Scratchgravel Road (Josie Gray Mysteries #2)(75)

“I’ll check it out and keep you posted,” she said.

Josie hung up and faced Otto, who stood ready to walk out the door.

Josie pulled her chair back over to her desk. “Let me call Paiva’s office and make sure he’s in.” She checked her phone list on her computer and found his number. She reached Sylvia Moore first.

“Mr. Paiva has a full schedule today. The first I can squeeze you in is Monday morning at nine thirty.”

“Please tell him this is urgent. We need to speak with him this morning.”

“One moment.”

Josie covered the receiver with the palm of her hand. “I don’t imagine he’ll be very happy to have to see me today.”

After several minutes she came back on the line. “He’ll see you in thirty minutes.”

“We’ll be there.”

*

Otto drove and Josie sat in the passenger seat making a list of questions they wanted to address. The sky was overcast, but the rain had stopped for the moment. The streets in downtown Artemis were passable, but once Otto and Josie hit the county, mud and streams of water crossed the roads making it almost impossible in some places to determine where the road began and ended. Some of the arroyos were overflowing, and the sheriff’s department had already prohibited travel to certain areas of the county. The maintenance crews had been putting in mandatory twelve-hour days and were still barely keeping up with the workload.

Otto pulled onto Plant Road and they saw a large dump truck blocking the road a half mile ahead. As they drove forward, the truck advanced slowly, dumping a layer of gravel behind it. They could see that sections of the road had washed out completely and were now being built up again. It looked like a losing battle, but at least they were fighting.

As was the case with their first visit, by the time they stepped out of Otto’s jeep, Sylvia was walking briskly across the lot toward them. After a sour “good morning,” they walked into the building and were taken to Diego Paiva’s office where he met them at the door and showed them to the conference table.

“We appreciate you changing your schedule for us today,” Josie said.

“Absolutely. I hope you’ve come with news about Juan.”

Josie noticed his demeanor was a bit cooler than their first meeting, but it appeared he did not intend to bring up the previous night.

“We’ve come for two different reasons. We have follow-up questions regarding the Santiago case.”

He nodded once.

“I also talked with Sheriff Martínez this morning. He asked that I check to see if you need support in regard to the flooding situation.”

“I appreciate that.”

“If the rain continues we’re concerned how the flooding may affect the plant.”

“I have an engineering team handling the preparedness plan.”

“I’m most worried about the wash from the foothills to the north of the plant,” Josie said.

“As are we. This is not being taken lightly. The team is to have recommendations to me by this afternoon. You are welcome to attend the meeting.”

Josie nodded. “Good. What about someone from county maintenance? I think we need to keep them in the loop.”

“Absolutely. I’ll have Sylvia make the call.”

“Okay. Switching topics. We’re making progress on the Santiago murder,” Josie said.

Diego’s expression was focused and attentive but unemotional. She figured he played a great hand of poker.

“What can I do to help?” he asked.

“Is the name Leo Monaco familiar to you?”

His eyebrows rose in surprise. “Yes. He’s working as a consultant for us. He’s actually conducting scholarly research.”

“Which means?” Otto asked.

“Beacon performs laboratory research, but there is a lot of information that must be culled through in order for us to stay current. You can imagine, any company conducting scientific research has to stay up to date in the field. Just as important, we need to stay abreast of past research that may inform current projects. We often don’t have the time or manpower to conduct the scholarly research, so we’ll hire out to grad students.”

“How did you connect with Leo?” Josie asked.

“He applied for a job here last year for a lab position, but he had no direct experience. He was, however, bright and well versed in physics and chemistry. I called him and offered him a job collecting research on a current project we’re working on.”

“What kind of project?” she asked.

He considered her for a moment before responding. “We’re conducting a dose reconstruction process for the area.”

Josie frowned. “Which means?”

“We’re looking at the amount of various chemicals in the environment versus the amount of various diseases typically associated with those chemicals.”

Surprised, Josie let her reaction show.

Paiva smiled. “Contrary to popular sentiment, we’re the watchdogs. We’re here to keep you safe. Leo has access to several thousand documents and historical records that were collected during the lawsuit. He’s compiling data. Our internal researchers will then assess the data.”

“Is he a good employee?” Josie asked.

“He’s done an excellent job analyzing and synthesizing data for us.”