A Season Of Miracles

by Christine Michels

  Almost twenty-four hours had passed since he’d left Devon’s—he still thought of it as Devon’s home, not his. Geoff was preparing for another lonely evening spent in his office Well, at least he had the meeting with his mother to look forward to. She was supposed to arrive on Sunday afternoon.

  But he wasn’t looking forward to tonight, despite the time it afforded him to do some more digging through obscure files. He was just contemplating going out to a restaurant for dinner when his cellular rang.

  “Geoff, it’s Devon. I need to see you. Where are you?”

  He frowned. She sounded rattled “I’m at the office.”

  “Are you going to be there for a while?”

  “I can be. What’s up?”

  “I’ll tell you when I see you. Have you had dinner?”

  “No I was just thinking—”

  Uncharacteristically, she interrupted him “I’ll pick something up. How about Mexican?”

  “Sure.” He was starting to get worried.

  “I’ll see you in a couple of minutes.”

  By the time Devon arrived carrying a sack of take-out food and a large tote bag, Geoff was pacing his office in impatience. “Tell me what’s the matter,” he demanded without preamble.

  Setting the bags on his desk, Devon withdrew an object from the tote and passed it to him. It was the answering machine from the main phone line at the house, not his office phone. “Listen to the message on there,” she said.

  Without comment, Geoff found a plug-in for the machine, and depressed the play button. “Devon, dear, I really wish you would speak to your father. He’s been like a bear ever since—” Honoria Sherwood’s voice came over the small speaker and Geoff flashed Devon a questioning look

  “It’s the next one,” Devon spoke over the message

  An instant later a muffled voice came on, recognizable as male, but nothing more. “Mrs. Grayson, do you know where your brother is? I bet he didn’t even leave a forwarding address.” There was a strange rasping sound, the person clearing his throat behind whatever he was using to muffle his voice. “Tell Geoff to talk to his assistant manager about the latest complaints if he wants to find answers.” There was a click as the caller hung up, and the machine shut off.

  Geoff stared at it thoughtfully. It looked like they had somebody on their side. But who?

  Devon’s voice came out of the silence. It was tight with strain. “I called Winston and he wasn’t home. Tyler heard me leaving a message for him and told me that Winston had come by to see the children yesterday after school.”

  Geoff looked up. “What did he say?” he asked quietly.

  “He told them goodbye—that he was going away for a while. He also told them not to tell anyone unless they were asked.”

  Geoff’s jaw clenched. He didn’t like people who put children in the position of keeping adult secrets. “I guess that explains why we haven’t seen him since he called in sick on Wednesday. What could have made him run?”

  Devon grimaced. “The last time I spoke with him, I mentioned the fact that we were digging into what had happened before. I told him that this time, we were going to find the answers together.”

  That could have been enough to make him take off. “Did he say anything else to the kids?”

  “Just that they shouldn’t worry because he’d be fine and that he’d try to come back and see them someday. Apparently he directed them to tell me that, too, when I asked about him ” Devon was staring at him with heartbreak in her eyes.

  “I’m sorry, Devon”

  She swallowed and her gaze slid away. “I know.”

  He wanted to hold her, to comfort her, but considering the current state of their relationship, he wasn’t certain his embrace would be welcome.

  She took a deep breath, offered a quick, tight little smile, and began removing the tacos and fajitas from the bag she brought. “I hope you’re hungry, because I brought lots.”

  He nodded, but his thoughts were on the portion of the message that hadn’t had to do with Winston. Moving to his desk, he picked up the phone.

  “Who are you calling?”

  “Danson,” he murmured. “I want to hear what he has to say.”

  Devon nodded. Unwrapping a soft taco, she sat down in one of the chairs before Geoff’s desk and began to cat while she waited for him to complete his conversation.

  It didn’t take long “Danson,” he said, when his assistant manager picked up the phone. “It’s Geoff. Can you come down to the office for a few moments?”

