Exposed (Rosato & DiNunzio #5)(78)

“Possible, since you heard what Simon said, they roll their eyes at him. He’s like the boy who cried wolf.”

“I know but Simon wouldn’t let them forget it.”

“Maybe they talked about it but there was no email.”

Mary didn’t think so. “Simon told us he rarely talks to Ray. And you would think he would’ve remembered that, because it’s what we were just asking him about, conversations with Ray over quality problems.”

“So what are you thinking?”

“I’m not understanding why I didn’t see any mention of Jarrat before.” Mary searched her document index again, but there was no mention. “It’s not there. This is a significant quality issue, clearly discussed with Todd and Ray, but it wasn’t included in any of the email that the company sent us. So there’s one obvious conclusion.”

Bennie lifted an eyebrow. “You think it was intentionally omitted?”

“Honestly, yes.” Mary felt her heartbeat quicken again. “Think about it. They kitchen-sinked us with emails. They expect us to get snowed under reading them, but they don’t realize that we have a way of checking if there’s any missing. They don’t know that Simon archives his email. It’s only because I read the email they produced and compared it with Simon’s email archive that we know that these were omitted from the production.”

Bennie nodded, perking up. “So the question isn’t what emails did they produce. The question is, what emails didn’t they produce?”

“Exactly!” Mary almost cheered. They were finally getting to the bottom of something, but of what, she didn’t know.

“So why did they leave them out?”

“To hide them. So the question is, what are they hiding?”

“And why?” Bennie asked, her blue eyes glittering.





CHAPTER THIRTY

Bennie kept reading the emails, but they were repetitive and technical, and a hunch was forming in the back of her mind. She turned to Mary. “I think there’s something going on with quality control, so why don’t we refine the search to only quality control.”

“You feel confident enough to narrow it? What if we miss something?”

“Take a chance. We don’t have a lot of time.” Bennie set down her laptop and shifted over. “I don’t think the answer is in my emails. I think it’s in the recent stuff.”

“Okay, I’m filtering the leftover emails now.” Mary typed away, and in the next moment, the screen turned white except for a single email with the subject line Quality Control. “Whoa.”

“Let me see.” Bennie leaned over and read the email:

Ray, Did you talk to anybody at PowerPlus about the wiring yet? Susan at Jarrat keeps asking and I want to give her an answer. I know you’re busy lately but can you please get back to me on this? Flickering in the wiring can be a real problem, not just for people with migraines. What if it sparked or started a fire? You can’t negate those possibilities, and Susan is already voicing concerns about that. So please get back to me.

Mary frowned. “I never saw this email before, either. This should have been included in the production. Todd is copied on it.”

“So it was also intentionally omitted. They hid it from us. They never knew we’d compare.” Bennie sensed that her hunch was correct. “And we know there was no response because it would’ve been filtered in.”

“Right, but why?” Mary looked over. “So where are you going with this?”

“Fire, like Simon said.” Bennie was thinking out loud. “Let’s think about it logically. They took out the emails concerning wiring issues and Jarrat. The fact that it’s about Jarrat doesn’t matter, but what matters is the issue. The big problem with bad wiring isn’t that it causes migraines. That would be a problem peculiar to Jarrat. The real problem with faulty wiring is that it causes fires.”

“Right,” Mary said slowly.

“So we know that they hid these emails from us. Simon was telling Todd and Ray that there were wiring issues in the cubicles. He put them on notice that something bad could happen and the most likely thing that would happen is a fire.”

“Oh my God, you’re right.” Mary’s eyes flared open. “So maybe Jarrat had a fire?”

“Not Jarrat because Simon would’ve known that. We would’ve heard about that. But another account. All of the cubicles at OpenSpace contain wiring manufactured by PowerPlus. Any one of the accounts could have had a fire and if any of those accounts had a fire, OpenSpace was put on notice by Simon.”

“I get it!” Mary said excitedly. “He’s a whistle-blower, but he doesn’t know it.”

“Right, because he doesn’t know about the fire. So there must’ve been a fire. Or at least it’s a working theory.”

Mary turned to her laptop, her fingers poised above the keyboard. “So what do we do? How do we find out?”

Bennie’s thoughts raced. “You have a list of the accounts, right?”

“Right.”

“We know it’s not on Simon’s accounts or we would’ve heard it. So start with Todd’s.”

“That would make the most sense!” Mary started typing away. “We should start looking in the file that has Todd’s accounts, which they produced to you.” She looked over with a slight frown. “What if they omit the account we’re looking for from the list? That would be the thing to do if they were going to hide it, wouldn’t they?”