Page 56 of Backwater Justice
“Sure. No big secret there. Toilet paper, tissues, cleaning supplies. Not classified documents.” She chuckled.
“Maybe you could give me a quick tutorial?” Isabelle asked.
“Sure thing. Just give me a few minutes.”
Isabelle sat in front of a computer screen that had the company logo as the wallpaper. She clicked it. Up came the main website with company information, personnel, and back story. The usual things to be found on a company website.
Jessica rolled herself over to Isabelle’s desk. “See that S.E.I. icon on the bottom? Click there.” An entirely different menu appeared. “That’s our database.”
Isabelle wondered if it was secure enough. Given her newly acquired hacking skills, she could test the system after hours.
“At the top are all the individual tabs for each division. Click on Cascade. Okay, there you see each individual location. Click on Eugene. There you’ll see all the inventory, staff, schedules, and the rest.”
“Pretty streamlined.” Isabelle nodded.
“Everything on these tabs populates to another program where Mr. Milton can view things in a number of ways. Like, if he wants to know the total number of rolls of toilet paper used each month, and so on. Sorry if I use toilet paper as an example, but it seems like that’s what I spend most of my time chasing. Can you believe people actually steal rolls of it?”
“I guess if you’re a trucker, you might be worried about not making it to the next rest area,” Isabelle joked.
Jessica cackled. “Good point.”
“So, Mr. Milton is the only one with access to that part of the database?”
“All three Spangler men,” Jessica replied.
“Got it,” Isabelle said. “I think I can figure this out now. I’m going to go down to Eugene either tomorrow or the next day, so I’ll start with that database. Manager and assistant manager?” Isabelle asked.
“Doreen Finamore is the manager. Nice woman.”
Another nice person. The company was beginning to sound too good to be true.
“Assistant manager?” Isabelle asked.
“He left. I think it had something to do with that Lori George girl.”
Jackpot!“What do you mean?” Isabelle asked.
“We had a young woman. Student. She worked part-time. Showed up day before yesterday, punched in, but then disappeared.”
“Disappeared? How strange.” Isabelle reacted as if she had no idea.
“Yeah. Mr. Oliver wasn’t too happy about it. Her folks went on TV last night. Said she would never ditch her job. Or school. Or her family. She lived at home while she was working on her degree in the hospitality business.”
“No sign of her?” Isabelle furrowed her brow.
“Not a stitch. Such a shame. She’s the second person gone missing between here and Eugene in the past two weeks.”
“Wow. That’s scary,” Isabelle replied.
“Sure is. Nobody is sayin’ anything. Not the sheriff, the news people. Nobody. Her folks want to bring in the Bureau of Indian Affairs, but local law enforcement said they should wait a day or two. They say she isn’t a missing person until she’s been gone for more than twenty-four hours.”
“Actually, that’s not true. Only on TV and in the movies. If anyone believes foul play is involved, they are urged to file a police report immediately.”
“Huh.” Jessica looked confused.
“I know someone who works for the U.S. Marshal’s office,” Isabelle said. “He specializes in missing kids. Or he used to.” Isabelle was referring to Myra’s friend Ellie, who had an art center in Asheville, North Carolina. One of her tenants was engaged to the marshal.
“Wow. That’s a pretty tough job, wouldn’t ya say?”