Chapter 23

After I squared away the new ground rules with the girls, Paz and I started to work on strategizing while the others prepared a welcome dinner for Tala. Everything had generally gone well, with Mayu and Paz sleeping in Mayu’s room and Luz with me, while Tala had her room to herself.

Monday started with a question that had gone forgotten in the chaos of yesterday. Would Tala be riding with me to work? It was a delicate question because of the nature of the image I was hoping to be able to present to the public.

“The solution is simple,” Paz said. “She goes with me in the Kia.”

I stroked my chin in thought. “I think that solves all our problems,” I said. “Yeah, that’s good.”

“I was a bit worried about how it would look if I arrived with you every day, Mr. Sheffield...” Tala said.

“Don’t be afraid to speak if you have questions or issues, Tala,” I said. “No one’s going to be angry with you.”

“No, it’s...” she said, biting her finger. “It’s not really an issue for me, but for you...”

“It is a problem for you,” I said. “We don’t want anyone getting ideas about you that aren’t true. I know how it looks for young women to live with an old man like me, even if I have a loving wife.” I winked at Luz, who was not wearing the maid outfit today, for Tala’s benefit.

Luz blew me a kiss from the kitchen.

“I just don’t want any of you to be disadvantaged over something so trivial.” And a bunch of other things it was best she didn’t worry about as well.

Paz and Mayu nodded over their coffee, and Tala felt she wasn’t in a position to argue back.

“You can start the day by helping Paz with the usual,” I said. “I’ll need you in the afternoon though, so I’ll send Mayu to pick you up after lunch. Okay?”

Tala nodded, and off we four went.

The morning was mostly uneventful. A few meetings about nonsense, some emails. The afternoon was what would be pivotal. Or maybe not. Maybe it was the paranoia, but the meeting that Roberts called via email in the middle of the night had me all sorts of suspicious. Especially for a meeting that was apparently so important it required all hands on deck.

Why not first thing in the morning, then? To give him time to do something this morning. But then why make it sound so urgent, going as far as to send the email at 5AM? To make sure everyone was there.

“What are you planning?” I murmured to myself in my otherwise empty office. “And is it your plan or someone else’s? Questions ... questions...”

While no answer came from the aether, the man himself happened to cross my vision. I’d never liked these glass walls, but they were worth their weight in gold on occasion. I jumped up from my desk and followed after him.

I quickly texted Mayu telling her to go have lunch with Paz and Tala, then I caught Roberts at the elevators. He was talking to our Head of Engineering, a joyless man called Johanson. I wouldn’t have thought he’d be involved in any sort of conspiracy or corruption, boring as he was, but one could never be sure.

“Roberts! Johanson!” I called. Roberts whipped around as if he’d heard a gunshot before forcing an easy smile onto his face. Johanson barely glanced in my direction. “Leaving for lunch? I’ll join you.”

“Of course,” Roberts said, betraying no further discomfort. “I didn’t think to invite you since you always eat alone, but you’re more than welcome, Sheffield.”

“Great!” I exclaimed. “I’ve been having more free time lately thanks to my new assistant. Thanks for signing off on that, by the by.”

He hadn’t really had a choice in the matter since being in charge of Operations meant I had some say in employee shuffling. I had also gotten in good with HR, often dropping by to have some coffee with the excuse of making sure they had everything they needed.

“Oh, it was no issue at all,” he said easily. “I’m sure she’ll be more use to the company in her current position.”

Maybe I was being touchy, but the way he intoned that didn’t sit well with me. Before I could fire back, the elevator beeped, and Johanson started muttering complaints about how it was always so slow as we entered.

“I’ve been seeing her around less often lately,” Roberts continued. “At first, I thought you fired her, but she’s putzing around on occasion, looking for files and such. What have you been using her for, anyway?”

Ugh. That wording was purposefully chosen to poke at me, I was sure. God, I fucking hated Roberts. If only he was half as good at his job as he was at bickering and sniping.

“She’s great at information retention and correlation,” I answered. “Exactly what I need to figure out what’s going on with manufacturing.”

Roberts hummed. “That’s just what I wanted to talk about, actually. This afternoon, I mean.”

“I had been wondering,” I said, searching his face for any clues. “I would’ve thought that if you had information on that you’d have wanted to divulge it this morning.”

“I wanted to be sure,” he said. “I was reviewing some data with Johanson here. I figured you wouldn’t appreciate it if I didn’t have all the details.”

I clicked my tongue theatrically. “So it really was the etching, then?”

His eyes widened, but only for a moment. I wanted to laugh but managed to keep an even frown on my face. The elevator doors opened at the first floor, and we made our way out of the building.

“It isn’t the machines, is it, Johanson?” I continued, pressing my advantage.

“Nope,” the disinterested engineer said. “We checked over the weekend. Has to be the chemicals. We think they started to add something cheap and neutral to bloat weight and lower costs while still charging us full price and hoping we don’t notice. This is what you get when you source local.” The man shook his head, murmuring some unflattering insult under his breath.

“Thought so,” I said. “The wafers were good enough, and I’d seen no reports of problems with the machines after we changed maintenance companies. I was going to start investigating the chemicals next, but it’s good that you’re ahead of the curve.”

Truth was that we were suspecting the chemicals because of their supplier. It seemed like an older one we’d been relying on for a long time. It hadn’t been changed in years. The replacement suppliers had always been newer companies. Never so new as to be suspicious, but set up a year or two in advance, and relying on local government contracts.