Chapter 19

"How serious are we talking?" Binkie asked.

"TPIG, Trenton Private Investigators Group received a specific list of clients who used Rangeman to complete background security checks. This list is accessible by all Rangeman employees," I replied.

"Even contract workers?" Ram asked.

"Yes. We need to clear all full time, part time and contract Rangeman employees starting with Rangeman Trenton."

"You think someone in our Trenton branch sold the information," Manny stated. "What about our other branches? Have they been compromised too?"

"Unfortunately you can access all branch clients from any Rangeman office. TPIG has chapters in each of our branch cities," I replied.

Binkie whistled, "Somebody is going to pay big for their betrayal." Don't I know it.

"Did you have to clear yourself?" Manny asked.

"Ha ha, brother. It wasn't necessary since it happened prior to meeting Ranger. There's now way I could be responsible," I replied.

"Can't we just restrict who can access the lists?" Binkie asked.

"We can, but if we suddenly place a company wide restriction to prevent access to them, it may tip off our man," I answered. "However, we can prevent access to new clients who hire us for background security checks."

"How do we go about that?" Ram wondered.

"All potential new clients go through me. Any background security checks also cross my desk first then I assign them to a team. They will be added to a list, but only core members have access to the data," I explained.

"What if one of the core members are sharing the data?" Manny wondered. It was a valid question, but I could see Carlos clench his jaw. He trusts his Trenton core members. They've been friends for most of their lives.

"I doubt they're involved, but we'll work on their searches first. Manny, get started on them. Ram, Binkie, I need you to run background checks on TPIG, I need to know who is pulling the strings. TPIG was recently charged with falsifying results. One of the men they ran a BGC on was stealing and selling company secrets. Rangeman was hired to run another check and we discovered large amounts of money in the man's account and he had a history of selling confidential data."

They need to know exactly how important this job is and exactly how deep they needed to dig. Binkie was staring at me; his lips were drawn in a straight line. "Yes Binkie, I already ran a check on you, Manny and Ram. If you weren't cleared, we wouldn't be having this conversation," I stated before returning to my job on Ranger's personal laptop.

I double checked Manny's results and he double checked mine. Neither of us found anything amiss with Tank, Lester, Bobby or Carlos. My husband whispered some account information in my ear and I entered the data into my computer. We have so much money that neither of us really needs to work another day.

Manny reviewed the account information and compared the deposit amounts with Ranger's special ops contracts. "Cleared," Manny announced. "Core team is officially cleared." Binkie and Ram sighed in relief.

"Why are you double checking the results?" Ram asked out of curiosity.

It was Manny who answered, "To be certain nothing was overlooked. Steph is really good at picking up the nuances and diving into the data."

"Manny is really good at following any money trails and finding patterns. No stone unturned," I added.

When I finished reviewing Vince, Hector, Cal and Hal, I announced they were clear. Manny and I picked our way through our full time employees and cleared every one of our closest friends. We repeated the process with our part time employees. After Manny verified the final result, he stated, "All Trenton full and part time employees are cleared."

"Damn!" Manny practically shouted. "I think I accidentally deleted something from the database."

"Manny," I said his name a few times until he looked at me. "You have 'read only' access to the database. It's impossible for you to 'accidentally' delete anything. It may look like it's deleted, but when you exit and restart the program, you'll find the missing data." He had to check for himself. When he saw the information still in the database, he was relieved.

"I think I found something," Binkie announced.

"Me too," Ram stated.

I went to look at their screens. Ram found Anthony Morelli's best friend in the employee roster at TPIG. Wherever you found one, you'll find the other. Sure enough, Binkie found none other than Anthony Morelli himself. "Excellent job men." I printed the results and passed them to Carlos.

He stalked across the room to enter the name 'Timothy Asher' into my search engine. I dug into his background. Asher was Anthony's bunk mate in the Navy. They shared quarters with Cam Doyle and Pete Schneider. Cam is Anthony's best friend. Pete started working at Hill & Carter marketing firm when TPIG took over their background checks.

