“You were wrong,” Declan said.
“Very wrong,” Peter agreed.
“You were here, dipshit,” Christopher glared at Peter. “Do not try to throw me under the bus for this one.”
Peter had the decency to blush, and Allison quietly cheered for Christopher. She’d never liked Peter much. He’d always seemed somewhat sniveling to her. That probably wasn’t a very fair assessment. Peter was just an ordinary guy who wanted to do ordinary things. The fact that he was head of digital security meant he was allowed to access more confidential information than she was, though, and that bothered her more than she was willing to admit.
Allison had paid her dues at the company. She’d worked long hours and she’d turned down other offers to work for competitors because she believed in the mission of this organization. The fact that she’d been excluded frustrated her, but knowing that Peter, of all people, knew more than her was even more annoying.
“Uh,” Peter sputtered, but Brian rolled his eyes.
“Don’t bother saying anything else,” he snapped.
Peter looked at Brian sharply, but Brian continued.
“You were the one who was supposed to protect us from this shit. We’re a fucking security company, yet we got hacked? That’s not going to look good for any of us. It’s not going to please our investors, and it’s not going to please our clients, and it’s really, really not going to please me.”
“Well, I, um, I...”
“We need a plan,” Allison finally spoke up. All eyes were on her.
“We already know that,” McKenzie said. Allison didn’t care. McKenzie was a total suck-up. She’d do anything if she thought it would get her some attention from the bosses. McKenzie had had an open crush on Brian for what felt like an eternity. Brian was either completely oblivious or wildly disinterested, and Allison didn’t know which was worse.
Ignoring McKenzie, Allison stood up. She smoothed her clothing and moved to the front of the room. Declan seemed amused by this turn of events, and he stepped aside. He even managed not to pace while she was standing up there. Christopher just kept watching her, looking at her like she was the most important person in the room. Somehow, that gave her the willpower and the courage to keep talking.
“What do we know so far?” Allison said, pointing to Rebecca. “Can you sum it all up in a few sentences?”
“Absolutely. Saturday night internal alarms went off notifying us that someone was trying to access a classified server. Mr. Monster and his brothers were notified immediately. They came into the office, along with Peter and me. McKenzie was the one who raised the alarm.”
So, Allison was the only one who hadn’t been called in.
Interesting.
“Really?” Allison looked toward Christopher. “You called in every single person but me?”
“I...”
She wasn’t sure whether she should be offended or pissed that Christopher had left her out of this. She understood that he hadn’t wanted to bother her, but she was bothered. She didn’t deserve to be left out of her own career. She’d deal with that later.
“It’s fine,” she said, not wanting to start an argument. “I’m sorry,” Allison turned back to Rebecca. “Please continue.”
“Upon investigation, Mr. Monster came to the conclusion that no personal information had been leaked. It was just someone testing the waters.”
“They were trying to figure out how tight the security was,” Allison said. “I get it. What were they after? Any idea?”
“What they accessed today was pretty straight-forward. They tried to get some employment files and, if I’m correct, potentially some data on previous employees.”
“That’s weird,” Allison said. She looked to Christopher. “Have you fired anyone recently?”
“No.”
“Strange.” Allison would have to mull it over. She did some of her best thinking in the bath, and there was definitely a nice, long bath in the cards for her tonight. She’d earned it, she thought. She deserved to just go home, lay down, and relax. She could take some time to think about everything they’d covered because she really did need to figure this all out.
The group talked for a few more minutes. Declan and Brian had meetings they had to attend, so they took off. Christopher got irritated with Peter and sent him away. That left Rebecca, McKenzie, Allison, and Christopher to finish coming up with a plan of action, which they did.
Christopher wanted to know exactly what files had been accessed. He said that if they could get that squared away, then everything else would become clear. Allison trusted him, but she had a feeling there was more to this than that. Christopher still seemed to think that whatever it was they were dealing with was minor kid stuff. He didn’t think the company was really in danger. He didn’t think he was in danger.
But Allison did.