Derek looked over at him and shook his head. “She’s nuts.”
“I am not.” Grant watched as she looked up at the snow-covered trees surrounding them. “How could you not love this? It’s beautiful.”
“It’s cold and wet,” Derek grumbled. “It also makes it damn near impossible for me to drive my beautiful car, which is why I had to borrow one of R.I.S.C.’s.”
“Why are you here?” Grant asked bluntly.
Brynnon gave him a look, and he knew she was confused by his sudden change in mood.
Derek smirked. “Nice to see you, too, buddy.”
Rather than call him out on it in front of his teammate, Brynnon covered it with a smile. “Speaking of cold, my pants are soaked. I’m going to go change into something dry. I’ll put on a fresh pot of coffee for us while I’m at it.”
“Sounds great.” Derek grinned. “Thanks.”
“No problem.” With another quick glance in his direction, she turned and headed back to the cabin.
Grant waited until she was inside before speaking. “You must’ve found something important, otherwise you would’ve just called.”
“Very perceptive.” Derek reached into his coat and pulled out a file. “Our P.I. is officially missin’, and it doesn’t look good. Eric’s contact got back with him. No one’s seen or heard from Mitchell in several days. There’s no sign of his car, his phone is untraceable, and his mail’s stacked in front of his apartment door.”
Not wanting to jump to conclusions, Grant said, “Could’ve gotten caught up with another job.”
“That’s what I thought until I hacked into the guy’s bank account. There hasn’t been any activity since the day he was last seen. Not his checking, savings, or credit cards. And there are no records of any recent cash withdrawals, which he would need in order to stay off the grid.”
Grant sighed. “Damn. That’s not a good sign.”
“Nope. Eric’s contact is going to keep lookin’. In the meantime, the guy was able to get me access to Hank Mitchell’s computer.” Derek tipped his chin toward the folder. “That’s everything the P.I. had on the bridge collapse and Cantrell Construction. He’d deleted the file, but like most people, the guy didn’t realize deletin’ somethin’ doesn’t actually make it go away.” He looked back toward the cabin then to Grant. “I haven’t had a chance to look through it all, but from what I can tell, Wright was tellin’ the truth.”
“What do you mean?”
“Take a look at the P.O.’s.”
Grant opened the file and glanced over the documents. “Am I supposed to know what I’m looking for?”
“See the dates and company Cantrell supposedly ordered the supplies from? Those are all for the bridge in Kunar.”
Grant’s brows turned inward. “What’s your point? We already knew they built the bridge.”
“I accessed the listed buyer’s records to see if they matched. They don’t.”
“What’s off about them?” He looked back up at his teammate.
“Everything. There’s no record of that company havin’ ever received an order for those supplies on those dates. Not from Cantrell Construction or any other buyer I could find.”
Grant studied the P.O.’s. again. “What are you saying? These are fake?”
“Looks that way.”
Shit.“The only reason someone within the Senator’s company would falsify purchase orders would be to cover something up.”
Derek’s expression became grim. “Exactly.”
“We need to find out where they got the materials to build that fucking bridge.”
“From everything I’ve found so far, that’s where Mitchell’s investigation was headed when he disappeared.”
Grant closed the folder. “We figure out which company actually supplied those materials, they should be able to point us to the person responsible for the collapse.”
