Chapter 2 - The Audit of Shadows
Before Brandon could raise his hand to signal the night guard, a sharp, decisive sound shattered the tense silence behind the front desk.
CLACK. CLACK. CLACK.
A woman stepped out from the glass-walled manager’s office in the rear corridor.
Her name was Maya Lin. She was twenty-nine years old, wearing a fitted purple polo shirt, her dark brown hair pulled back into a tight, professional ponytail. Her face was pale, her features sharp and unreadable, but her dark eyes were pinned on Brandon with an intensity that made the younger man instantly drop his pointing finger.
"What is going on here, Brandon?" Maya asked, her voice low, even, and dangerously calm.
"Old guy's trying to scam us," Brandon muttered, leaning back against the credit card reader with an arrogant shrug. "System flagged his blue card as deactivated three weeks ago. He's been wandering in through the side doors without paying. I'm taking care of it."
Maya didn't answer him. She stepped around Brandon, her shoulder brushing past his chest as she took her position in front of the main terminal. Her long, slender fingers danced across the mechanical keyboard with practiced, terrifying speed.
The green light of the monitor reflected in her pupils as screen after screen of encrypted transaction logs scrolled past.
"Arthur Pendelton," Maya read aloud from the monitor, her tone dropping an octave. "Member ID 884-Bravo."
"See? Deactivated," Brandon smirked, crossing his arms over his chest. "Tell him to hit the road, Maya."
"Shut up, Brandon," Maya said quietly.
Brandon blinked, startled. "What?"
Maya leaned closer to the screen, her eyes narrowing as she highlighted a series of recurring line items flagged in yellow and red. Her breath hitched slightly.
"He paid three hundred and fifty dollars in cash on January 4th," Maya said, her voice echoing in the quiet lobby. "Paid through December 31st."
She clicked a sub-routine menu, pulling up the automated billing ledger linked to Excel Fitness’s corporate merchant account in Chicago.
"And because someone on the morning shift failed to clear his manual ledger entry," Maya continued, turning her head slowly to stare at Brandon, "the automated system has been auto-billing his linked social security debit card twice a month... every month... since April."
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The smirk vanished from Brandon’s face.
"We haven't just been letting him walk here, Brandon," Maya said, her voice rising so that every member in the lobby could hear her clearly. "We've been stealing from him. He's paid through December, and we've been billing him twice a month since spring. We owe him four hundred dollars."
