Caramel Kisses (16 page)

Well
, at least they didn’t take my phone
, he mused as he clicked it open. It was
Charli’s
phone number.

“Hey,
Charli
.”

“Hey, you,”
Charli
responded. “Where are you?”

“I’m on the way home. Security just brought me my keys and my
suitcoat
.”

“Good. I’m on my way to your house,” she paused.
“With your things.”

“Really?
Great.
See you shortly and thanks.”

He knew
Sydni
was responsible and floored the gas, moving as quickly as he was able toward his destination.

Chapter Thirteen

It had been two weeks since Drew had been suspended from his position. He’d spent his days piecing together whatever he was onto in regard to the electronics shipping deal that had him stumped before. And
Sydni
got more and more pissed off the longer he dug into it. He’d said it involved Alex
Voltier
, but the stubborn man wouldn’t tell her what it was, saying he didn’t want her involved in case it all went to hell in a hand basket. So she’d quietly allowed him to borrow her copies of the contracts and let him do his lawyer thing.

She’d managed to use her standing in the company to get the senior partners who served on the board of directors to hear his defense instead of taking it to arbitration, or worse, to the District Attorney.
Sydni
sat in her chair feeling more like bacteria under a microscope than a senior executive at this firm.

“It is exactly eight a.m., Ms. Cannes. Let’s begin.”
This from Mr. Epps, a literal senior partner.
The man was so old,
Sydni
was sure he’d invented dirt. He was a no nonsense kind of man, but he was also fair. Just as she opened her mouth to address the board Drew chose that moment to enter the room.

“Excuse me, sir, I apologize for being late. May I?” he asked motioning to a seat across the conference room table from
Sydni
.

She took a deep breath and put her cards on the table. “Mr. Epps, members of the board, I don’t believe Mr.
Caruth
harassed Alexandra
Voltier
.”

“And why is that, Ms. Cannes,” Mr. Epps asked in a bored, or perhaps tired, voice.

“Because, sir, we’ve been dating since before he received the promotion to my division. He’s spent practically every hour he hasn’t been working with me.”

“Really?
You know how we feel about nepotism here, Ms. Cannes.”

Drew cleared his throat.

“Excuse me,” He said. Every head swiveled his way and paid him their utmost attention. Clearly the man was wearing his lawyer hat. He addressed the board with a simple, “If I may?” while motioning toward the front of the room.

With a nod of the senior partner’s head, he stood and addressed the board.

“Ladies and gentlemen of the board, nepotism can’t be used against Ms. Cannes in this case. I came to work here without her knowledge, and had accepted the job offer before we’d ever met. She also had no knowledge of my promotion into her division. Also, we’d have to be related by blood or marriage in order for nepotism to be a factor. And neither of those circumstances exists.
Though I hope to rectify the situation soon.”

His gaze found hers as he flashed a smile, then turned away.
Sydni’s
mouth fell so wide open she was sure she tasted the fuzz on the carpet beneath her shoes. Oh my god. The man was simply too bold. And he hoped to rectify the fact that they weren’t related?
By marriage?

The ancient skin of the senior associate’s face almost cracked with his wide smile. “No wonder you’re on the legal team, young man. Well said, and it gets Ms. Cannes off the hook. However, it doesn’t quite do the same for you.”

“Again, if I may, sir?”

“Why the hell not?
You seem to be on a roll, young man.” This brought a chuckle from a couple of the other stern-faced board members. Others remained grim, reminding
Sydni
of how serious this matter was.

“Thank you, sir,” Drew said. There went the twinkle in his eye that she was becoming more and more familiar with. What was he up to?

“Ms. Cannes and I have been working to get me caught up on the Japan accounts. While she is the Executive Vice President of International Shipping, it is not her responsibility to oversee each and every customer account. Do you agree, sir?”

“Of course.
We have hundreds of customers. There is no way a single person could oversee them all. What’s your point?”

