IN Doubt by John W. Mefford

Author:John W. Mefford [Mefford, John W.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: pri, domestic suspense, amateur sleuth, private investigator suspense thriller series, crime fiction female, private investigator thriller series, female sleuth, mystery thriller series, crime thriller female, domestic thriller
Publisher: Sugar Hill Press
Published: 2017-05-05T05:00:00+00:00

25

It was close to midnight, and I stared out the window of Dillon’s office as a steady rain drenched the backyard. Emma was fast asleep, and Cristina was curled up on the couch, a random TV show playing as she read from her phone. After attributing her black eye to breaking up a fight at a shelter, she shut off almost all communication with anyone over the age of four. I didn’t bother asking about the scrapes on her face that had become more visible throughout the day. What was the point when she was in one of her funks?

With so many landscape lights shining from the trees, it made the raindrops seem fake, as if I were watching a Hollywood movie set. A yawn escaped my lips as I turned around and scanned Dillon’s office, lifting my eyes to the door every few seconds to ensure I wasn’t being watched. Zeke and two of his men were roaming the property to hold down the fort, but they rarely walked to this part of the house at night. I was counting on that trend to continue.

Besides two monitors, a pull-out ergonomic keyboard, a stash of pens, and a wire tray with two manila folders, Dillon’s L-shaped desk was mostly filled with mementos. On the corner of his desk was the largest memento: a brass clock. It had the Spatium logo etched into the glass and the phrase “Time on task” engraved on the side, with his name beneath it. I imagined that was something he’d given to all of his employees with the belief it would initiate remarkable productivity gains throughout the enterprise.

Oh brother.

Five other work-like trophies lined the front of his desk, all made out of glass or crystal, some spouting accolades for Spatium being a “favorite place to work” and the rest related to visionary leadership in space exploration technology. Pulling around to the other side of the desk, I ran my fingers across the mouse pad, something I hadn’t noticed earlier. It was a collage of Emma pictures, including one with her eyes and mouth wide open as she went down the slide. I wondered if that was her maiden voyage.

I paused and looked to the office door, thinking I heard footsteps from the hallway. After a couple of seconds, I realized it was nothing more than the patter of rain off the gutters from outside. I picked up the manila folders and opened the one on top. It was filled with loose papers, some with crumpled corners.

“Purchase orders,” I said out loud, riffling through page after page. The descriptions of the items were vague and might as well have been written in Chinese. What I did recognize were the dollar amounts. A few items with three digits in front of the decimal, but most had four and a few had five. In all, I counted twenty-seven pages of purchase orders dating back to no earlier than just four months ago.

Most likely, that was business as usual at Spatium as they continued executing their trips into space.

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