PART 5:

He had stepped away to answer. But Lily had been right there watching him with those big eyes asking why everyone was yelling. “That’s right, sweetheart,” he said, his voice rough. “I was with you the whole time.” “Then why did the man say you did it? Because sometimes people make mistakes. Sometimes they believe the wrong things.

Can’t you just tell them the truth? I tried, baby. But they didn’t listen. Lily’s face scrunched up in the way it did when she was thinking hard about something. Maybe the lady will listen. She has nice eyes. Ethan pulled her into a hug, burying his face in her hair to hide the tears that threatened to spill.

his six-year-old daughter, with her innocent faith and her simple logic, had more confidence in Clare Ashford than he did. And maybe, just maybe, she was right, too. The door opened, and Clare stepped back into the room. Her expression was different now, more focused, more intense. She held a tablet in her hand and moved with the purpose of someone who had confirmed a suspicion. Mr.

Cole, I need you to tell me exactly where you were at 14:32 on the day of the incident. The exact location, the exact activity, Ethan straightened, keeping one arm around Lily. I told you I was in the suble two maintenance break room with Lily. Drawing what? Cats. Lily wanted to learn how to draw cats. Clare’s gaze shifted to the little girl.

Lily, do you remember that day? The day you came to work with your daddy? Lily nodded solemnly. I had a temperature. Daddy said I was warm like a toaster. And do you remember what you were doing when a lot of people started calling your daddy’s phone? We were drawing, Lily said, echoing her father. Daddy was teaching me ears.

Cat ears are triangles. How long had you been drawing before the phone call started? Lily thought about this carefully. A while. I did three whole cats, one for me, one for daddy, and one for grandma in heaven. Ethan felt Clare’s eyes on him, reading his reaction to his daughter’s casual mention of his dead mother-in-law.

He kept his face neutral, though the grief never really went away. “Thank you, Lily,” Clare said softly. “You’ve been very helpful.” She turned to Ethan, and when she spoke, her voice carried a weight that made him sit up straighter. The badge logs show you entering suble 2 at 1431 and not leaving until 1518.

The security camera in the server room shows someone at your workstation at the time of the crash. But the image quality is too poor for facial identification. However, I can tell you that the person in that footage is not wearing a maintenance uniform. Ethan stared at her. What does that mean? It means someone used your credentials to access the server room while you were documented being somewhere else entirely.

It means the physical evidence does not support the conclusion that led to your termination. Then why? Why did they fire me without even checking? Clare’s expression hardened. That’s exactly what I intend to find out. Derek Vaughn was having a good week. His new office had a window that overlooked the parking lot, which wasn’t exactly scenic, but was significantly better than his old cubicle near the breakroom.

His salary had increased by 15% with the senior systems position, and he had just received approval for a conference trip to San Francisco that would get him out of Seattle’s perpetual gray drizzle. Yes, things were finally going his way. He was reviewing his calendar when his phone buzzed with an internal message that made his stomach drop.

Report to conference room 4A immediately. C. Ashford. Derek had never spoken directly to Clare Ashford in his four years at Data Stream. He had seen her at company meetings, watched her deliver keynotes with the kind of composed authority that made people sit straighter in their chairs. But a personal summons, that was new, that was concerning.

He straightened his tie and made his way to conference room 4A. his mind racing through possibilities. Maybe it was about the Henderson account he had been managing. Maybe she wanted to commend him personally for his work. Maybe he opened the door and found Clare Ashford seated at the head of the table, flanked by Marcus and a woman Derek recognized as Data Stream’s head of legal.

The atmosphere in the room was decidedly not congratulatory. Mr. Von, please sit down, Derek sat, keeping his expression professionally neutral, despite the cold sweat beginning to form on his palms. I understand you were on shift the day of the server incident 3 weeks ago, Clare said. The one that resulted in Mr. Cole’s termination. Yes, ma’am.

Terrible situation. Ethan was always a bit careless, but I never thought he would do something like that. Interesting. Because I’ve been reviewing the evidence and I’m finding some inconsistencies. I’d like you to help me understand. She turned the tablet toward him, displaying a spreadsheet of timestamps and locations.

According to the badge logs, you accessed the server room at 1428, 4 minutes before the crash. Would you care to explain what you were doing there? Dererick felt his face flush. I I must have been checking on a routine issue, something with the cooling systems. I think the maintenance report for that day shows no issues with the cooling systems.

In fact, it shows no issues at all that would have required server room access by anyone other than the scheduled technician. Clare’s voice remained perfectly level. Would you like to try again? I don’t remember exactly. It was 3 weeks ago. But whatever I was doing, it certainly wasn’t crashing the server.

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