and there’s the public relations angle, too. Customers have an expectation of privacy, and in most cases of data leaks, they are hard pressed to prove they’ve suffered actual damages, such as loss of income or a situation where they are rendered unable to perform their occupation. That said, we and Mississippi.com could be hit by class-action lawsuits. Usually these are settled with a nominal gift certificate and life goes on.”

  I try not to glare at the attorney. She’s as bloodless as they come—a real shark. Life goes on for her, but what about the people ruined by this privacy breach? Or my employees who’ll lose their jobs? Except one of them is the guilty one.

  “What about Amy Suzuki’s lawsuit?” Dave asks, correctly assessing the severity of the situation. “She claims her image as an actress was harmed by having her sex toy purchases made known.”

  “She has the burden of proof. It might even enhance her image and give her more media attention. I would suggest offering her a settlement in exchange for her retracting her claims against us.” Michele tosses her long, midnight black curtain of hair flippantly.

  So, she thinks everyone can be bought off. Amy Suzuki might be a B-list actress for a Japanese samurai film, but she’s a real, living person—someone who was at least embarrassed, if not feeling violated. How dare Michele dismiss it with a settlement?

  “Of course,” Dave replies. “But it doesn’t solve the problem for our reputation. The whole essence of social shopping is to share your purchases with only your selected circle—not the entire world.”

  “People will forget. Their memories are short. Every day there’s a security breach, credit card numbers stolen, user accounts, even the IRS was hacked.” Michele marches across the front of the conference room, one hand on her hip, as she parks herself on the table in front of Jewell. Her tight skirt slips upward exposing her bare thigh.

  “That’s not an excuse.” Jen powers up, standing to her full height. She glares downward at the shorter lawyer. “Trust is everything. If people can’t trust us, they won’t do business with us. We made a mistake. We’ll admit it and pay damages.”

  “That would be stupid.” Michele all but sneers at Jen. “No one admits guilt. The data breach was unintentional and caused by malicious outside hackers.”

  I feel as if the chair I’m sitting on is a thousand degrees hot. My initial investigation didn’t turn up a single breach. No backdoors, no large file transfers, no suspicious traces, no alarms, nothing. Sean and I have an in-house system that logs every data connection, every message, every remote login. We found nothing. Not a trace.

  “You’re calling my wife stupid?” Dave roars, backing his chair from the table. “Need I remind you who you work for?”

  “Duly noted.” Michele meets his gaze straight on, unflinching. She waves her hand toward me. “As I was saying, there’s no need to advertise our mistakes. Shopahol responded swiftly, taking down the feature and wiping out all of the records immediately. Of course, it might help if the CEO of ScrapCloud were to step down.”

  A bolt of ice slices through me. She wants me to resign? To be the sacrificial lamb? But then, I’ve already resigned myself to the inevitable. If we can’t find a trace of our network being attacked, then it has to have been an inside job. A traitor in our midst.

  Jen moves around the conference table until she’s at Michele’s side. She, too, sits on it in front of her husband, forcing the smaller woman to back off. “I’m not sure how punishing Miss Reed would make all of this go away.”

  “It’s not a punishment.” Michele slips off the table and juts her chest at them. “At least in the legal sense. It’s a symbolic gesture that shows the public Shopahol is on top of the situation and assures them you will not tolerate such carelessness.”

  Dave rises from his seat and walks toward me, his hands on his hips. “I’m not in favor of throwing Miss Reed under the bus. Yes, it’s symbolic, and the public loves this kind of headline. In some atavistic sense, it feels like justice has been served. ‘Data Breach CEO Resigns.’” He puts his fingers up in quotes. “But we’re in this joint venture together. Let’s hold off on the head rolling and see if we can’t negotiate with the hackers.”

  “That’s a definite mistake,” Michele shoots back, following his footsteps. “It’s blackmail. How do you know if you pay, they won’t come back again and expose more data?”

  “Michele’s right,” Jen says. “I’ve been blackmailed before and it never ends. Not until …”

  She shudders and hugs herself, then lowers her gaze.

  Ordinarily, her admission would have perked me up, piqued my curiosity, but right now, I’m up shit creek without a paddle, and I desperately need a lifeline.

  “What do the hackers want?” I ask, even though no one wants to hear from me.

  “They obviously can’t come forward and identify themselves,” Michele says. “Perhaps they like the notoriety they gained, or they work for a competitor and they want us to lose market share. Maybe they have something personal against one of you.”

  “In this business, there’s always someone out there.” Dave swipes his hand over his head and scratches the back of h
is neck.

