Passion in Bloom (Hometown Heartstrings #2)

Chapter 24

Roarke

U h-oh.

Heather looked concerned, furrowing her brow as she took this call from her boss on speaker. She didn’t show the screen so I would be in the background, and I wasn’t going to make myself be known on the call anyway.

Staying quiet, I set the plates on the table. I ensured the ceramics didn’t make a sound. She didn’t look over at me, too enraptured with Janelle’s call.

I’d met the bank manager once, but I wasn’t sure if she’d remember me much, at least not any better compared to anyone else in town.

If there was another room, I’d excuse myself and wait for this call to be done. If this was something related to work, confidentiality would matter. I didn’t want to intrude. But the bathroom was the only other option.

“Compromised?” Heather asked. “How? What does that mean?”

“I’m not sure. The official who called me was concerned and talking too fast. They were worked up, all emotional and not slowing down with facts, but it sounds like the data that you had stored on the documents either was missing or doctored.”

She shook her head as she slumped to the chair she’d just fucked on me. She was focused and entirely concentrated on this call now. No distractions about the memory of what we’d just done.

“That’s...” She lowered her gaze and frowned. “That’s not possible though. Could they have screwed it up?”

“No,” Janelle replied. “I don’t think so. That was my worry, too. That maybe they opened up the attachment and something in their spreadsheet software had a default setting that automatically changed up something on our settings. But that’s not it. I opened a copy of what I forwarded, and it’s all out of whack.” She cleared her throat. “I’m not hovering. I don’t like to micromanage, but I did look at the doc and spreadsheets within the first week of you taking over the project. And everything looked fine then. The numbers and labels you had stored and categorized then are not the same as what’s in the current file that I forwarded.”

Heather tucked her hair behind her ear, frowning deeper now. “I don’t see how this could’ve happened.”

“Me neither. Something is going on, and I just wanted to give you a heads up that we’ll need to troubleshoot it first thing.”

“I wish I brought my laptop home again. I could look right now.”

“No,” Janelle replied. “No, no worries like that. We don’t need to go to the bank at this hour of the night or anything. I was hoping you’d be able to say it was acting glitchy or something and I could know it was something beyond our control.”

“I haven’t noticed anything like a glitch. The last time I put new numbers in, a couple of days ago before Fergus went with me on the collections for that project, everything looked and acted normal.”

“We’ll get to the bottom of it.” Janelle’s heavy sigh suggested she wasn’t confident about that claim though.”

They disconnected the call. For a long moment, Heather zoned out, staring at the table. Her focus never settled on the plates of food that I put down, and I wasn’t stupid enough to suggest that she distract herself from this news about a work problem to eat.

“What was that all about?” I asked.

I hoped it didn’t sound intrusive. It wasn’t my business and it was likely something that she had no permission to talk to me about, but I had no idea how else to say something, to ask anything. Maybe that wording was trivial and she wouldn’t get defensive. However I could word it, I wanted her to know that I was here to help in any way that I could. As a sounding board, to offer advice, or whatever else she might need or want.

“I don’t know.” She slowly shook her head, still zoned out and stuck in a vacant stare at nothing. “I... She put me in charge of the county’s toy drive and charity donation drive.”

I nodded. “I remember that.” It seemed like Burton participated in it every season. “Last year Nance and Fergus walked around doing it, right?”

“Yeah.” She nodded feebly. “They did. Janelle asked me to take over the project for this year. It’s nothing. Just collecting the toys dropped off and taking them to the bank. Finding all the cash and receipts put in the businesses’ boxes. Simple stuff.”

She wasn’t telling me anything that I didn’t already know.

“But Janelle says the docs are compromised.” She frowned, looking up. “You’re sitting right here. You heard.”

“Would you like me to go?” I asked.

“No.” She winced and looked away. “Don’t be ridiculous. It’s raining now, anyway. That’s not necessary.”

“What can you do?” I asked.

She frowned. “Do you think it’s my fault?”

“Do I think you sabotaged the documents you were in charge of?” I scoffed. “No,” I said, as If it was obvious.

“Something happened.” She grimaced. “I wish I had my laptop here to look through it and try to figure out what it is.” Then she perked up a little bit. “Maybe Fergus can help.” She picked up her phone and scrolled down the screen.

“Why? Because he worked on this project last year?” I asked.

“Well, no. He’s the techy guy out of us at the bank. He knows his way around all the programs and stuff.”

I nodded, quiet while the phone rang. I hoped Fergus could help. I wasn’t too familiar with him, but the impression I had of him made me think he’d want to help his coworker.

“Hey, Fergus,” Heather greeted on the video call when he answered. “I’m hoping you can help me figure something out. Janelle says the docs about the toy drive were compromised.”

“ She said that?” he asked.

“She said the county people claimed it’s compromised. She checked what I had in the shared cloud and she said it doesn’t look right.”

“Look right how? Is stuff deleted? Or you typed it in wrong with a wonky code on the formulas? Copy and paste something weird?”

She shook her head. “She didn’t explain completely. Just that the numbers were all off.”

“Damn. That doesn’t sound good,” he concluded.

I winced.

Heather groaned, rubbing her hand down her face. “I’m not stupid...”

