Page 26 of Deserving Ryleigh
Tiny could hear the stress in Alaska’s voice, but she was as professional as ever.
“Yeah, I guess that’ll work. I was really excited to come here and couldn’t believe my luck when I was able to get such a late reservation. I’m sorry if I…uh…if I was too harsh a moment ago.”
“It’s okay,” Alaska assured him.
“Can I see the confirmation email?”
Tiny glanced over and saw Ryleigh standing to his right. He wasn’t sure when she’d appeared at his side, but he wasn’t particularly thrilled she’d put herself in range of a potentially dangerous man. Nine times out of ten, their guests were polite and calm, but a PTSD episode could flare at any moment, and the last thing Tiny and his friends wanted was for someone to get injured.
Mr. Henderson shrugged and held out the piece of paper he’d been clenching in his fist. She took it, and Tiny grasped her elbow and gently moved her off to the side. She dutifully shuffled where he wanted her to go, her mind occupied with examining the piece of paper.
Tiny heard Alaska talking to the man, and he vaguely noted some of his friends heading back to the lunch tables and the impromptu celebration of Spike and Reese’s newest arrival, but his attention was riveted on Ryleigh.
Her brows furrowed, and she frowned as she read the email Mr. Henderson had received. From where he was standing, it looked legit. It had The Refuge’s logo on the top and the signature line looked authentic as well. He had no idea how a mistake as big as sending someone a confirmationwithouta reservation could actually be made, but he knew Ryleigh and Alaska could figure it out.
Owl volunteered to show the man where his cabin for the night was located, and as soon as he and Mr.Henderson had walked away from the desk, Alaska began speaking.
“I don’t know what went wrong. That’s never happened before. There’s no way he should’ve gotten that confirmation without the number being generated by our system. And if he had a confirmation number, it should be on the schedule!”
“Easy, Al, it’s okay,” Brick told her.
“It’s fake,” Ryleigh said firmly. Her voice wasn’t loud, she was being cautious so the other guests eating nearby wouldn’t overhear, but she sounded completely confident in her assessment.
“What?Fake? How is that even possible?” Alaska asked in confusion.
“Look—the email address is correct, but it’s spoofed. See the a? It’s different from the one in our default email font. Ours is a circle with a straight line drawn down on the right side. But this one is a Cyrillic a,” Ryleigh said, pointing to the email address.
“That makes a difference?” Brick asked.
“Absolutely.”
“But…why?How?” Alaska asked.
Tiny kept his gaze locked onto Ryleigh. She knew what this was about, of that he had no doubt.
Alaska took the piece of paper and studied it. “Wow, this is really good. The picture at the top, the way it’s set up, the signature—everything is exactly like what we send out.”
“I’m sure that was done purposely,” Ryleigh said.
“So did Mr. Henderson actually pay for his stay? Where’d his money go?” Brick asked.
Anger rose within Tiny at the realization—someonewas stealing from them. Had spoofed their confirmation email and taken the guest’s money. Not only was The Refuge out the cost of the man’s stay, but they would also essentiallypaythe guest to stay there, since they were refunding half of his charge.
“Tiny?”
Turning, he saw Luna standing behind him, looking concerned. He hadn’t even heard her approach, which he mentally kicked himself for. “What’s wrong?” he asked.
“Dad’s having a meltdown…I think…can you come to the kitchen and talk to him?”
Tiny nodded, on Brick’s heels as his friend also headed toward Robert and the kitchen. He wasn’t sure what was happeningnow, but his gut was screaming that something was very wrong.
When they entered the kitchen, they walked into chaos. The weekly delivery of food had obviously arrived while they were eating and dealing with the reservation issue, but it seemed twice as big as normal. There were boxes of food on every available surface, and Robert was checking off items, muttering swear words under his breath.
“What’s wrong?” Brick asked, interrupting the chef’s rantings.
“Everything! This order is all wrong!” Robert exclaimed. “I ordered twenty dozen eggs and instead got twenty.Twentytotal, not twenty dozen. The flour’s missing entirely. I got baking chocolate instead of semisweet chocolate chips. If I used that in my cookies, you’d all revolt. The asparagus is celery and instead of fish fillets, I got frozen fish sticks. And that’s just the tip of the iceberg with this shitshow! Someone has to be pranking me, right?This isn’t cool. How the hell can I plan meals this week when my order’s so fucked up?”
The feeling that something was very wrong—something much bigger than a simple food order—continued to make the hair on the back of Tiny’s neck stand up.