“Well, it is the project managers assigned to each account who actually
oversee
the day-to-day activity with our customers in regard to expedition of the agreements and fulfillment of contractual obligations. Yet, because Ms. Cannes is one of the few who
does
get involved with each of her division’s customers she noticed something irregular with a recent account that she personally landed for one of our larger client’s electronics division.”

“Oh?” asked Mr. Epps.

All eyes pinned
Sydni
to her chair. While confident in her ability to skin and grin with the best of ‘
em
she didn’t enjoy so many eyes scrutinizing her just now. She almost sighed with relief when Drew continued and every gaze swung his way.

“After learning my way around how you all do things here, I went back and looked over the deal, keeping in mind the irregularities that Ms. Cannes had been trying to rectify. She’d even had several talks with the project manager and the accountant handling things on our end.”

“And?”

“Independently, and without Ms. Cannes knowledge, I also spoke to the project manager, Alex
Voltier
, a couple of days before Ms. Cannes and I went on vacation together to New Zealand. Notice,” Drew said as he passed around a screenshot of his IM from Alex. “Notice the date on the message to me from Ms.
Voltier
. Considering the, uh, friendly tone of the message, you would have to agree that any harassment on my part would have had to have happened after that date. Do you all agree?”

Every head bobbed in agreement. After all, it was the only thing that made any sense.

“Well,
sirs, the only problem is
such harassment would had to have taken place while I was in New Zealand with Ms. Cannes. Which I do believe would have been rather difficult considering we had no access to a computer. If you check the network files you will find there was no electronic communication between Ms.
Voltier
and myself during that time.”

“Okay, Mr.
Caruth
.
Point taken.
Now back to this Sony business. When Ms. Cannes spoke to Ms.
Voltier
and the accountant, what did they say?”

Sydni
answered the question without hesitation. “They assured me it was simply a lag in the accounting.”

“However,” Drew jumped back in. “Ms. Cannes was right. We invoiced the customer. The customer paid the invoices. But it wasn’t charged against the purchase order. The invoices billed against the purchase orders was off by almost half a million dollars.”

“What!?”
The board room erupted into utter chaos.
Sydni
kept her seat and Drew kept his cool. Finally, Mr. Epps signaled for quiet, but the tempers in the room remained at a simmer. “Continue, Mr.
Caruth
.”

“Turns out the money was being deposited and credited against another customer’s account. There’s only one problem.”

“And what is that Mr.
Caruth
?”

“Said customer does not exist. Basically someone siphoned the money away. And since both Sony and the fictitious customer project were handled by the same person, it only makes sense that they would have a problem with me and Ms. Cannes sniffing around.”

“So are you saying you were set up, son?” another of the senior partners snarled.

“I am, sir. It’s all here.” Drew tossed copies of his findings to each person sitting at the table.

“And was Ms. Cannes aware of your findings, Mr.
Caruth
?”

“No sir. She’s finding out the same way you are, right here, right now.”

Sydni
sweated bullets. No wonder Drew wouldn’t tell her what the hell had been going on. He wanted her free and clear no matter what happened. He could also say, truthfully, that he’d independently found the truth so no one could accuse
Sydni
of trying to take down another employee just to save her lover.

“And how did you come by this data?”

“I made my own copies and worked on them.
Before I was suspended of course.”

Each person present, including
Sydni
, looked through Drew’s evidence. No one could deny its authenticity because it all carried the
Expedex
digital signature on every page. Finally, Mr. Epps and several others slammed the folders closed on the table and glowered.

Drew cleared his throat and said, “That’s not all.”

“You’ve got to be fucking kidding me.” The senior partner cleared his throat, the blood vessels under his parchment thin skin flooding with color. “Excuse me.”

“Thief or not, Alex couldn’t have set up those customer accounts. Only someone with EVP or accounting roles on our network could do that.”

“Who was it?”

