Suddenly Sexy by Susanna Carr

minutes, I’m sure those guys have them back now. The guys kept their USB sticks on their key rings.”
    “Most programmers do,” Ace, their resident computer expert, said from down the table.
    “Wouldn’t the information be encrypted?” Asia asked.
    Ace shook his head. “Not always. People get lazy.”
    “I don’t know if it was encrypted,” Julie said. “All I know is that the women were downloading the information on their cell phones.” She looked at her colleagues. “So, what now? What are we going to do about it?”
    “Um…nothing,” Asia said, giving Julie a curious look.
    “Really?” Her friend’s response stunned her. She thought Asia would be the first to jump in and develop a strategy. Asia was just as hungry for a big case. “Why would you say that?”
    “Well, first, it’s not a paying job. I don’t do pro bono work. Second, we don’t know the victim or the culprit. And third—”
    “And it probably didn’t happen,” someone at the table said in a stage whisper.
    Julie looked around the table. “It did happen.”
    Ace gave a chuckle. “You’re just like every rookie I’ve seen, Uniform Girl.”
    Rookie? Uniform Girl? Julie glared at the guy. “What are you talking about?”
    “It’s like when an intern starts practicing medicine,” Max explained, “and thinks they discover a rare disease. You had your first assignment and now you see crime wherever you turn.”
    Was that what she was doing? Seeing a big case, a potential crime, where there was none? Julie gave a quick look at Eric. He was listening to her, but didn’t ask any questions. He remained watchful and quiet.
    “It happens to everyone,” Martha said as she set down her cocktail. “When I first started out, I thought my neighbor was trying to poison his wife. They still won’t talk to me.”
    “This is different. I saw them with key rings.”
    “They were probably their key rings,” Ace said. “Did you consider that?”
    “I did and I know the keys weren’t theirs. They said they were putting them back.” She clearly remembered hearing that. Her mind wasn’t playing tricks. “Anyway, they seem the type to have Chanel or Coach key rings. Not something with action figures.”
    “They were probably updating their Facebook statuses,” Martha said with a dismissive wave of her hand. “Lloyd is always doing something like that. As I was saying, Lloyd…”
    Julie saw her colleagues, one by one, turn their attention to Martha. They didn’t believe her. She stood straight as she glanced around the tables. No one was interested in what she saw. They thought she was imagining all this.
    Julie slowly walked to the empty chair next to Eric. When he stood up to help her into her seat, she forced a polite smile on her mouth. When she sat down, she saw that Asia was on her other side.
    “Asia,” she whispered, “I know what I saw.”
    Her friend patted her hand. “Honey, is it possible…”
    “What?” She was wary of her friend’s cautious approach.
    “Perhaps…” Asia tried again. “Could it be that your deductive skills are on hyperdrive right now?”
    Her words almost sounded complimentary. Almost. “What does that mean?”
    Asia twisted in her seat and lowered her head so she could speak privately. “Tonight was very important to you but your assignment didn’t go as planned. You want to end the night on a successful note and just happen to see a potential case. Not just any case, but one that deals with espionage.”
    Wow. Julie stared at her friend, but no words came out of her mouth. She thought if anyone believed her, it would be her friend. She didn’t see that one coming.
    Asia gave her an apologetic look before she turned back to listen to Martha. Julie knew it was hard for Asia to give her the hard truth. Her friend knew how important the decoy assignment was for her, and how much she needed it to work.
    Julie stared at her clenched hands as the conversation grew to a low buzz. Was she so