Researching Asher made me very angry. He worked a few missions with Ranger and his team. Timothy Asher happens to be a contract worker at Rangeman Trenton. In fact, he was the first contract worker for Rangeman. His credentials were used to access the data. If my spidey sense is correct, he first attempted to use Cal's credentials, when he couldn't crack the password, he used his own profile. I checked our schedule and decided to pull Cal off the monitors. We needed to get Asher into the building.

"At 1800 hours, Asher will arrive for his monitor shift. I sent him a request to cover Cal's shift. Oh… can we have Cal come up with his personal laptop?" I asked my husband. Ranger nodded before using his phone to send Asher the request to work a shift.

I sent the request to Cal, asking him to bring Bobby, Tank and Lester with him. Before hitting send, I showed Ranger the request. He grabbed my phone to send the message. It was time to tell them our plan.

Several minutes later, the apartment door opened. Instead of having only the four men arrive, there was five. The fifth man was my dad. Ranger debriefed his team. We were planning to monitor his station to see if Asher would access the system. It would be an added bonus if we could get him to use someone else's credentials. Dad came up with a logical plan. Now all I had to do was plant the red herring.

Lester started smiling as I created a false company name and CEO. They were asking Rangeman for a security and BGC quote. In the past, when a company reached out to us for a quote, TPIG would know and outbid us. After fulfilling their 6 month 'test' contract, they always approached Rangeman.

"Now all I need is a burner phone with this phone number," I announced. On cue, a knock sounded on the door. "That better be Hector with my new phone," I joked.

"You just created the phone number," Lester stated.

"Santos, watch and learn," Ranger told him.

Tank answered the door. As I hoped, Hector was outside holding out a new phone. I dialled the number with Lester watching. The phone in Hector's hand rang. With a smile, he answered the call. "Angel."

"Hola Hector, gracias," I said before hanging up the phone.

"How?" Lester asked dumbfounded. I unlocked my phone to show him the message I sent to Hector. "I didn't see you send the message."

"You were too wrapped up in the company she created," Binkie explained.

Cal sat at the table next to Ram. He opened his laptop to contact his trusted SEALS teammates. I really hope our plan works.

At 1930 I received notification someone used the computer in my cubicle to access Rangeman's client files. They used dad's credentials. I used my Rangeman laptop and pulled up the camera feed to see the person sitting at my desk. It definitely was not dad.

The man resembled Tim Asher's Rangeman ID, but I still needed visual verification from someone more familiar with the man. "Is this Asher?" I asked the room.

Tank leaned over my shoulder to take a closer look, "Affirmative." He abruptly left the apartment with Ranger.

Binkie added, "He just forwarded the list to TPIG's info account using Frank's email account."

"Busted." I used the other cameras to follow Ranger and Tank.

Ranger roughly shoved his chair back. Tim nearly fell off the chair. I turned on the audio so we could hear what Ranger said. "You fucked with the wrong man," Ranger ground out.

"It's not what it looks like, I was checking my email," Tim quickly lied.

"So you're telling me you are Frank Plum?" Tank asked as he pointed to the name on the screen.

"He asked me to check something for him," Tim tried another tactic. "His daughter Stephanie sent him an email and I was getting the information for him."

I was trying hard not to laugh at this man's obvious stupidity. "Do you know who Stephanie is?" Tank asked.

"Stephanie Plum is Frank's daughter. What does it matter to you?" Tim spat.

"Do you now who Stephanie is?" Tank repeated.

"Some washed up has been bounty hunter. She worked here briefly before disappearing," he replied. I sent Carlos a message telling him I was on my way.

The elevator didn't take too long to arrive. I was walking towards the men as they were trying to have a stare down.

"Hi, I haven't met you before, are you new here?" I asked sweetly.

"I'm a contract worker," he quickly replied. He looked me up and down, his expression showed exactly how lecherous this man truly is.

"Do you know who I am?" I asked.

"Stephanie Plum," he answered.

"Well, yes… that was my name, but do you know who I am… now?" I asked in a different way. He shook his head. Lester stood behind Tim's chair and placed his hands on his shoulders, holding him in place.

"She's my wife!" Ranger barked.

