Alison Brooks walked into the meeting with her laptop, IPAD, and files for the business. She had been assigned to audit Styles and Roode Investment Firm. No one thought anything was wrong, her company just had been hired to do an external audit. She saw the internal auditor for the firm already there. She and Becky had gone to college together.
"Allie, nice to see you," Becky said to her.
"You too."Allie smiled. "I was surprised you needed my company to audit."
"Well, the investors wanted an audit done. There was a business deal that went bad a few months back. Bobby and AJ were doing business with a sports management agency."
"Oh okay," Allie replied just as the door opened.
"And these are the owners," Becky replied. "Bobby Roode and my husband, AJ Styles."
"Nice to meet you both." She replied.
"You as well," Bobby said with a smile. "So, where do we need to start?"
"I was thinking I could work with you, Mr. Roode. For this part of the audit."
"Of course. And call me Bobby."
"Well, call me Allie." She replied. She looked at AJ and Becky. "I will start the audit with Mr. Roode. Then go from there. So you two are free to go." AJ and Becky nodded and walked out.
AJ looked at Becky. "She's not going to find anything wrong is she?" He asked his wife.
"Of course not. I'm sure everything is on the level." AJ nodded. He knew the deal with Heyman Management had been a bad idea. But Bobby talked to him and got him to agree. Bobby was sure doing the business deal with Heyman would be good for their company. Now he was regretting it so much.
Allie looked at Bobby after AJ and Becky had left. "Well, let's get started." He nodded and they sat down at the table. "So, you and AJ did a deal with Heyman Management?"
"Yes, we did." He replied. "Paul Heyman said he wanted to look into investing in the company and then investing in more things. AJ and I told him that investing in some of the things he wanted to were very risky."
"Who did you deal with there?"
"I dealt with Heyman," Bobby replied. "But we were responsible to all Heyman employees and sub-contractors."
"Alright." She replied putting the information into her laptop. She picked one of the files. "So, you don't know which sub-contractors you dealt with?"
"No. Heyman never said."
She nodded. "Alright." She opened the file. "You and AJ proceeded to take thousands of dollars from your client and invested them in different types of stock."
"Yes, we did. We were certain that the market could be good and the company would make a lot of money."
She nodded as she picked up a receipt. "Have you noticed any irregular spending with the company accounts?"
"I haven't." He replied. "But then AJ handles the accounting part of the business."
"He's over the accountants and auditors?"
"Yes, we have two accountants and one auditor. Michael Cole and Corey Graves are our accountants and of course, Becky is our auditor."
She nodded and made some notes. "I would like to review all the receipts for any company trips or expense account."
"Alright." He replied. "Do you need a hard copy or flash drive?"
"Flash drive is fine for now. But I might need physical copies later." He nodded and turned to his laptop and quickly downloaded what she needed. "Here you are."
"Thank you." She smiled. She wanted to focus on the job she was hired to do. But this was the first time she was actually attracted to a client. She had never been one to mix business and personal together. But she was really attracted to him. She put the flash drive into her laptop and brought up the files. She looked over each one. "Why would Mr. Graves spend over ten thousand dollars on a business trip to New York? That seems excessive."
"Ten thousand?" Bobby asked shocked. That was an excessive amount. "I don't know. That is very excessive."
"Okay, I will need the hard copies of all the receipts and expense forms from that trip involving Mr. Graves and his assistant, a Mickie James."
He nodded and called down to the records and got the copies of what she needed. He hoped Corey hadn't done something he shouldn't have. The records were delivered a short while later.
Allie had printed out everything from the file and now she was matching it to the copies. "Okay, this receipt for a hotel says it was booked by your travel executive, Charlotte Flair. The hotel was 150 a night. Mr. Graves and Ms. James stayed for five nights with two rooms booked." She added up the cost. "But then there is another receipt for a different hotel." She looked at the receipts. "So, your company was charged by two hotels for different rates with two rooms. And each room charged several hundred dollars of services to the room, which your company paid for."
"We wouldn't have signed off on that," Bobby replied. "Well, I wouldn't have."
She nodded and looked to see who had indeed signed off on the expenses. "It appears AJ signed off but you reviewed the receipts and signed off as well." She looked at him. "Did you actually see the receipts or trust AJ?"
"I trusted AJ and Corey." He replied. "Corey was the one who dealt with Heyman. AJ dealt with the sub-contractors and I signed off on what AJ did."
She sighed. "I think Mr. Graves is doing something wrong. These numbers just don't add up." She looked at him. "I need to speak with Mr. Graves, Ms. James, and Ms. Flair. Then I will need to speak with AJ."
Bobby nodded and arranged for the employees to come to the conference room. He could tell this girl was determined to find out if anything was wrong and he welcomed it. He wanted his business to be super clean with the financials. He had a good reputation prior to opening the firm with AJ and he wanted to keep it that way. He and AJ had known each other for years and he trusted AJ.
Allie interviewed the employees and questioned them about the issues with the receipts and files. She knew immediately that the three of them were in on something. Now she had to figure out if AJ and Bobby knew it as well. It seemed that Corey, Mickie, and Charlotte had embezzled money from Heyman Management and particularly the sub-contractors. She spent the rest of the day going over everything with Bobby and it was soon late in the day.
"How about I order some dinner since it seems we will be here for awhile?" Bobby asked when he saw the time.
"That sounds great." He nodded and ordered them some Chinese. He still couldn't believe that Corey, Mickie, and Charlotte would embezzle from the firm. There had to be a mistake somewhere.
He and Allie went over every piece of paper and every file into late in the morning. "It's late." He said when he saw the time. "It's two am."
Allie laughed. "Well, time does fly when you're working." She replied. She looked at him. "But I have enjoyed the company."
"I have too." He replied. "So, would be a conflict of interest to ask you out?"
She smiled. "It would right now. But once the audit is done, it wouldn't be."
"Alright." He smiled. "Well, let's call it a night."
She nodded and got her things together and they headed out. She smiled as he walked her to her car and made sure was safely inside. She thought about him as she drove home. She definitely hoped he would ask her out after the audit was done.