“Leftovers from a corporate picnic last week. You should see all the Sprite I got stacked in my garage.”

I spin around at the sound of his voice, closing the refrigerator door; I hadn’t realized he had followed me into the kitchen. But if he notices my discomfort, he doesn’t appear to.

“If you want ice, it’s in the door,” he offers brightly.

“Just water’s fine,” I say.

He crosses to the cupboard, takes down two glasses, and fills them from the tap. He downs his and watches me carefully as I drink, as if my reaction will bring a final and definitive end to our investigation. The water tastes fine.

Brent’s refrigerator door is cluttered with magnets, and before we leave the kitchen, I notice that one of them bears Aaron Pulaski’s name. He sees me looking at it.

“Local guy,” he says. “Or as local as he can be. He comes from over in Hanover. I did some work on his campaign.” He says it casually enough, but I’m sure I’m not imagining the new tension in the way he’s standing. “I thought he’d do some good for the district. Turns out he’s just as incompetent as the rest of the pack.” He shrugs. “Oh, well. We all make mistakes, right?”

“We sure do,” I say. When he turns his back to me, I slip the magnet into my pocket. Weak spots.

Chapter Sixteen

Monday morning, Joe and I strategize. We’ve got one chance in a thousand that a circuit court will take our slipshod suspicions for evidence, but all we need to do is file the suit—and hope Optimal is frightened into giving us actual evidence.

We can’t get a court appointment until Wednesday afternoon, which gives me a few days to put together a cohesive picture and try to find a prosecutor’s office willing to work the criminal side of the investigation.

Flora and Portland head down to greet the ETL lab techs; they’ve arrived to draw samples from the reservoir and from the filtration plant it feeds to, and I want to be sure no one bothers them while they work. Maybe I’m being paranoid, but given Optimal’s long tentacles, and its grip on Barrens, I can just see some local townies trying to chase them off with pitchforks—or, more likely, .22s.

I put in a message to the county prosecutor’s office where Aaron Pulaski worked until recently, and kill a few hours researching the bioaccumulation of a variety of types of heavy metals, detailing the evidence found in plants and seedlings—at least we know the foliage can’t be paid to keep quiet.

Just before lunch my phone blows up, and a woman with the kind of chirpy voice that immediately suggests a pantsuit introduces herself as Dani Briggs, junior prosecutor. “I got your message,” she says. “But I’m afraid we can’t help out. There was a personnel sweep after Mr. Pulaski left.”

One skill I’ve learned as a lawyer: to make a no into an opportunity. “Why so much turnover?”