“This way.”
He wasn’t the CEO of the company and it showed. Elijah’s office was only big enough to fit a desk, a love seat, and a coffee table. His view wasn’t the greatest either. It faced the mill instead of the front view of trees and a nicer landscape of the town. There was also the metal roof of the first floor that was right outside the window. Storm debris and rust patches sat along its creases. There was also a damp smell that met Blake’s nose as she was guided into the lone chair opposite his desk.
All in all, it didn’t seem to fit the man wearing a suit on a Sunday.
“Sorry again for the misunderstanding,” Elijah began. “Rhonda, my father’s assistant, will contact me if there’s business after hours or on the weekends so as to give my dad some space. When the request came in for you to talk to him, it came to me first. I felt like I was just as capable of answering, and, well, she said there sounded like there was some urgency there too.”
Blake decided to play it sweet for a while. She upped her southern twang and made sure to smile nice.
“Well, I sure do appreciate you taking the time to see me, especially on the weekend and on such short notice. You must be plenty busy as it is.”
That seemed to stroke his ego just right.
His shoulders relaxed as he sat forward and domed his fingers together.
“I’m just happy to be of help. I heard you wanted to talk about your sister, Beth Bennet?”
Blake was curious as to how much Elijah actually knew of what happened. She watched his expression closely as she spoke.
“Yes. I recently heard that Beth had a fight with your father about the safety investigation she performed here on the Hector Martinez incident. I know it’s none of my business, especially if it was about work, but it happened to be the day she passed, and, well, I’ve been trying to get a better idea about my sister’s life leading up to her last days. So I thought I’d ask your father what that fight might have been about, especially since it’s so unusual for Beth to get heated.”
Elijah was as cool as a cucumber. No surprise.
“Ah, yes, I remember the fight. Though it was more of a misunderstanding. She thought my father had disregarded her suggestion for a several-step authentication system for the furnaces’ computer system.In realityit was me who went in a different direction.” He swapped out his smile for a look of concern. “My father was trying to explain I had already implemented a new security system that would take care of any future human-caused errors.”
If he had stopped right there, if he had ended his side at that moment, then Blake might have wavered in her initial thought of the man. She might have questioned if Missy’s ex, Kyle, had seen the end of the fight instead of just the yelling. Then, realizing she had never asked, felt a bit guilty and frustrated that she hadn’t thought to at the coffee shop the day before. She would have felt a sliver of negligence, all her fault.
But Elijah kept talking.
“I was ready to personally reach out to her to explain the situation, but, well, I never got the chance.”
It was a simple statement and understandable. He couldn’t have talked to Beth about the change because Beth had had her accident right after.
It made sense.
However, Blake had made a career of reading people. Of following her gut.
He’d met her on the weekend instead of his father. It didn’t feel like an obligation.
It felt like Elijah Grant wanted to talk to her for his own reasons.
So she kept going to see which one of them would get what they wanted first.
“I guess you can explain it to me, then?” she asked sweetly. “I mean, I don’t know a lot about computers, or anything really about them, but it sounds like you do. I’m sure my sister would have loved to hear it.”
Elijah’s smile lifted.
It wasn’t like Liam’s at all. Liam’s made her feel warm. This man’s made her feel like she had just accidentally touched something wet while using public transportation.
He waved his hand through the air, all nonchalance.
“I won’t get into the specifics, but the new system that’s in place is all automated, minus a few initial commands.”
“Automated? The furnaces can run on their own?”
“Once set up and given specific times to run, yes,” he said. “We still need people to man them, but now we don’t have to worry about people like Mr. Martinez getting hurt during their maintenance.”
“But he wasn’t hurt during their maintenance.” The words came out as Sheriff Bennet instead of coy Blake before she could stop them. She tried to save face in the next breath. “I mean, I heard that Hector’s accident was him trying to manually shut them down after one started overheating. He was worried the whole warehouse might go if one had a meltdown and that the entire mill would be affected. That’s the word around town at least.”
