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“Wait, is that legal?” I ask.
Simon pauses. “Depends. Do you need this to hold up in court?”
“Maybe.” When he doesn’t speak, I continue. “Could you have found this doing what you were already doing to find the leak?” I ask.
“Oh yeah. Eventually,” he assures me. “This just sped things up. Anyhow, I concentrated on Mr. Ofer’s signature in the code, and I found how he did it. Looks like during the last software update, he built himself a back door into the server, but he cocked it all up and didn’t cover his tracks. Not well enough, anyway. He’s your leak.”
“You can tell which file he downloaded?” I press.
“Don’t need to. Building yourself a back door is dodgy. Taking a file more so. Companies don't allow it.”
“I know that, but we need to prove he took the Swop file. Without that, I don’t have the leverage to force Sling to withdraw their patent application.”
“Can’t say it was the Swop file, not yet. It’s encrypted. But if it wasn’t, why else would he fence it?”
“What?” I wonder aloud. “What do you mean fence it? He tried to sell it?”
“Looks that way. RB Securities recently put a lot of money into Sling. Why would they fund Swop’s competitor if they didn’t have inside information? Sling doesn’t track with their typical interests.”
“No, it doesn’t. They don’t usually go anywhere near retail investments, not a big enough return for them,” I muse. “When did they invest?”
“Right about when the file was downloaded.”
“That is interesting,” I murmur.
“What made you want to look for a link between Erik’s employees and RB?” Simon asks.
“Something I heard tonight at the pitch event. It sounded off.”
“What do you want me to do now?” Simon asks.
“Erik can probably see which file got downloaded, right?”
“Yeah. The only reason he hasn’t seen it yet is the guy disabled the alert for downloading files, so it still looks like it’s working. But if Erik’s looking for a digital trail, it’s there, and I assume he can decrypt whatever he wants to confirm.”
“Okay. I guess it’s time to talk to Erik. Can you send me a copy of what you found? He won’t want to believe it, so I have a feeling I’ll need to prove it to Erik first.” I mentally catalog all the steps I’m going to have to take to get things under control.
“File’s on its way.”
“Thanks, Simon. You may have just helped me save a really great new company, and Erik. I’ll drop your payment by the office this week.”
“Anytime. Hope you nail the bastard.”
“Me, too.”
I hate canceling on Lisa, especially tonight. She doesn’t know I attended the pitch event, she just knows I had to work late. I had planned to go over after the event and come clean about where I was, why, and my real role with Engage, all of which I want to have in the open when I tell her how I really feel about her. But my feelings will have to wait. I owe it to Erik, and Kurt, to plug the leak and get things back on track as quickly as possible.
“Why are you here? Isn’t the barbeque tomorrow? Afternoon. At Charlie’s house.” Erik rubs the sleep from his eyes.
“This can’t wait.” I wave a flash drive in front of Erik’s face.
“What the hell is this?” Erik demands.
“Trouble.” I spend the next hour convincing Erik that he really does have a leak, that Simon is the good guy acting under my direction to protect Erik and all his clients, and that Erik can put a stop to all of it by verifying which file Taylor swiped. It goes down exactly as I predicted, which is to say that Erik has never been so close to throwing me out. He doesn’t want to believe that any of his employees are capable of doing anything illegal, nor that it could be accomplished without him noticing. Even when presented with the evidence of how Taylor had built a back door, Erik’s first reaction is to think that Simon had fabricated it and that I’ve been duped. After rehashing the events several times, Erik finally concedes, and for the first time since I’ve known him, he seems at a loss.
Watching Erik stare absently at the floor, struggling to wrap his head around what’s been happening right under his nose, is so painful I almost wish there was some truth to the notion that I’d been duped. I’d give anything to spare Erik the pain of realizing that someone he trusts has abused him, but we both know I’m right about the leak. Now the only way to fix it, to make Erik feel whole again, is to set things right.
“You are the only one who can keep Taylor from getting away with this. You know that, right?” I insist.