“Of course not. But everyone makes mistakes. I’m sure it’s just a silly, simple mistake.”

“You think?” She cringed, not looking convinced.

“Well, if you didn’t make a mistake, then the other alternative is that you intended to mess up the docs. And we both know, all of us at work, know you wouldn’t do that.”

She shook her head. “Of course not. But with the docs being ‘compromised,’ it’s easy to assume that’s what the county people are going to say. That it’s my fault.”

“I see what you mean, girlie. Because you’re the only one who’s been inputting the numbers in the doc and spreadsheets. So—wait.”

“What?” Heather swallowed.

“ Are you the only one working on the doc and spreadsheet for that project?”

I watched Heather open and close her mouth, seemingly at a loss for words.

“Who else would be getting into it? It’s just you, me, Nance, and Janelle at work. We all have access to most of the shared docs and files.”

“Right.”

She furrowed her brow. “You mean someone from the county?” She shook her head. “That can’t be it either, because she checked what she forwarded, what she took straight from the shared cloud.”

“Well, has anyone been around your laptop unsupervised?”

She huffed. “I hardly ever bring it out of the bank. I keep work at work.”

“Me too, girlie. Me too.”

“And if I do bring it home, it’s just here. At home. With me.”

“Does anyone ever come over?” he asked.

Heather glanced up at me. “Roarke. But it wouldn’t be him.”

I appreciated how quickly she shot that idea down. Of course, I wouldn’t have messed with her laptop. Besides, it wasn’t like I was always here. This sleeping over stuff had only just started after my cabin was flooded.

“Anyone else?”

Heather’s face turned pale. She stared at me, but didn’t seem to see me at all.

I mouthed my concern to her. “What?”

“Nevaeh.” She stated it quietly, coldly, and with fear. Maybe a hint of dismay to match the shocked expression.

“Who?” Fergus asked. “I didn’t hear you.”

“I... I’ll...” She cleared her throat, stammering. “I’ll call you later,” she told Fergus.

She disconnected the call at record speed, tapping the button and dropping her phone to the table with a clatter.

“Nevaeh?” I asked. I’d heard her all right, but that didn’t make sense. “Did she break in here?”

“No.” She pressed her lips together, mad. “She was here. Yesterday. Remember?”

Fuck. I’d forgotten about that. She’d offered for Nevaeh to come over when she looked so ill. Then when I showed up, she was suddenly perky and healthy enough to leave.

“Nevaeh was here. She was unsupervised, supposedly napping on the loveseat while I showered.” She shot to her feet and braced her hands on her head as she paced. “I was cold and wet from your place so when she said she just wanted to lie down, I took a shower. She was out here near my laptop where I couldn’t see.”

I connected the dots. It wasn’t that hard to catch on. As I stood, shaking my head, I tried to let it make sense in my mind.

It didn’t, though.

Why?

“You think Nevaeh wanted to get on your work laptop and somehow screw something up?”

She narrowed her eyes at me. “I don’t think it. I know it. She’s the only person who could’ve had unsupervised access like that.”

“But that still doesn’t add up, Heather.” I held my hand up when she scowled, ready to lash out or shout. I had to tread carefully. By saying her claim made no sense, I was implying she was stupid or incompetent, talking nonsense. “Why would she do that? If someone compromised something for your work files, if anyone tried to get onto your work laptop at all, they’d be someone trying to get you.”

She crossed her arms. “Well, your niece hasn’t exactly been Miss Congeniality with me.”

“I won’t argue you about that. Nevaeh is rough around the edges. She’s mad at the world, but she’s not going to target you in something like this just for the hell of it.”

I don’t think...

I would never excuse my niece’s wrongdoings. Wrong was wrong. No gray area. Something was either right or wrong. When she broke into my place, that was wrong. When she stole my things, wrong. When she tried to shoplift or steal a car, wrong and wrong again.

But she’d never done something to deliberately hurt someone or get them in trouble. Nevaeh’s crimes were always to better something for herself. That was it. Interfering with Heather’s work laptop didn’t fit in her MO.

“How do you know?” Heather challenged hotly. “How well can you even claim to know her?”

“I...” I shook my head. “I can’t.” There was no denying how secretive Nevaeh was. “I hate that she’s not more open and direct with me.” Hell, half the time I didn’t know if she’d taken off again or was hanging out nearby.

For a long, tense moment, she stared at the floor. Glowering. Glaring. Seething and fuming. I knew better than to speak up and irritate her any further.

“Roarke, I need you to leave.”

I blinked, feeling like that was a harsh request.

I didn’t break onto her laptop or do anything.

I wasn’t necessarily arguing that my niece hadn’t either, but I couldn’t understand why or how she would.

“What?” I asked, feeling a nasty pit of uncertainty in my gut. She’d just rejected my offer to go and give her privacy as nonsense. And now, she wanted to kick me out and push me away because she believed my niece had messed with her work things?

What the hell?

I wasn’t prepared for this whiplash.

“I need to...” She rubbed the back of her neck. “I need to do damage control and think about how to handle this.”

“Janelle just said to wait until the morning...” She didn’t even have her laptop here to do any damage control.

“No.” She shook her head. “I need to be alone and deal with this. I don’t have time for you or your niece right now.”