“Morning, Asher,” she said as she stepped in. “You wanted to see me?”
She seemed to be playing things very coolly, keeping a decent distance between herself and me. All I could do was to play along and try to keep my burning desires bottled up. Which was precisely why I avoided making eye contact with her for longer than a millisecond.
“Have a seat.”
“So, it's about the tweet, right?”
“Yup. In all the panic last night, I forgot to ask how you found out about it?”
“My best friend Meg, she's an attorney. Last night she was doing some research for a case she’s working on regarding transgender issues. When she saw the Sinclair name pop up on a transgender message board, she contacted me.”
“That was a lucky break for us. Thanks to her quick response, and yours, I was able to delete the tweet quickly enough. Nothing has gone viral.”
“Good. But how in the hell did that get tweeted to begin with? That campaign isn't even finalized yet!”
“Exactly. And I have no idea how that got out,” I explained.
“Who has access to that Twitter account?”
“Myself, Janice, and all of the senior members of the team.”
“Have you questioned any of them yet?” she asked.
“Not yet. I thought I'd speak to you first. Got any theories?”
It looked like she wanted to say something, and she opened her mouth—then paused.
“Aside from the obvious theory that we’re being sabotaged . . . no, not really,” she said.
I stared at her for a while, long enough to make her squirm uncomfortably in the chair.
“All right then,” I said slowly. “I’ll let you get to work. I'll talk to each member of the senior team individually and see what I can find out. Thanks for your help—and thanks again for bringing that tweet to my attention so quickly.”
“I just did what I had to do.”
“I appreciate it,” I added and our eyes met for a moment longer than I had intended.
She forced her gaze to the desk, got up rather quickly, and headed for the door. I knew she had an idea about who was behind this, likely the same idea I had, but I couldn't fathom why she wouldn't just tell me. Perhaps she needed proof before she made any accusations; I could understand that. Still, this was an urgent matter and if it went viral we'd be in hot water—boiling hot water. I'm not sure how well we could weather that storm.
There was, of course, still the matter of the break-in to consider and how it’s possible our social media accounts may have been compromised because of it. Granted, every password in our system had been changed, but it was possible. So far, the PI had still not been able to conclusively link Savage to the intrusion, although he said he was working on some good leads.
With these thoughts swirling around my head, I pulled in a deep breath and called the first member of the senior team in for questioning.
***
A few hours later, I stood and stretched as the last member of the senior team left my office. It had been a long morning. The interviews, or interrogations as Janice had called them, had taken a lot longer than I'd thought they would. In the end, I still had nothing. It seemed nobody had any idea about how the tweet had gotten out. And if they did, they were concealing it extremely well.
I glanced at my watch to confirm it was time for lunch—something my stomach already knew.
I stepped out of my office, headed toward the elevator, and turned the corner that would take me past Lilah's office—only I didn’t make it past her office. I stopped dead in my tracks.
There, standing in her doorway, talking and smiling as she held a huge bouquet of flowers, which, presumably, he'd just brought her, was none other than Brendan Savage.
“What the hell are you doing here?” I hissed.
Brendan turned around, a smug grin plastered across his face. Lilah simply looked away, blushing furiously and looking as though she’d prefer to slink into a corner.
“I'm just visiting a friend. Aren't I, Lilah? It's a free country, Sinclair. I'm not breaking any laws.”