there it was; Zane had already ratcheted up the jeers and his ass hadn’t even been in his seat for five minutes.
“Ignore him,” Linc advised. “Ivy brought home Eric’s new cat and now he’s salty the new pussy’s getting more attention than he is.”
“Can we please curb the shit talk while my woman’s in the room? And while we’re at it, get to fucking work.”
Zane lifted his head, pinned me with a Zane-Lewis-I’m-always-right stare, and smiled.
“We sure can, but first, I want it on record I’m not jealous of a pussy…cat. Also, the little furball claws my couch one more time it’s out on its ass.”
“Noted,” I grumbled. “Now, what did Delilah say?”
Thankfully, Garrett was prepared and Delilah’s email flashed on the big screen.
Short and sweet. A name and a phone number and a time Delilah would answer a call.
“Who’s Dr. Ramon Gates?”
“The key to the puzzle,” Garrett answered. “He was the leading scientist on a whacked experiment to restore brain circulation and function on decapitated pigs.”
Evette’s hand went to my knee and her short-cropped nails dug deep. In an effort to relieve the pain and prevent her from drawing blood I picked her hand up and threaded my fingers between hers and returned it to my lap.
“Are you serious?” Linc scoffed.
“Yep. Now, I say it’s whacked but in the scientific and research communities this is a huge breakthrough. However, it’s still highly controversial and the NIH is conferring with an ethics board about further experiments.”
“How is this the key?” Evette asked.
“In my opinion, this is what Abrams is hiding. They’re funding a lab in Croatia for Dr. Gates.”
Zane’s phone rang and he snagged it off the table and announced, “Tex. We’ll come back to this.” Then he swiped the screen and answered, “Tex, you’re on speaker.”
“Who’s in the room?” Tex’s voice boomed.
“Linc, Owen, Cooper, Garrett, Evette London, and Mr. Love Fool.”
I rolled my eyes and flipped Zane off.
“I see you have more than one situation on your hands,” Tex put in.
“I do. And it’s unfortunate because they never listen. I give sound advice from the start—glove up, don’t fight it, or do, just don’t bring your shit to work. It’s easy but they bring that shit into the office, then have a coronary when I try to run an op. I’m having Ivy draw up a new employee handbook. I have three more assholes after this and I want it in writing that any woman involved in any drama is off-limits.”
“Good luck with that.” Tex chuckled and at the same time Cooper said, “Where do I sign?”
“I followed Evette’s hunch and she was damn near spot-on.”
Evette perked up and smiled.
“Are there minerals on that plot?” she asked.
“There are. Silicon. It’s the semi-conductor needed in the manufacturing of integrated circuit boards.”
“I knew it. Abrams is trying to get their new cognitive radar to market before anyone else. The hold-up was on the manufacturing of the monolithic microwave integrated circuits. So that’s why they wanted the land. To mine it.”
“That and it makes for a good dumpsite.”
“Makes sense,” Garrett cut in. “You need to dope the chemical composition of silicon.”
“Um…sorry, you need to dope what?” Evette tilted her head and blinked.
“To make the circuit and the connecting circuits from the same string of silicon you need to alter the composition. Some of the dopants bond with silicon crystal and give up one electron…” Garrett paused and glanced around the room. I didn’t look but I was ninety-nine percent sure everyone had the same dumbfounded expression I had. “Never mind. Bottom line is, the dopants used are arsenic and gallium. Both highly toxic. Not only when they’re being used but stored and disposed of as well.”
Dumpsite.
Abrams was planning on using the civil unrest and low environmental standards to exploit the land then make it into a toxic wasteland.
“That’s concerning,” Tex continued. “But I took a closer look at the pictures Delilah Watts emailed Evette and that’s where the real issue is.”
Zane sat up in his chair and I watched as his overly-large frame stiffened. Then I praised all things holy that Kyle was still on vacation and not in the conference room. A threat against his wife would have his head spinning, which would translate into an ungodly amount of carnage.
“Who’s the target, Piper, Kalee, or Anaya?” Zane’s voice was edging toward the danger zone and his brother Linc perked up.
“None of them. I couldn’t figure out why Delilah sent those images. Nothing stood out so I looked at the EXIF data.