Once Upon Stilettos (Enchanted Inc #2) (7 page)

I shook my head. It couldn’t be Owen, and not just because he was so incredibly cute. Idris really hated him, so even if Owen went crazy and decided to become a spy, Idris would probably laugh in his face. I’d seen how freaked out Owen got over the idea of dark magic. He wouldn’t go near the stuff, and that was what Idris was all about. For the time being, I put Owen in the “safe” column.

He finished reading the memo and looked up at me. “It’s enchanted, isn’t it? A binding spell, it seems, jointly cast by Rod and Mr. Mervyn.”

“Yeah. How’d you know?”

He shrugged. “Magic has fingerprints. I’ll get this to the director.”

“Thanks,” I said, wondering if I should be suspicious about his evasion.

I must not have hid it well, for he grinned and said, “Don’t worry, there’s nothing sinister going on. Mr. Lansing tends to avoid people in general. Almost everything for him goes through me.”

“Oh. Okay. Well, thanks again. I guess I’d better finish my rounds.”

As I left, I heard another zap behind me, followed by another yelp from Jake. “I don’t think that’s it either, boss,” Jake whispered painfully.

On my way out, I was surprised to find Sam entering the department. “What’s up, Sam?” I asked.

“Hey, dollface, nothing much. Just doing a routine security sweep of the department.” He winked as he said the word “routine.”

“Probably a good idea in these times. I left a memo for you in the security office.”

“Thanks for the heads-up.”

My final stop was the sales department. As far as I was concerned, the entire sales department was suspicious, but that probably had more to do with my personal experience with salespeople than with any actual evidence. Before I moved to New York, I ran the business end of my family’s farm and ranch supply store, and I’d dealt with more than my fair share of slick sales guys. The MSI sales force seemed like good people/elves/gnomes/whatever, but they came and went often and interacted with a variety of people outside the company. As long as they could get the information from inside MSI, they could sell it to almost anyone on the outside without looking the least bit suspicious.

Most of the sales beings I knew were out of the office as I passed through the department. I went straight to the office of Mr. Hartwell, the director of sales, whom I was convinced was a giant Ken doll brought to life. He gave the memo a cursory glance, then put it aside as he said, “We need to have a meeting about marketing soon. It’s time to shake things up again.”

“Of course. Let me know and I’ll put it on my calendar.” While I kept up a cheerful front, I groaned inwardly. Great, more to worry about. I had my usual job, and now this spying thing, and then I’d have to do more marketing. I was going to be busy. Then again, marketing would give me more excuses for investigating. But I could put him to work, too. “Did you get my e-mail about the winery?” I asked.

“Yes, I did. We have them on record as a customer in the past, but they dropped off about a year ago. I’ll get Corporate Sales on it to see what happened. It sounds like they found another supplier.”

I knew who that other supplier might be, and it wasn’t good. “Please let me know what you find out,” I said.

I returned to Merlin’s office suite and found myself wondering about Trix as I looked at her desk. She had access to Merlin, which meant she had similar access to the rest of the company through her association with him. She was also out sick on the day Owen discovered the spying. I’d seen her Saturday, and she hadn’t looked particularly brokenhearted then, but she could have fought with Pippin on Saturday night or Sunday and still not felt well enough to be at work Monday. I left her in the “possible” column until I had actual evidence, but I reluctantly admitted that I needed to check out her story.

Merlin’s office door swung open, and he and his latest victim emerged. The chairman of the magical committee for something-or-other didn’t look quite as shell-shocked as the Amalgamated Neuromancy guy had that morning, so he must have been cooperating. He and Merlin shook hands, then Merlin approached Trix’s desk once his visitor was gone.

“How’s it going?” I asked him. “Are we getting allies?”

He sighed. “They’re reluctant to accept change, to acknowledge that the cheese has moved.” Oh boy, he was now quoting from the business books. This was going to be fun. “I’m having difficulty persuading them of the threat inherent in one lone renegade. They seem to have forgotten the last few lone renegades who caused serious trouble in the magical community. They hide their heads in the sand until the danger is so dire they can no longer ignore it. Arthur was the same way about Guinevere and Lancelot and about Mordred.”

It still blew my mind that he was talking about people I’d always considered fictional characters as people he knew and remembered. “Human beings haven’t changed all that much in the past thousand or so years,” I said.

“And how is your investigation coming?”

“It’s difficult,” I admitted reluctantly. “It’s all rumor and personal impression at this stage. But if you wanted the fact that we might have a spy to remain secret, I’m afraid you’re going to be disappointed. It seems like the whole company knows, or will know before long.”

He rubbed his beard thoughtfully. “Now, that I find interesting. You, Mr. Palmer, and I are the only ones who know the full details—and the spy, of course. I haven’t told anyone, I can assume you haven’t told anyone, and I suspect Mr. Palmer has remained as guarded as ever.”

“I think most of it is guesswork. Someone saw Owen tear out of R and D, and there’s already some worry that we could have intruders or spies. Next thing you know, word has spread around the company that someone’s spying, and they broke into Owen’s office. Finding a real spy when everyone else is already doing their own spying is going to be nearly impossible.”

“This is only the first day of your investigation,” he said kindly.

The intercom squawked just then. “Katie-Bug, you there?” said Sam’s voice.

“Yeah, I’m here. What is it, Sam?”

“I’m at R and D. You’d better get the boss down here, pronto.”

Merlin and I looked at each other, then he headed toward the escalator. Without waiting for an invitation, I got up and followed him. I’d been there no more than fifteen minutes earlier. What could have happened?

