Hot Water (17 page)

Hunter didn’t even bother to hide his snicker as he shut the door behind them. “Just like old times, isn’t it, Elizabeth?”

It took every ounce of energy not to slap him.

EIGHTEEN

It turned out Morris had walked from his office. I parked the SUV in the lot near the outer perimeter and we strolled toward the plant. Instead of taking the more direct pedestrian/tram route, he guided me along the road that looped around the outside of the parking lot and curved alongside the river. My polo shirt was quickly drenched in sweat. I wondered how he managed to look so cool. He wore khakis and a broadcloth shirt identical to the ones he’d worn yesterday.

“You and Owen grew up around here?” I broke the silence as we walked on the side of the road, only the chain-link fence separating us from the tidal mudflats. It was a bit cooler here in the shade of the live oaks. I liked the way they curved and twisted—they’d be fun trees to climb.

“Down the road. Small place, not even on the map anymore, not since the last census. Harbinger was its name. Mainly shrimpers and their families, just about all gone now.”

“And you both left? Went to college?”

He nodded, a sudden cloud of sorrow hiding his smile. I’d gotten used to seeing his constant smile and regretted asking the question as soon as it fled. “I was already at Georgia Tech when my folks died. Their insurance paid for Owen to go as well.”

“Are you both nuclear engineers? PhDs?”

“Not quite. I never got my doctorate—couldn’t handle the oral tests or dissertation defense.” The smile returned, a shy winking of self-effacement. “I don’t do so well around people. Not like Owen. He’s a real people person. Got his MBA.”

So Owen wasn’t even an engineer. We passed the second checkpoint and I stopped for a moment, admiring the way the sun wove through the fields of lavender and wildflowers. “Morris, I know this is none of my business, but did you know that Owen tells everyone that he designed Colleton Landing?”

He looked away, scuffing his boat shoe in a pile of pine needles. “That’s okay. We’re brothers. We’ve always shared everything.” Morris sounded like he believed that, but I wondered. To willingly give credit of his creation to his brother? “Owen says he needs this win. He’s meant for bigger and better things. World-changing things, he says. Not that he ever asks, but I think he’d be better off staying right here. We make a great team. And it’s nice, being back home.”

Grandel sounded like he had no qualms riding piggyback on his brother’s shoulders to secure his own place on the fast track. I made a mental note to ask Elizabeth to do some checking on Owen’s background.

“Don’t you want some of the credit? You deserve it.”

“Nah. Owen poured his heart and soul into this place. He was the one who got the funding, talked to all those congressmen and officials. Without him, Colleton Landing would never have been built.” He shrugged. “Like I said, I have a hard time talking to real people—not like you, I mean important people—not that you’re not important. You know what I mean. Crowds and committees and boards and inspectors and all. Owen does all that so well.”

“Morris, you know Owen is planning to expand the company, take your design around the world. Your ideas could be worth billions of dollars.”

“I already have everything I need right here. And if he stopped to think about it, so does Owen. We can be happy here, just like when we were kids.” His smile grew blinding, expanding to fill his entire face. “Owen will change his mind about leaving, I’m sure.”

I doubted that. Grandel, with his Armani suits and Rolex watches, didn’t seem the kind to stay in a backwater like this longer than necessary. Then I realized what was really worrying Morris. “He isn’t taking you with him?”

A strange look twisted across his face, like he’d swallowed the wrong way and had to choke it back down. He looked away and coughed. “Don’t worry. It won’t come to that. He’s going to stay.”

Poor Morris. He seemed like such a nice guy to have such a lousy brother. I changed the subject. “Is there a reason why someone would want to know in advance about a shipment of medical isotopes?”

He thought about my question without asking what was behind it. As if it were a logic puzzle rather than a possible security threat.

Nice and naive, despite his obvious genius. I felt a little bad about using him for info, but I didn’t want to go to Grandel with my suspicions until I understood more of what was going on.

“The isotopes are extremely time-sensitive,” he finally answered. “So if you knew a shipment was going out and you were able to stop it, theoretically the isotopes could decay to the point where they were unusable.”

“Would setting off one of the radiation alarms, like the incidents you’ve already experienced, delay a shipment from leaving?”

“Sure. We’d need to check it for leaks, make sure security was in place—” His face clouded again. “Oh, you think someone wants to steal the isotopes, make a dirty bomb?”

Actually, I was hoping he’d tell me that medical isotopes couldn’t be used for bombs. I didn’t like the idea of Vincent’s followers possibly intervening to bring about the end of the world themselves. “Is that possible?”

“Of course. See, a dirty bomb isn’t really about killing or hurting people. There’s not enough radiation to actually kill anyone, not unless you’re too close to a large concentration that’s unshielded. But the idea of
potential
radiation—that causes panic because people don’t understand. And that panic is the real danger, what the terrorists really want: to terrify us.”

“So the isotopes you ship, they couldn’t be used to build a conventional nuclear bomb?”

“No. Atomic bombs are made with plutonium or highly enriched uranium. We start with low-enriched uranium and bring it to criticality, producing Molybdenum-99, which is then extracted and subsequently used to produce the technetium and other isotopes used in medical tests and treatments.”

He shook his head. “People have been brainwashed into thinking any kind of nuclear event by definition cannot be survived. But even in the event of a real bomb or nuclear plant meltdown, simply staying inside behind a concrete wall will block the vast majority of radiation unless you’re in close proximity.” He suddenly ran out of steam, seemed surprised that he’d talked so much.