“An employee named Alfred Pawn in accounting. But I think he was just being used by Alex. He didn’t necessarily know what she intended to do with those accounts. All she had to do was deliver a signed requisition to the accountant and he would open the account no questions asked.”

“So…”

“Only an EVP can sign one of those,”
Sydni
burst out, unable to keep her cool for one second longer.

“Who was it?” Epps questioned.

“Jenkins, sir.”

“Jenkins?
As in, twenty year service award for outstanding direction, Jenkins?”

“Yes, sir.
But I don’t believe he’s involved in the plot,” Drew assured.
“Because Alex got Jenkins to sign the requisition when he was out sick.
She claimed that it absolutely had to go through and that his being out that day couldn’t hold up the process. So, Jenkins signed a blank form and faxed it to his secretary with instructions to give it to Alex. Of course he trusted her to complete it correctly. What he didn’t know was that form would be used to create an account at First National, as we usually do, but when legal had the bank pull the files for the account, someone named Viktor Talent was listed as the Trustee instead of
Expedex
.”

“Luckily for Jenkins, his secretary called both the accountant and Alex to confirm once she received the faxed form here at the office with nothing but Jenkins’ signature on it. Then she smartly made notes in the files. Those files are time stamped and the calls are on the network’s electronic call log with full records of when and to whom the calls were made.”

“Shit!”

A quiet knock sounded, and Alex poked her head in. She immediately spotted Drew. Her eyes went wide for a second before a frozen façade slipped into place as she sat down in the nearest chair.

“You sent for me, Mr. Chairman?” she asked, all innocence and lace.

“Yes, Ms.
Voltier
.
We understand you are the project manager for the Japanese accounts, namely Sony?”

“Yes, sir.
Is there a problem?”

Sydni
wanted to smack the bitch. She’d basically set Drew up with that harassment bullshit to get him out of her hair so she could complete her scheme. But what Alex hadn’t counted on was the fact that her man was brilliant. And
Mizz
Voltier
was toast.
Burnt.
No butter.

Syndi
glanced down at her wrist and felt her cheeks flush with anger. It was almost
time
. Drew would face his accuser any moment now. She wondered what that bitch, Alex, would come up with to get out of this mess now that Drew had pretty much set up the pins for a knock down.

Another board member spoke up, as ancient looking as Mr. Epps, but with blazing blue ice-fire in his eyes and steel in his spine. “There is indeed a problem. But let’s take care of what we originally came here for. Ms.
Voltier
we do not believe your claim of sexual harassment against Mr.
Caruth
has any grounds. However, we’re not sure about the rest of it.”

“The rest, sir?”
Alex asked, still attempting to pass off her ruse of sweet-as-candy-
ness
.

Mr. Epps cut across her and addressed Drew instead. “You’ve presented a pretty solid case so far, Mr.
Caruth
. Is there any other proof, other than these documents, that Ms.
Voltier
is involved in espionage?”

“Espionage?”
Alex snorted.
Geesh
, the broad just couldn’t suppress the smirk that leaked out of the side of her lips to save her life. And Drew pounced.
Sydni
wanted to get up on top of the table and root him on.

Drew pinned Alex with a glacial gray stare, then turned toward the door and called out. “Please come in, Alfred.”

The tall conference room doors eased open and Alex’s pawn walked in.

Chapter Fourteen

Six weeks later

“Well,”
Charli
said to her sister, “I think this is the most I’ve seen you enjoy life in, hell, I don’t know how long.”

“Try forever,
Charli
,”
Sydni
grinned. After all, it was true, and it was all Drew’s fault. The man attracted excitement wherever he went. Take all the drama at work with Alex and the espionage case.
Sydni
may have found the initial discrepancy in the documents, but in the end, it was all Drew.
That first trip to New Zealand.
Drew. Getting fucked like an animal up against a wall in a car port just off the beach? Drew. Enjoying life more in the past months than she had in years? Again, Drew. The man was insatiable, incorrigible…and damn stubborn. And
Sydni
couldn’t have loved him more.