Sammie

As soon as I realized that the folder had one of my proposals in it, I could feel a leap of excitement. Not that I let that show on my face. I had sent out a lot of proposals and this was the first one that came back to me personally. I know that my father knew about them. He had even taken them into consideration whenever a company came to us after reviewing them, but often the fact that they existed was never mentioned.

“The cops came by this morning.” He pushed the file over to me. “One of their experts read through this and had some questions.” Maintaining eye contact I pulled the file over. Flipping it to face me, I was stunned to realize that it was the Tempo Art Gallery proposal.

“What kind of questions did they have?”

“Not sure, but I didn’t like their tone.” I could see that he was watching me. That kind of scrutiny was usually reserved for suspects when they were potential threats to the people we guarded. I tightened my lips and I picked up the proposal and thumbed through it. Since it was just a visible security scan intended to get the gallery to consider switching from TCSP to us, I couldn’t guess why my father thought that there was an issue.

Requests for proposals were the typical route that companies in the industry used to gain new business. Web traffic and word of mouth tended to be standard. But I knew that security really required a personal touch when it came to our current and potential clients. People who got complacent in the industry didn’t last long. What I did for these proposals was a quick walkthrough of the location. I would then point out obvious security gaps in a potential client’s security systems in a report that I could send to the client That would leave them with the option of fixing the issues with their current security system or reaching out to us. Our company would then offer the potential client an audit package or a security.

“You are probably reading into it. Checking on things like this is probably standard, especially since we aren’t Tempo’s hired security company.”  I laid the folder back on the table.

“I don’t think it is that simple.” I frowned at my father. Even though he couldn’t get over his archaic views on women, I knew that if he had come to me directly, something the cops said had triggered one of his red flags.

Martin Steele was known in this industry for his spot-on intuition.  Though he was older, those hunches had led him to create and run a multimillion-dollar security business. I could remember the stories he told at holiday parties and for bedtime stories growing up. He made them fun and interesting, but many of them were life or death situations. If he were going on a hunch…

“Something didn’t measure up.” I had walked through Tempo almost six months ago. This was before Zachary Von Soest had taken over the gallery. I picked up the file again, reading though it closely.

“They have asked for the person who wrote this report to come to the station for questioning. I have already called your brother.” I let a grimace flit across my face before carefully concealing my emotions again.

“Is he meeting me there?”

“Yeah.” I could tell how agitated my father was over this ordeal. I reached over the table and grabbed his hand, giving it a squeeze as I smiled at him.

“It’ll be okay, Dad.” His eyes flew up. Maybe he realized that his worry was transparent, but he shook his head and smiled back at me.

“I’ll drive you down.”

“No” I told him, giving his hand a last squeeze before releasing it. “I’ll have Benny, you should stay here and take point.” I could tell that he was about to try and argue with me but I held my hand up, “If you are right, this might result in some trouble and I need you here.”

I could see that he wasn’t happy about my decision, but he did back off. We stopped at Jeremy’s office and let him know what was going on. Walking me down to one of the company cars, he didn’t say anything.

I called my brother to confirm that he was on the way to the station. After I hung up, the drive to the station was quiet. I usually put on my music, but today I wanted to focus on the drive. It wasn’t long before I reached the station.

My brother pulled up in his gray Carnry. The moment he got out, he had already switched from my brother to Lawyer Benny Steele. He took a moment to remind me of everything I should and shouldn’t say, we walked into the station. The receptionist had us sit down until an office could lead us to a conference room.

What proceeded was three hours of questioning. Though the officer didn’t say it, they were looking at me like I was the person who had committed murder. By the end of the questions, I had reassured them that I was not the culprit. Then they asked about my proposal.

Dad’s hunch had been right. There were key exploitation points that I talked about in my location review. One of these exploitations had been used by the killer to gain entry into the Art gallery. After quizzing me about who would have access to my proposals, Benny started to push back.

“Officer, it has been three hours. I think that we have answered plenty of questions. My client is getting fatigued..” The officer looked back at the mirror next to us. After a moment, he nodded.

“We have no further questions at this time, but please stay close.” I stood and exited the room with Benny. After hugging my brother and thanking him for his help, I headed back to the office.