“Good to know.” I wasn’t sure if I should confide in him about what Vincent had asked me.

If Vincent was a real anti-nuclear crusader, then maybe he wanted to create a dirty bomb–like event and blame the plant to further his agenda. But Yancey’s portrait of Vincent as a greed-driven manipulator looking for an easy score by muscling in on Grandel’s company seemed more likely. “Do you have a shipment leaving anytime soon?”

“Sure. Tomorrow.”

“I think maybe you’ll want to increase security. I was talking to some of the protestors and they seemed interested in the next shipment of isotopes.”

He looked truly startled. And a bit frightened, as if the real world didn’t often impinge upon his sunshine-filled universe. “Our protestors?” He acted as if they were family. “Really? I don’t believe it.”

“Just add the security. For my peace of mind if nothing else.”

“Sure, AJ. No problem.” His mood and smile had returned to normal. “Anyone tell you, you’re easy to talk to? I don’t think I ever said so much in one sitting my whole life.”

By the time Elizabeth finished at court it was lunchtime. But before she could stop to eat anything—she’d skipped breakfast as well, felt like she was back in Philly rushing around and forgetting about everything except winning her next case—she had to convince AJ’s parents to move into the summerhouse with David.

When she pulled into their driveway, she saw Frank Palladino’s pickup truck parked there. As a foreman at Masterson Mining, one of the perks of working above ground was that he got to come home for lunch every day to his “lovely, blushing bride.”

In a way Elizabeth envied the deep emotions that bound Frank and Edna together, but, after seeing how they treated AJ, their only living child, she wasn’t sure that the price they’d paid—that AJ paid—was worth it.

Wondering if they’d pass that price onto their only grandchild, she walked up to their front door and rang the bell. Thankfully, it was Frank Palladino who answered instead of AJ’s mother. Frank at least tolerated Elizabeth. His wife, Edna, tended to look right past her as if she wasn’t there.

“AJ isn’t here,” Frank greeted her. As if she was a kid looking for AJ to come out and play. He started to close the door, but Elizabeth was prepared and slipped her foot over the threshold before he could retreat.

“I know. She’s in South Carolina. David needs your help.”

He glanced over his shoulder before stepping outside and closing the door behind him. “David? What’s wrong? Is he okay?”

“He’s fine.” She quickly outlined the events of the night before and the judge’s decision. “So you’re the only ones left. Unless you want him to stay with Masterson.”

She’d added the last hoping it would clinch things, but instead he nodded thoughtfully. “Mr. Masterson has that big house, all that help. He could keep a good eye on David. Better than we could.”

Lack of sleep and an overabundance of frustration welled up inside Elizabeth. “You cannot be serious! He’s your grandson—I can’t believe you can’t help out for just a few nights.”

The door opened before Frank could say anything and AJ’s mother joined them. “Frank, your lunch is getting cold.”

Frank turned away as if by delegating David’s care to Masterson, he’d solved the problem. Elizabeth could not accept that. “You do understand that without your help, AJ could lose her son. Forever.”

Total hyperbole—at least she hoped it was—but given the dirty tricks Hunter and Masterson had already played, Elizabeth wasn’t taking anything for granted. If they found any reason to prove AJ unfit to parent David, a sympathetic judge could grant custody to Masterson.

“What’s she talking about, Frank?” Edna Palladino asked, still not making eye contact with Elizabeth.

“AJ needs you to stay a few nights at the summerhouse with David,” Elizabeth answered her. “One or two nights at most. Just until she gets home.”

Edna wrung her hands and glanced over her shoulder at the empty foyer with its closed doors. Elizabeth had seen firsthand what lay behind those doors, but she never thought that a house filled with junk would take precedent over family.

“Leave? Who’d look after the house?” Edna asked Frank. “All our stuff?”

Frank ushered her back inside. He stood on the threshold, turning his head to follow Edna’s progress even as he spoke to Elizabeth. “I’m sorry. We can’t help.”

Then he slammed the door in her face.

The rest of the kids, Ty’s nieces and nephews and a few young cousins, were all outside playing in the woods. David had done most of his practice with his crutches on the mountain paths behind Ty’s mother’s house, but there hadn’t been time to drive all the way home to get them this morning, so today he was stuck in his chair.

That was okay. He had his notebook and pencils and laptop, and the house had a good Internet connection, so he parked himself in a quiet, shady corner of the side porch of the hundred-year-old log cabin and went to work analyzing Jeremy’s case.

Years ago, when he was a little kid, he’d devoured Sherlock Holmes, but now that he was learning more about science, he realized that you couldn’t rely solely on pure logic and deduction. You had to throw a little imagination into the mix as well. What Einstein used to call his thought experiments.

David began with a simple timeline scrawled onto a blank page in his notebook:

Dinner finished, 6:45, Flora fine.

Me and Elizabeth left for the summerhouse around 7:10, Flora fine.

Returned to find Jeremy smelling of alcohol and Flora passed out at 8:35.

Which left an hour and twenty-five minutes for someone to drug Jeremy and overdose Gram Flora. Flora said she’d fallen asleep right after dinner, when Jeremy had begun washing the dishes. But the dishes hadn’t been finished, so the attacker, call him Mr. X, must have interrupted Jeremy in the kitchen. Somehow surprised him and incapacitated him so fast that he didn’t make enough noise to wake Flora.