"Crap!" Tim said before Tank grabbed him by his shirt. Lester grabbed Tim's keys, wallet, phone and all other belongings. He was promptly handcuffed and taken to the containment cells in the basement.

It didn't take long for Asher to tell us the complete story. Both Anthony and Joseph Morelli joined the Navy. Neither man was able to make it past the preliminary SEALS training. When Rangeman opened their Trenton branch, Anthony was furious because they wouldn't hire him.

He gave us names of people strategically placed within highly respected and profitable companies. Basically any company that hired Rangeman for security or background checks. TPIG only offered BGC services. If someone within the company was stealing and selling client information, Rangeman would be to blame since they're responsible for monitoring such things. The purpose was to undermine Rangeman's reputation.

From his confession, we had all the required information to shut down TPIG and it's affiliated chapters. Unfortunately we couldn't find a direct link to Joe Morelli, but we literally had Anthony by the balls.

Even though we found the man responsible, we still needed to finish running BGCs on the other Rangeman offices and contract employees. Lester, Bobby, Tank and dad grabbed their personal laptops to assist.

Every Rangeman full and part time employee were cleared. A few contract workers were questionable. Manny and I were digging deeper into their pasts. We found a few more who knew either Joe or Anthony, but none of them were involved with their scheme.

A Rangeman wide memo was issued. Ranger announced the changes to employee access. The sales department had minimal access to client lists. They were permitted to add potential or new clients to the database. All current or previous client data would no longer be visible. Only selected team members had full access to the files. Contract employees had minimal access to Rangeman programs and files. When contract employees are working, they must have a full time Rangeman employee for a partner. These new rules were more restrictive, but it was necessary.

It took a few more days to finally get through all the minutia. Fortunately, only Tim Asher was linked to TPIG. I reached out to the companies containing moles and asked for their CEO to meet with me at Rangeman Trenton outside typical business hours.

Our meeting is set to start at 1900 hours today. I was getting anxious because most of these people had no idea their companies were compromised. Lorena Hill arrived nearly 30 minutes early. She is the CEO of Hill & Carter. Her husband Toby Carter is the CFO. He was home tending to their young children.

"Hi Lorena, you're here early," I said while reaching out my hand.

She shook my hand and explained why she was early. "And I caught Pete copying our newest marketing strategy on one of those USB drives."

"Where is Pete now?" I asked.

"Federal custody. My IT department stumbled across his activities a few months ago," she answered.

"Are you responsible for the lawsuit against TPIG?" I asked even though I strongly suspected she was.

"Yes. We pressed charges after finding proof they falsified Pete's military records." I wondered how she managed to uncover that little tidbit. "My brother works in the Navy records department. He visited me around the time we discovered Pete's activities. Sam recognized him and asked why I was employing a dishonourably discharged military man. He said Pete would sell his own grandmother for extra cash," she explained.

"Eek… that's just…" I had no words.

"Selfish," she offered. "I hope none of your other clients experienced this level of deceit." Unfortunately, quite a few have.

I led her to the large conference room on the second floor. We talked while others started arriving. When all the CEOs were finally present, Ranger started the meeting. He apologized for the circumstances making this meeting necessary.

He immediately turned the meeting over to me, "I received a request several days ago to provide employee background checks for a company. One of you reached out to me with a valid concern. Each of you hired a company called TPIG, Trenton Private Investigators Group, to perform these background checks on potential hires. Based on their recommendations, you hired men or women to work in various departments. The men and women hired were strategically placed to steal and sell your company secrets."

A few men were outraged and demanded Rangeman fix the problem. I waited for them to settle before continuing. "We have reviewed all hires recommended by TPIG. Most were guilty of selling proprietary programs or ideas. However, some refused to be part of the scheme; a miscalculation on TPIG's part. I have personally reviewed each person TPIG placed within your respective companies. Here are my recommendations," I said while handing each CEO a list of problematic employees within their employ.

"How much do we owe you for your time?" Lorena asked.

"Nothing," Ranger answered. "We completed these searches on good faith."

"Can we trust Stephanie's findings?" the CEO of Global Accountants asked. Something about him rubbed me the wrong way. He came across as high and mighty, but my spidey sense said he has a few skeletons hiding in his closet.