  “How about the VP of Marketing who resigned last week? The one who came up with the Monkey-See project?” Marlena Morley chimes in from the back. “What’s his name?”

  Michele walks toward the podium and picks up her tablet. “Brandon Cole. Is he holding a grudge? What were the terms of his departure?”

  “He’s Miss Reed’s brother-in-law. He couldn’t want to hurt her.” Dave crosses his arms and shakes his head.

  “So far, Miss Suzuki’s the only one who’s suing,” Michele says. “Hopefully the hacker doesn’t release any more data and the news dies down over the holidays. In the meantime, I suggest you issue a press conference detailing all the steps you’ve taken to mitigate any further damage. It would have been better to have the symbolic head rolling.”

  She gives me a hard stare, clearly conveying that I should resign, whether Dave or Jen force me or not.

  Jen reaches over and gives me a comforting squeeze on the shoulder. “We’ll get to the bottom of this. The more I think about it, the more I believe there was an insider who tipped off the hacker about our vulnerabilities. Who worked on email notification?”

  “Samantha, but everyone had access to the source code, including the Shopahol engineers who integrated it into the platform code.” I bristle at the implication that my cousin could have betrayed me. “Samantha really needs this job. She wouldn’t have jeopardized it.”

  “Not saying she did,” Jen reassures. “We need to look at everyone, including your sister, Lacy, Brandon, any ex-employees of ours, and of course, the guys at TrophyShots. They could be getting back at you for the Selfie Apocalypse last year where you released a worm into their system.”

  An idea pops into my head. “What about the guys at BuyFriend? Didn’t they attack you last year with the pricing hack, setting all prices to a penny?”

  “True, all true,” Jen agrees. “Although, I’d start with Sean Rodgers, Lester Mathews, Holly Barnes, and of course Samantha Reed, your employees. They had means and opportunity, although maybe no visible motive.”

  Something about the way she circles back to my people makes my hackles rise. I’m not going to get out of this one alive.

  “Sure, you might as well add me to your list of suspects then, or maybe I’ll do everyone a favor and resign.” I push away from the conference table.

  I drop my badge on the table and meet each person’s gaze. Jen’s jaw drops. Dave’s frown deepens. Michele is poker-faced, and Marlena grins.

  Without giving them the satisfaction of a response, I turn and walk out of the building.

  ~ Ben ~

  Ben sat in his truck in the ScrapCloud parking lot and watched the door. Earlier, he’d called Brittney from the guest phone and she hadn’t answered. He chewed on a piece of beef jerky and checked the time. No matter what was going on, he was going to get to the bottom of this.

  A few cars were parked in the lot, and he’d been sitting for hours. Thankfully the day was foggy and on the cool side, and he’d spent his time going over agent proposals and pitches. There was an ex-rapper turned sports agent who’d gotten top dollar for several baseball and basketball players. Another was a Hollywood powerhouse combining a talent agency for actors and musicians with sports representation. They’d invited him to a swank Christmas party in Beverly Hills with Steve Sanderson, Pro-Bowl linebacker of the Los Angeles Flash.

  Ben had read about some of the dirty deals pulled by the now defunct Rob Cash Agency in Los Angeles, including sex favors, gambling, and ties to organized crime, and he wasn’t sure if he wanted to be anywhere near that scene.

  He ignored another call from Dominique. She’d been rude and had treated him like a child—telling him to stay away from Brittney. He read a text message from her sister, Delaine. The lawyer was now telling him her services were pro bono and that she was doing everything possible to repair Brittney’s reputation, including contacting Brittney’s lawyer and working with him. About time.

  Ben was just about to check out news for Brittney Reed on the internet when a group of people stepped out of the ScrapCloud building carrying boxes.

  Brittney was among them. She led the group to a white Toyota and popped the trunk. It looked like she was moving things from her office.

  Ben watched them put the boxes into the car, and one by one, each person hugged Brittney. One of the women wiped her eyes and both the guys, including that tall photographer at the Pet Rescue event, hung their heads down, looking sad.

  Had Brittney been fired? Ben had read about the data breach at the online superstore, Mississippi.com, and had briefly wondered if Brittney knew about it. Surely, she was too brilliant to be involved in such a large mistake.

  Ben stepped from his truck and strode toward the group, closing the last few yards in a jog. The entire group closed ranks around Brittney, staring at him with cold, hard looks.

  “Britt? Is everything okay?” Ben stopped in front of her as if he were her best friend. “You didn’t call or text, so I got worried.”