  There was a moment of silence, perhaps due to surprise, on the other end of the line. Then Danson responded, “Sure, Geoff. I’ll be right there.”

  Not even half an hour had passed when Danson Hart stuck his head around the corner of Geoff’s doorway “Evenin’ Geoff” He seemed a bit surprised to see Devon. “Devon,” he said with a nod.

  Geoff nodded. “Come in, Dan. Have a chair.” When the man was seated, Geoff continued. “I understand we’re having more problems.”

  Danson studied him for a moment, glanced at Devon, and then nodded. “Yeah, I guess you could say that.”

  “Why didn’t you tell me?”

  “I wasn’t sure if you were ready to hear about them. You seemed kind of preoccupied with studying the things that happened before, you know I assumed you were more interested in trying to get your memory back than in anything else.”

  Devon reacted with surprise. “You mean you didn’t think he cared?” she asked incredulously.

  Danson looked uncomfortable. “Well, I wouldn’t have put it quite like that.”

  Geoff studied the man. Danson’s body language was telling him that he felt defensive and a bit nervous. “So tell us about the problems.”

  “All right.” Danson cleared his throat. “A couple of our clients are saying that their customers have had break-ins that resulted in the loss of sensitive information. The trouble is that the security systems don’t show any breach so there’s no real proof except the fact that the stolen plans and designs are, presumably, showing up in their competitors’ hands. At first I thought it was just a matter of a company being a bit paranoid, but this is the third complaint now ” His jaw tightened. “I thought all these hassles would be over with when everything hit two years ago ”

  He paused, searching for his train of thought. “Well, it almost seems like the problems never really stopped because this is the same kind of situation we had with Fort Knox Security, except that this time, it’s happening with two different installation companies, ComWest Security and Pro-Shield Security. They can’t both be at fault.”

  Geoff’s mind raced. “What’s the status of their clients—of the companies who experienced the losses?”

  “Well, since in these instances the audit trail doesn’t show a breach, they’re mostly just blustering about having their security systems pulled, not paying the balance on their contracts, and reconnecting with one of our competitors. Even that could prove costly though. Especially if word spreads that Future-Tech’s systems can’t be trusted”

  Geoff frowned. “So the difference between what’s happening now, and what happened with Fort Knox Security’s clients, is that this time there’s no proof of a break-in?”

  Danson nodded. “That’s about it.”

  “How and why did the proof surface last time?”

  Danson shrugged. “According to our techs, the modifications that Spencer made to the systems that he installed provided a more complete audit trail than the one we use.”

  Devon frowned. “I don’t understand. If the modifications Spencer made are what proved there had been security breaches, shouldn’t they have realized that it seemed pretty unlikely that he was the one facilitating the break-ins?”

  Danson paused, looked at her, and nodded. “You bet it does I said that at the time. The modifications he made make it damn near impossible for anyone to break into a system without leaving some kind of evidence behind. It’s like an electronic fingerprint.
But the money they found in his account clinched it the other way. They said he’d probably just made a mistake in his reprogramming that ended up giving him away and wrapped everything up in a neat little package I think it was just easier to pin the blame on a dead guy.”

  Geoff silently considered everything Danson had said. “So, if the changes Spencer made to the systems were so favorable, are we implementing them in production?”

  Danson’s attention returned to him. “Nope. Too costly for the additional programming hours without any demonstrable benefit. At least that’s what Russell and Pete decided a while back. Of course, Pete really doesn’t know the business and I think he sided with Russ because of Russ’s years of experience. Still, the result was that I was outvoted. And, since I don’t own any shares...” He shrugged, making it obvious that his voice in the company was not that strong.

  “What’s your opinion now?” Devon asked.

  Danson considered her. “My honest opinion is that we should look at it again. Especially if things like this are going to keep happening It could get more costly not to do it.”

