Chương 7
My stomach tightened.
That account held mortgage documents, insurance notices, contractor invoices, closing paperwork, tax records, utility logins, and enough personal information to ruin several months of my life if the wrong person wanted to.
“How did she get in?”
“I assumed you gave her the password.”
“I did not.”
My mother looked at the porch floor.
That was answer enough.
I stepped outside and shut the front door behind me.
Harris had not left yet.
He was sitting in his patrol vehicle with the window down, writing something.
I almost walked toward him.
Then Elise spoke.
“There’s more.”
“Of course there is.”
“I think someone else got into my account too.”
“Your management account?”
“Yes.”
“When?”
“I don’t know.”
“That is becoming everybody’s favorite answer today.”
“I found exports.”
“What kind of exports?”
“Owner data.”
The anger in me cooled into something much worse.
“How much owner data?”
“Names, email addresses, mailing addresses, property information.”
“Financial?”
“I don’t think bank account numbers.”
“You don’t think.”
“They’re masked in the dashboard.”
“Are tax IDs in there?”
“No.”
The answer came fast.
I wrote it down anyway.
“Are copies of identification stored anywhere?”
“Not in my side of the system.”
“Guest information?”
“Some.”
I rubbed my forehead.
Mom sat down on her suitcase.
The afternoon heat had turned her face shiny.
For once, she did not complain about it.
“Why didn’t you report this?”
Elise whispered, “Because I would have had to explain why I noticed.”
The truth arrived piece by piece.
She had not discovered a breach while doing her job correctly.
She had discovered it while using the system improperly.
Reporting one meant exposing the other.
“So you hid it.”
“I was trying to figure out what happened first.”
“How long?”
“Two weeks.”
I stared at the dunes.
A gull floated low above the beach grass and disappeared beyond a roofline.
Normal life continued with offensive confidence.
“Change nothing else,” I said.
“What?”
“Do not delete anything.”
“I haven’t.”
“Do not edit anything.”
“I won’t.”
“Do not contact my mother.”
Mom looked up sharply.
Elise exhaled.
“I already did.”
“When?”
“Yesterday.”
“For what?”
“To tell her we couldn’t use the house this weekend.”
I turned toward Mom.
She looked away.
“You told her no?”
“Yes.”
“Then how did she get the code?”
Elise did not answer.
I looked at Mom.
She rubbed both palms over the knees of her white pants.
“Elise.”
“I disabled the temporary code I had created.”
“That isn’t what I asked.”
“I know.”
“Who retrieved my primary code?”
Silence.
My mother stood.
“Mara, hang up.”
I stared at her.
“Why?”
“Because she’s making this sound like something it wasn’t.”
Elise said, “Linda.”
The way she said my mother’s name carried panic.
Not friendship.
Not affection.
Warning.
Mom stepped closer.
“Give me the phone.”
I laughed.
It came out ugly.
“No.”
“This involves me.”
“Yes.”
“That means I have a right to explain.”
“You have had about fifty opportunities.”
“I was trying to protect somebody.”
“Apparently everybody except me.”
Her face tightened.
I turned away.
“Elise, who accessed the primary code?”
“I did.”
The answer was nearly inaudible.
My head snapped back toward the phone.
“You said you disabled the temporary code.”
“I did.”
“And then?”
“Linda called me.”
Mom said, “She is lying.”
Elise heard her.
“I’m not.”
Mom raised her voice.
“You told me it was fine.”
“I told you I couldn’t do it anymore.”
“You said Mara never checked.”
“That was months ago.”
Their voices overlapped through the phone and three feet of air.
I suddenly understood why Harris had been so patient earlier.
There came a point where people stopped needing questions.
They simply began injuring themselves with words.
I spoke quietly.
“Both of you stop.”
They did.
That frightened me more than the shouting.
“Elise, tell me exactly what happened yesterday.”
She inhaled shakily.
“Linda called around noon.”
“I called because you canceled on me,” Mom cut in.
I looked at her.
“Canceled what?”
Mom folded her arms.
“The weekend.”
“You arranged the reunion here.”
“It was supposed to be here.”
“Without asking me.”
“You weren’t coming.”
The simplicity of her reasoning made something inside me go still.
Elise said, “I told her I couldn’t create another guest code.”
“Why not?”
“Because I had started seeing activity I didn’t recognize in the administrator logs.”
“You knew the system might be compromised and you still didn’t tell me.”
“I know.”
“No, I don’t think you do.”
“I panicked.”
Mom said, “She panics constantly.”
I looked at her.
“You used a panicked woman with financial problems to get access to my property.”
“That is not what happened.”
“Elise, continue.”
“She got angry.”
“I did not get angry.”
“You called me six times.”
“Because you stopped answering.”
Elise continued as though Mom had not spoken.
“She said the whole family was already traveling.”
I closed my eyes briefly.
Brooke’s message had come that morning.
The trip had been planned well before I was banned.
“So what did you do?”
“I logged in.”
“And retrieved my permanent code.”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“I thought one weekend wouldn’t matter.”
Mom said, “Exactly.”
I looked at her so sharply that she stopped.
Elise’s voice became smaller.
“Then I saw an export had been generated from my administrator account.”
“When?”
“Tuesday.”
“By you?”
“No.”
“What was exported?”
“Property access records.”
My grip tightened around the phone.
“Which properties?”
“All of them.”
Harris had gotten out of his vehicle.
He was not approaching yet.
He had probably noticed my posture.
“How many owner accounts do you manage?”
“Twenty-three.”
Mom whispered something.
I could not hear it.
“Was my lock history in the export?”
“Yes.”
“Codes too?”
“Not plaintext.”
“What does that mean?”
“The report shows code slots and user labels, not the actual digits.”
“So whoever exported it could see when properties were entered and by which assigned credentials.”
“Yes.”
“Could they see addresses?”
“Yes.”
I turned toward Harris and lifted my hand.
May you like
He immediately started walking over.
Mom saw him coming.
