Fiction
When Toxic Rivers Flow Part 4
A Sunny Alexander-Johnson and Henry James Series By P.G. & Sharon Barnett
My name is Sunny Alexander-Johnson, and I’m Henry James, and we’re writers for Dark Sides of the Truth Magazine.
Along with the realization we had a serious discussion ahead of us with Cynthia Alexander, CEO of Alexander Investments, mother to one of us and wife to the other, came another realization.
Either Tim Rice or Roberto De La Cruz or maybe even both, needed to get inside the plant and someone needed to take the place of a very dead Louis Delgado.
And they needed to get in and hopefully out before local authorities started putting the pieces of the puzzle together. The arrival of local police asking questions that soon after Tim and Roberto come on board would clearly point the fingers of suspicion to the two men.
What’s the old saying?
Snitches get stitches.
While Robert, Manny, and Donnie assured us identification profiles could be created, complete with driver’s license, school records, and even tax returns, the problem wasn’t that.
It was Tim Rice’s insistence he needed to be Louis’s replacement.
“Look, as I said earlier, and no offense to my partner here, but nobody knows the textile industry like I do. I’m not trying to brag…”
“Unusual for you Rice.”
“Shove it, Henry. You of all people should know I’ve been following companies just like Uttar and others for years. Roberto’s a damned good journalist, but he’s just stepped out of the ring. I’ve been doing these kinds of stories for the better part of twenty years. I’m going in and that’s final.”
None of us chose to argue the point. Tim was right and we all knew it. We all also knew Tim was putting himself in front of somebody or an entire group of people who had no problem killing to keep their secrets from going public.
“Tim, at least let Roberto go in with you. He can be a worker bee at the plant. I’ve seen him in action. He can handle himself well enough and if you two get in a spot I think you’ll be glad he with you. Besides, have you ever done anything like this before?”
“No.”
“Then you at least need to have some muscle with you, Look, we’ll put you two in an apartment in Brownwood where we can set up shop. You and Roberto can give us daily status reports until you both feel you’ve got enough to run the story. Plus we can provide you communications if need be. Roberto? You game?”
“Yeah, Robert. No problem.”
Robert turned away from the conversation, gazing at Manny.
“When is Becca coming back?”
“This Wednesday.”
“Okay, that should give Donnie enough time to create the history for Tim and Roberto, and for us to rent an apartment big enough to handle the seven of us.”
“Seven of us?”
“Yeah, Sunny. Me, Manny you, Henry, Donnie, Tim, and Roberto.”
“Oh hell no, Robert. Brownwood is only a two-hour drive from here. This ain’t summer camp where we all sit around toasting marshmallows, then hold hands and sing Kumbayah.”
“And if something goes south with Tim and Roberto, we can’t wait two hours for you to show up before we make a move, Henry. You know better than that.”
“Tim. How much time do you think you’ll need?”
“Well, I’m not sure Robert. A couple of weeks, maybe more.”
“Oh, for the love of God. Seriously Rice?”
“What? Henry, it’s not like Roberto and I are going to go waltzing in there and start asking people to show us how they dump toxic waste into the freaking Colorado River. Come on man think about it.”
“I think there’s something none of you geniuses have thought about.”
“What’s that Sunny?”
“What if Uttar isn’t hiring?”
It was such a simple question. Five words spoken in less than three seconds. But those five words might have possibly revealed a huge barrier not only to getting inside the plant but getting to the story as well.
“Way to go Debbie Downer.”
“Somebody had to say it, Henry.”
“Okay, you might be right hon, but we still need to move forward until we can’t. In the meantime, you and Henry still need to speak with Cynthia about that stock thing right?”
“Don’t remind me, Robert. Henry? Tell mother Robert and I are coming over tonight.”
“Bring the twins. We’ll need them to run interference for us.”
“You can count on it. You know how mother gets when we start sticking our noses into things.”
“I don’t think Cynthia minds us poking around on a story, princess. What she minds is the possibility of us getting our asses shot. I recommend we don’t say anything about Louis Delgado unless we absolutely have to.”
“Agreed. Well, let’s leave Tim and Roberto with Magic Donnie and head back to Dark Sides. We need to let Rick know what the plan is.”
The thing about having a plan was on most stories we’d worked over the years we were usually long on instinct and very short on plans. Unless the plan was something we came up with on the spot.
For us, making plans too far in advance usually meant something, in most cases, the plan, would go horribly wrong. Fortunately, this wasn’t our plan. We were more worried about the revelation our mistress Karma had provided. The little with a little eye-opener. The part about Alexander Investments owning shares in Uttar Textiles.
Not usually a big deal. That’s pretty much what investment companies did. Invest. Except for this particular investment made several years ago, when Tim and Roberto eventually broke their story, Alexander Investments stood to lose a large chunk of change when Uttar’s stock prices began to tumble. And it was a forgone conclusion they would. Investors usually get a bit nervous when toxic rivers flow.
And if the secretive pollution of the Colorado River wasn’t bad enough, a body had been found floating in that same river. Now it wasn’t just a scandalous bit of industrial espionage our hastily joined journalistic team was involved in. It was murder.
Read On — When Toxic Rivers Flow Part 5
Let’s keep in touch: P.G. & Sharon Barnett ([email protected]) © P.G. Barnett, 2020. All Rights Reserved.