  Geoff cast a thoughtful gaze ceilingward. “Yes.” Future-Tech systems had been deliberately altered and used to expedite corporate espionage. And he didn’t think Spencer Lonng had had anything to do with it except that, by making alterations to a Future-Tech product in an attempt to serve his own clients more competently, he’d inadvertently made it possible for the thefts that were taking place to be discovered. Geoff’s prime suspect now was, of course, Winston Sherwood. But, Winston couldn’t have done all the programming on all the systems. And, even if he was responsible for some of the sabotaged systems, who was he working for?

  “Danson, do you know who did the original programming on the security systems we sold Fort Knox Security?”

  He shrugged. “Not offhand.” He glanced at Devon with obvious discomfort.

  “We are aware that Winston may have had a hand in this.”

  Danson cleared his throat “Well.. if I had to guess I’d say Winston probably did a lot of our in-house programming. He was our best programmer. There are other programmers on the floor, of course. And we subcontract a lot too. I can’t figure it out. And, believe me, I’ve tried.”

  “You’ve suspected Winston for a while then,” Devon asked.

  He looked uncomfortable again. “Yeah.”

  Geoff studied Devon. She was looking more angry now than hurt. That was good There was strength in anger. “Are there any records that will tell me who programmed the individual systems whether it was a subcontractor or one of our programmers?”

  Danson nodded. “Sure In the accounting department. It’ll mean a lot of digging though. But, why don’t you call Russ? He might know off the top of his head who worked on the subcontracted systems, and that would save you a lot of time. Russ was the one that looked into having all that stuff checked for the cops a while back ”

  Geoff nodded. “I may do that.” He leaned back in his chair a bit and considered the man that, in another life, he’d hired as his assistant manager. “Is there anything else you haven’t told me that I should know?”

  “No.” Danson shook his head. “Not that I can think of. If I remember anything I’ll let you know.”

  “Do that,” Geoff responded. It was an order.

  “Sure. Well, if there’s nothing else, I think I’ll get back I...ah, have a lady friend over for dinner.”

  Danson was about to close the office door behind himself when Geoff added, “Oh, and thanks for leaving that message, Danson.”

  The man froze in the doorway. “How did you know?”

  “I didn’t for certain But I suspected when you said that Winston was our best programmer. You already knew he was gone.”

  Danson looked uncomfortable. “I wasn’t certain you’d take me seriously if I simply approached you.”

  “I would have.” Geoff assured him. “And in future, I’d prefer the direct route.”

  Danson swallowed. “Sure.”

  “Thanks for coming in.” Geoff waited until the door closed behind him.

  Devon looked at him. “Are you going to call Russell?”

  He frowned. “Yeah. But I have some thinking to do first ”

  Devon studied Geoff’s set features; they looked as though they’d been carved from granite. He was definitely angry “Geoff?” He looked at her “I’m sorry for not accepting the possibility that Winston...you know.”

  “Forget it, Devon. He’s your brother. I understand loyalty. What I don’t understand is how he could have gotten involved in something that involves murder. I mean it’s pretty obvious now, despite the lack of evidence, that my plane going down was not an accident. Spencer and Holly were murdered to keep this from getting out.”

  Devon swallowed. “And you and I almost as well. If I had gone...if neither of us had survived...our children would have been orphaned.” He was right. How could Winston have become involved in something like that? “Maybe someone was blackmailing him?” she ventured almost hopefully.

  Geoff nodded. “It’s possible.”

  “And we still don’t know enough to go to the police with anything. Do we? I mean, other than the fact that Winston has left, what do we have?”

  “Nothing yet But we will have I’m going to talk to Russell, and then, first thing in the morning, I’m going to start going through the accounting files ”

  Devon hesitated. There was so much distance between them. Which was exactly what she’d wanted just yesterday, but now. Now, it felt cold and lonely. “Tomorrow is Saturday I’d like to help, if I could?”

