“Don’t wear any panties, Jenny.”
“I won’t. Promise.”
He laughed. Then he hung up.
The presentation was typical Dax. Thorough, organized, and to the point. It was also sanitized for Angie’s viewing. Meaning there was nothing too sensitive contained in it.
Colt didn’t like what Dax was showing them. He made a mental note to ask for the extended version later.
Charles Martinelli had bought a plane ticket to Brazil. He had not boarded the flight. There was no record of him checking in, nor did he appear on any airport cameras. He’d simply disappeared.
Beside Colt, Angie swallowed. He knew she was wondering if her ex-coworker was dead.
“Dax,” he interrupted.
Dax turned. “Yeah?”
“Do we have a body?”
Dax shot a look at Angie. “No. We have no evidence that he’s dead.”
The tension in Angie’s body seemed to relax a little. Colt wanted to reach for her hand. He refrained. He knew she hadn’t been a big fan of Charles Martinelli, but that was a long way from wanting him dead.
Dax continued. “We’ve analyzed his desktop computer. He deleted his browser history recently, and he used a VPN to mask his IP address. Except for the last time he was on. He must have been in a hurry. He logged onto the Barton, Barnes and Blake server and transferred a file from his computer onto the server.”
“Quite possibly that spreadsheet you have,” Ian said to Angie. He nodded and Dax continued.
“He also had some saved tabs—porn sites, sports cars, shopping sites. Stuff like that. He had two bank accounts. One that his paycheck went into, and another savings account. He made small transfers from the savings account to another account. That one is much larger, and it’s offshore. There’s at least two million dollars in that account—and Charles Martinelli is the owner of it.”
Angie’s jaw dropped. “Wait—are you saying that Charles was taking kickbacks? Or stealing from clients?”
Ian spoke. “We don’t know, but either of those options are possible.”
“And he transferred the spreadsheet to the BB&B server from his desktop? When?”
“The night before he didn’t show for work. I think it was a few days later you were all told he’d quit?”
“Yes,” Angie said. “But if he was stealing, and that spreadsheet is evidence, why would he put it on the office server where any of us could access it?”
“Because he was afraid,” Ian said. “We don’t know for certain that’s what he transferred, but we’re working on tracing it.”
Angie frowned. Colt could almost see the wheels turning in her head. “You said he had an offshore account. Where?”
“The Cayman Islands,” Dax replied after a glance at Ian, who nodded. “The deposits to that account came from another account that seems to be located in the Cayman Islands—but not the same bank. We haven’t traced that one back to a source yet.”
“The Cayman Islands,” Angie said, half to herself. She reached into her handbag and pulled her laptop out. “I think I might have something.”
She flipped open the lid and powered up the computer while they waited.
“Here,” she said, turning the computer toward Ian and Dax. “This number right here. I copied it from the spreadsheet. It could be an account and routing number. And maybe a pin too.”
They were looking at it with interest. Ian gave her an approving nod. “I think you might be right about that being an account number. Dax, copy it down. Let’s try to sort it out and see what we come up with. Can I see the spreadsheet?” he asked Angie.
“Yes.”
He took her computer and looked at the screen. “If we can have this, we can compare it to the Cardinal Group’s official bank statements, and any other records we can dig up.”
“I don’t have their statements anymore,” Angie said. “They were erased from our server and the company closed their account with us.”
Ian grinned. “That’s okay. I can get them.”
“Is that legal?” she asked.
Ian shrugged. “Depends on who you ask.”
Angie shook her head and shot Colt a look. “I don’t want to know. And yes, you can have it.”
“Great,” Ian replied. He tapped a few keys and Colt knew he was logging onto the wifi and airdropping the spreadsheet to Dax. Once that was done and he’d scrubbed the network from her computer, Ian pushed it back to her. He slapped his palms lightly on the table.
“All right, kids. That’s it for the moment. We have a lot more to do, so let’s get cracking.”
Angie’s gaze darted around the room as the men pushed their chairs back and stood. Colt could tell she was confused about why they’d had to appear for a briefing when it was short and mostly about Charles Martinelli.
He knew exactly why.
Ian had wanted Martinelli’s spreadsheet quicker than it would have taken to dig up the deleted file, and he’d known he could get her to give it to him if he presented her with enough information. He might have had Dax put more into the briefing, but once they had the potential account number and the spreadsheet, they didn’t need to show Angie anything else.
Colt didn’t know whether to be amazed or annoyed. He hadn’t wanted Angie involved in the first place, but when she’d stated that she wanted to participate in the analysis, he understood why. She’d found the anomaly and she deserved to know the solution. Unless the solution could get her killed, in which case he didn’t care if she ever knew.
“Thank you for coming in today, Miss Turner. We really appreciate your help.”
Angie’s mouth was set in a suspicious frown. “You left a lot out. And now you intend to proceed without me.”
Ian didn’t do her the disservice of lying about it. “This is potentially dangerous information. Do you really want to know more than you already do?”
Angie’s chin came up. Her eyes flashed. “In fact, yes. I damn well do.” She flung a hand out, encompassed the room. The whole building, probably. “I know you’ve got more going on here than just a nice