Normally, the door into the research and development department was secured, with a hand ID and magic spell required for access. Even I couldn’t get into that department unless I was accompanied by an employee or Owen was expecting me. But now the door was wide open. Sam and a white-faced Owen stood in front of the door. “What is it, Sam?” Merlin asked.

“The security to this department has been totally short-circuited. Kaput. It looks like it works the same way as always, but anyone could have walked in at any time.”

“How long has it been like this?”

Sam shrugged as expressively as a stone creature could. “No telling. I wouldn’t have even discovered it today if the kid here hadn’t asked me to do a security sweep of the department.” He indicated Owen with one wing.

“I thought it was a reasonable precaution,” Owen said softly.

“And it’s good that you took that precaution,” Merlin said. “Can you fix it, Sam?”

“Sure. No problem. But first, we ought to run a similar sweep on the rest of the building.”

Merlin nodded. “Do it.”

“That would explain how the spy got in, huh, boss?” Sam said as he went back to fiddling with wires.

“It also means we can’t narrow the suspects down to only people who have access to R and D,” I remarked. Great, my job had just become even more difficult.

“Was this done magically or mechanically?” Merlin asked Sam.

“Maybe a little of both,” the gargoyle replied. “I’ll get someone down here to check people one by one as they enter. Then you’d better seal off the department for the night.”

“I’ll make sure everyone gets out on time tonight, then we’ll shut down,” Owen said.

While they were talking, I glanced over my shoulder at the corridor, then did a double take. I touched Merlin’s elbow and said softly, “Somehow, I don’t think our spy is a secret anymore.”

A
crowd had gathered, both in the outside hallway and in the R&D corridor. I noticed Jake peering wide-eyed over Owen’s shoulder. Ari hovered over the group clustered in the R&D corridor, looking like someone who had slowed down to ogle the five-car pileup on the freeway.

In the outside hallway, there was an even larger crowd. It was as if someone had gotten on the company intercom and announced that there was free food outside R&D. Gregor and Kim were there from Verification. Minerva Phelps of Prophets and Lost stood in front of the group, like she’d been the first arrival. Dortmund, the accounting gnome, was elbowing people in the knees as he worked his way to the front.

If Merlin had been any other boss, he would have said, “Don’t you people have jobs?” and sent them scurrying to stir up more rumors based on half-truths and guesses. Instead, he faced the crowd and said in a commanding voice, “It appears that we have a traitor in our midst. Please be aware of the activity around you and report anything suspicious to Miss Chandler, who will be managing the investigation. Now you may return to your work. The situation is under control.”

When Merlin went into ancient-sorcerer-who-built-an-empire mode, people tended to listen, so the crowd dispersed rapidly. When they were gone, I said, “I guess we’re not investigating covertly anymore.”

He sighed, and he was once again a very elderly man in a difficult position. “It didn’t seem likely that we could maintain any secrecy, so I felt it best to adapt our strategy. You will surely be overwhelmed with reports of suspicious behavior, but it’s possible that a germ of truth will be within. You’ll have to use your discernment to sort through it all wisely.”

“So you’re not going to reassign the investigation to people who know what they’re doing, now that we’ve been outed?” I asked hopefully.

“I see no need to make any changes at this point. Please continue your efforts.”

I could see already that I’d have to sit down with Isabel to get the scoop on the entire company so I’d be able to tell who had a grudge against whom and for what reason. Without being up on all the dirty laundry, it would be impossible to sort the malicious reports from the possible facts. Then again, there was always the possibility that someone who had a reason for a grudge might be telling the truth.

This was a whole new kind of verification, and it had nothing to do with seeing past magic. It would take seeing the truth in each person’s heart and soul.

Piece of cake. Yeah, right. I wondered if it was too late to opt out of my part in the saving-the-world-from-bad-magic gig.

By the time I got back to my own office, I had twelve e-mails and four voice mails. I checked to make sure there was nothing urgent in the mix, but they were all tips. I saved the voice mails and transferred the e-mails into a new folder I created for the investigation. It was almost five and I didn’t feel like I could face sorting through all that negativity. It could wait until morning.

I moved my things from Trix’s desk back to my own office, then got my coat and bag and headed out. I was surprised to bump into Owen in the lobby. “I don’t remember the last time I saw you going home this early. I mean, other than when you’d had your shoulder ripped to shreds,” I remarked.

“I suppose one good thing to come of this is the fact that sealing off the department means I have to go home on time.”

“You could probably use the rest anyway.”

Then we reversed our morning routine, walking to the subway station from the office, side by side and almost in step. “So you got the ugly job of sorting through all this,” he said.

“Yeah. I wonder what I did to deserve it.”

“You’ve got a level head and a knack for seeing through all kinds of illusions,” he replied.

“I was being sarcastic.”

“I wasn’t. I think you’re probably best for the job. You don’t have any real ax to grind, unlike most of us who’ve worked there a long time.”

I looked at him suspiciously. “You have grudges and enemies and all that, too?”

“Let’s just say that there are people I don’t trust. I wouldn’t go out of my way to hurt them, and I wouldn’t frame them. But I wouldn’t be sad to see evidence pointing at them, and I might not be as discerning as I should be at deciding whether to believe that evidence.” He shrugged. “The problem with a company this old and this stable is that not only have most of us been working there our entire adult lives, but our parents and grandparents also worked there. Some of these grudges and feuds go back generations.”

“It’s nice to hear that the company man isn’t entirely a thing of the past.”

“When you’re dealing with inherited job skills, it’s more likely. I suppose you could inherit a head for figures or a talent for art or music, but when the skill that makes you right for a job is a genetic trait, you get multiple generations in the same job. I’m one of the few outsiders in the company in a job that nobody in my family had before me. At least, as far as I know.”