  “I, uh …” She shot a glance at her friends and waved to them. “I’ll catch up with you guys later. Remember, cooperate with the investigators. Don’t destroy any records. Log everything. Sean, I’m trusting you to secure what’s left of the company assets—the code, the build system, the test suite, and passwords.”

  “I will, boss.” The tall man who had his hands crossed under his armpits nodded. “It’s unfair of them to take it out on you.”

  “I resigned. Dave and Jen tried to talk me into staying, but I’m not going to get in the way of the investigation.”

  “Everything will be okay. You’re not at fault,” one of the women said. She had reddish brown hair and a fair resemblance to Lacy, but looked to be part Asian. Could she be one of the cousins he’d heard about? The ones who had an actor half-brother?

  “For now, Marlena’s the interim CEO,” Brittney said in a clipped voice.

  “I don’t trust her,” the part-Asian woman said. “I bet she’s behind all of the breaches. When was she hired? A few weeks back?”

  “She wasn’t the one who forgot to secure the backend database. We did that all by ourselves,” Brittney said, looking every bit the strong, capable business leader she was. “The buck stops with me. Sorry, guys. Whatever happened, I’ll take the blame.”

  Ben didn’t know why, but at that moment, a mixture of pride and anger ripped through his chest, and he could barely keep from grabbing Brittney and hugging her tight. She had character, drive, and strength. With everything else going on, she still had the guts to take responsibility. Somehow, it made him want to protect her, although she seemed capable of taking care of herself. Still, she was a rare gem—smart, resolute, and kind-hearted, and he wasn’t about to let her slip through his hands.

  Brittney bade her former coworkers goodbye, promising to meet up with them soon. After they wandered off, she swallowed hard and fixed her gaze on him.

  Her eyes were bloodshot and weary, but she pasted on a tentative smile. “Thanks for calling off your lawyer. I also left a message with mine and told him to hold off until I hear your plan. Sorry for not getting back to you.”

  She sounded so formal and stiff, but she softened when he tugged her into a warm hug. He kissed the top of her head. Even though they hadn’t had the talk, she needed comfort first.

  “How’s your grandfather?” She rested her head against his chest a moment before tipping her chin up to face him.

  “He’s coming home soon. I’ve already selected a home care aide and he’ll be monitored by a nurse. He hates it, of course. You know how independent he is.”

  “I bet he misses being Santa.” Brittney took a deep breath. “He loves the holidays so much.”

  “I know. He’s kind of depressed they shaved off his beard. But it’s his second heart attack in two weeks, so they had to remove the stents and do the bypass instead.” Somehow it felt easier to talk about his grandfather. “Listen, I explained how the lawyers got between us and told him he’
d been too hard on you.”

  She raised her head from his chest and looked up at him. “What did he say?”

  “We didn’t know whether you’d called off your lawyer or not. Now that you have, I’m sure he’ll be over it. He owes you an apology.” Ben touched her chin, rubbing his thumb below that full, pouty lower lip of hers as a shiver went down his spine. To distract himself from yearning to kiss her, he changed tack. “What happened here?”

  “I resigned from ScrapCloud.” She blinked and a tear shimmered from the corner of her eye. “Someone hacked into our system and exposed customer purchases. I missed a design flaw and they exploited it.”

  “Do you have an idea who did this?”

  “No, except it was an inside job. Someone who had access to the source code. There’s no way anyone else would know the commands to trigger the vulnerability unless they’d read the code.”

  “That’s horrible.” Ben tightened his arms around her. “You’ve been betrayed.”

  “Yes, it seems that way. The person responsible for the code is my cousin, Samantha. My brother-in-law, Brandon, was the marketing guy who requested the feature. And my friend, Sean Rodgers, is the security guy behind the scenes.”

  “Sean’s your friend?” Ben couldn’t help the spurt of adrenaline launching through his heart.

  “Yes, a good one. Last year, when we were attacked by hackers, Sean snagged the culprit. He’s been working with me closely, and so far we haven’t had any hacking attacks.”

  “An inside leak.” It dawned on Ben what a horrible mess Brittney was in.

  “Yes, and that means in Dave and Jen’s eyes, I’m also a suspect. After all, if I can take down Shopahol, I’d be free to work with Lacy and Brandon at their new venture, no longer bound by the contract I signed where all new ideas belong to them.”

  “That’s unfair.”

  “Standard practice. The key is to not let anyone know your ideas until you’re safely outside. Or if the company you signed with no longer exists …”