  He nodded “I’d appreciate it”

  Devon looked at her watch “Well, I have to get back I told Mom I wouldn’t be long when I dropped the kids off with her ”

  Geoff stifled a yawn and glanced at his watch It was ten-thirty on Saturday morning Devon hadn’t shown up yet, and Geoff had been digging through old records for half the night, it seemed, and the entire morning His conversation with Russell the previous evening had been all but useless When Geoff had asked him if he remembered who had programmed the sabotaged security systems that had been subcontracted, Russ’s response had been “It’s been two years since I dug up that information, Geoff, and my memory isn’t as good as it used to be Let me see...no, I just can’t remember I’m sorry Why?”

  Geoff sighed. He liked Russ, they’d visited and had meals together. He regarded him as a friend, but he still didn’t know him well Certainly not well enough to trust him implicitly, so he’d skirted Russ’s question. “Let’s just say I have my reasons,” he’d responded “Thanks for your help ”

  “You’re welcome, Geoff,” Russ had said, and then he’d added, “But I really think you should leave well enough alone and get on with your life ”

  Get on with his life He wanted to do that, but he just couldn’t do it without answers. And so, he’d gone digging in the storage rooms for Future-Tech’s old records to find the information he needed

  It was like finding a needle in a haystack First he had to find the serial numbers corresponding to the particular systems which had been at fault. Then he had to work backward, through a maze of paper. All of which seemed to he tiled in obscure boxes in distinctly different areas of the storage room. He supposed he could have waited and asked for some help from his staff—the people here were, after all, his employees—but now that he finally had a course of action in mind, he didn’t want to wait. Besides, until he knew for certain what had happened and who was at fault, he didn’t trust anyone.

  He still hadn’t found anything to tell him who, other than Winston, had programmed the systems, and he was only marginally nearer his goal. The subcontractors who had worked on the systems not programmed by Winston were identified as 4839-A and 5621-C

  He’d located the accounts payable listing of corporations and their applicable numeric code and had printed off the list only to find that the company names corresponding to the codes he sought had been deleted and the ac
counts were inactive

  Now what the hell was he going to do?

  He frowned in perplexity, racking his tired brain. The company had to have been paid when it performed the work, so all he had to do was find the old accounting records He’d seen the backups in the storage room.

  A half hour later, he leaned over his desk and he began to leaf through the fanfold paper in search of the two codes m question.

  There!

  He verified the number: 4839-A Yep, that was it. Running his finger across the page, he sought the corporation’s identity.

  Manning Systems Ltd. a Division of Delta Systems Inc.

  Geoff stared at the page. Maybe there was a mistake It had to be a mistake. Didn’t it?

  He hastily began flipping pages, searching for the other code, 5621-C. There it was. More hesitantly now, he ran his finger across the page once again

  Damn!

  He stared at the words, not wanting to believe them, yet knowing in his gut that they didn’t he. The words Delta Systems Inc. stared back at him in bold black ink.

  Slowly, numbly, he sat down. What did he do now?

  A knock on his office door startled him. “Come!” he called. It was probably Devon

  But the person who opened the door was not Devon

  “Hello, Russ,” he said, hiding his surprise beneath an impassive facade. This visit seemed almost incredibly timely Did Russ know something? He undoubtedly suspected after Geoff’s call. “When did you get into town?”

  Leaving the door partially open behind him, Russell Manning strolled across the room and took a seat in one of the chairs before Geoff’s desk. “I’ve actually been in town on other business for a couple of days. Your call was forwarded to my cell phone last night. Unfortunately, this is the first opportunity I’ve had to stop by.”

  Geoff nodded and said nothing. He was certain Russ had a purpose here. If he waited patiently, he’d undoubtedly learn what it was

  He didn’t have long to wait. “So how’s your investigation going?” Russell asked. “I hate to see you cause yourself unnecessary stress, Geoff. But, I assume you’re planning on pursuing the matter to the bitter end.”