AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Of course it is.
He only likes a certain kind, imported from Costa Rica, roasted just so. Mr. Leblanc won’t tolerate anything else. The old secretary I contacted went on a twenty-minute tirade about the day they ran out of coffee beans. He tried to substitute Starbucks. Knowing it wouldn’t go over well, he didn’t actually tell Mr. Leblanc about the switch. Which led to quite an upset, apparently.
Mr. Leblanc shook his head in total disbelief.
“If we’reout,then tell me that,” he snapped. “Don’t bring me that garbage. Don’t expect me to fall for that bullshit.” He’d waved the secretary out of his office. “Put in another order. Do it now.”
Summit can never have too many of his coffee beans. It’s obviously best for everyone if the stock never runs out.
In the end, it’s anticlimactic to place the order.
The form guides me through the process. I tap out a description.Supply restock for Mr. Leblanc’s coffee.
And then, in place of the coffee company’s payment information, I enter my own bank account.
My hands tremble over thesubmitbutton.
I click it and brace for an attack.
An alarm. Some blinking red box on the screen that says,stop, thief!A cascade of windows on the screen announcing that I have broken the law and the evidence has been submitted to the NYPD. Officers will be arriving shortly.
Nothing happens.
The order just… goes through.
A small window pops up. Not red. White. It saystransfer complete.
Holy shit.
With still-trembling hands, I put in another order. A smaller one. This way, coffee actually will be delivered to the office. Everyone will watch it get dropped off. The finance team won’t be any the wiser.
And I’m officially a thief.
A criminal.
A con artist, just like my father.
I’ve handled orders at other companies using similar systems. The money really does pop through the Internet in a matter of seconds. Large bank transfers take fifteen minutes at most.
Shit. What if the bank marks the payment as fraudulent? They might have some system in place to realize that I, Bristol Anderson, would never receive fifty thousand dollars at one time. I grab for my phone, but there’s no message there, either.
This moment will forever taste like Tropical Punch. The candy’s gone. I must have chewed through it while I committed my crime.
I hold my breath for what seems like a year.
Mr. Leblanc’s meeting runs long. At five after five, I switch off my computer, gather my things, and head for the door. I have to get to the bank before it closes at five-thirty.
If this con is going to fall apart at the bank, I’m not waiting until tomorrow to find out.
I’ve got a story in place, too, in case the teller asks about the enormous amount of money.A death in the family. I was named in the will.Part of it’s true. I did lose my mother, and I do miss her. If I have to, I can summon that sadness.
It was easy to think up the story. Too easy. It makes my cheeks burn with a guilty heat. Was it easy because I’m more like my father than I want to admit? Do I hate liars because it’s something I detest about myself?
I’m not doing this for me, though. I’m doing it for the twins.
Or maybe it’s an excuse. A flimsy justification for theft. But I don’t feel guilty for protecting them. I can’t. They’re children, and there’s nobody else.
All my internal arguments ripple like conflicting currents. The ocean in my travel brochure would never be this unsettled.
