Chapter 1 - Nine Minutes After I Was Fired
The moment Richard Harrison pointed at the door, I knew my life had changed.
"You're fired. Don't show your face here again."
The whole operations floor went silent.
For three years, I had been the person everyone called when a driver missed a window, a customer changed an appointment, a trailer showed the wrong status, or Richard promised something nobody had actually arranged.
Officially, I was an operations assistant.
Unofficially, I was the person who knew where every emergency was buried.
That morning, I had refused to change twelve shipment records from HOLD to DELIVERED.
The trucks had not delivered.
Richard told me I was being difficult.
I told him a computer screen did not become true because he wanted a better number on the weekly report.
That was when he fired me.
"Sure, sir," I said, because two hundred eyes were on me. "But you'll regret this decision soon."
His face turned purple.
"You think you're special?"
No.
That was the part he never understood.
I didn't think I was special.
I thought the twelve trucks were still missing from the receiving schedule.
I picked up my purse and the red folder I had carried into his office.
Nobody spoke as I walked to the elevator.
Not Jasmine, who sat three desks from me and ate lunch with me four days a week.
Not Kevin from dispatch.
Not Trevor Dane, Harrison Logistics' vice president of network operations, who had spent the meeting telling Richard I was "emotionally attached to outdated procedures."
The elevator doors closed.
I finally let myself breathe.
My phone rang before I reached the lobby.
ERICA VAUGHN - NORTHSTAR RETAIL.
Northstar was Harrison's largest customer.
Their holiday electronics launch represented almost a quarter of our annual revenue.
I answered.
"Emily, where are my twelve trailers?"
I closed my eyes.
"I don't work for Harrison anymore."
Silence.
"What?"
"Richard fired me nine minutes ago."
"Emily, I don't care about Richard right now. Our system just received twelve route changes from your account."
I stopped walking.
"My account?"
"ECARTER. All twelve. New destination."
My scalp went cold.
"What time?"
Erica told me.
Nine minutes after Richard told me to leave.
I looked through the glass doors toward the parking lot.
My employee badge was in my purse.
My laptop was still on my desk upstairs, locked when I left.
"Erica, do not treat those changes as authorized by me."
Her voice sharpened.
"Then who made them?"
I opened the red folder.
The first page was the exception report I had refused to alter.
The twelve trailers were carrying $28.4 million in newly released electronics.
Their original destination was Northstar's regional distribution center in Joliet.
The new destination Erica read to me was a facility I had never heard of.
Then another call came through.
Ruben Salazar.
One of our drivers.
I answered.
"Emily, I've got a problem."
"What happened?"
"Dispatch says you approved a new stop."
"I didn't."
He went quiet.
"I knew it."
"Why?"
"Because the guy who called said to use your emergency phrase."
My heart stopped.
Every high-value Northstar run used a verbal verification phrase known to only a few operations employees.
"What phrase did he use?"
Ruben told me.
It was correct.
I looked back at the office tower.
Someone had my login.
Someone had my private verification phrase.
And someone had waited until I was outside the building to move twelve trucks under my name.
Then Ruben lowered his voice.
"Emily, there's one more thing."
"What?"
"The man who called said you won't be coming back."
I stared at the doors I had just walked through.
My firing had not interrupted the plan.
My firing was part of it.
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