Chapter 12
Riley walked to her office. Her heart still sang with the remembered warmth of Talon’s body.
She could practically feel the gentleness of his touch.
Last night was perfect in so many ways. The fact that he didn’t demand anything more than she could give cemented her love for him.
That was a blessing. No, he was the blessing.
She knew she wanted to be with him, but it was also important to her to establish the fact that there was something besides the texts before they fell into bed.
She’d talked about this scenario with her therapist. It had been morbidly embarrassing at first, but the doctor didn’t judge her, which had helped.
So, she’d known what she’d needed from their meeting.
She’d needed to know for a fact that there were real feelings and a connection.
And man, oh man, was there a connection. It sizzled in all the best ways.
She smiled up at the dark pre-dawn sky. All her fears had been swept away with his words and actions.
Nothing prevented her from a real relationship with Talon.
Every doubt and worry had evaporated in a single night.
Their connection was tangible and as strong as the love she held in her heart for him.
Love. The word had no way of describing the emotions flowing through her veins.
She was in love with a man who loved her in return … and they hadn’t slept together yet.
A happy smile floated across her expression until she walked up to the inner portion of the mining encampment.
She punched her code into the locked gate surrounding the controlled access portion of the mining facility.
Well, the entire camp was controlled access, but here, where the buildings processed and moved the rare earth minerals, the access was restricted to only those with the needed clearance.
It was the back way into her office, but she knew every inch of the facility.
She glanced over at the processing building.
She couldn’t shake the feeling that the mining camp had changed in the year since she’d left.
She considered the area as she walked. It wasn’t the buildings or the equipment.
Those still wore the same sun-bleached metal roofs, the same rusted bolts that the desert winds tried to pull loose every dry season.
The cafeteria still smelled faintly of burnt coffee and industrial cleaner.
The hum of generators still underscored everything.
It was the rhythm that felt different.
She pondered that thought as she made her way into her building and upstairs.
After starting the coffee in the office break area, she logged into her workstation in the ESG office.
Riley let her fingers hover over the keyboard for a moment.
A year away recovering and rebuilding her life.
Honestly, that time away should have made her feel like a stranger here.
But it wasn’t her who felt out of place.
It was the work. She felt like she was a half step behind what was happening, and that sensation bothered her.
The day started the same way it always had.
She checked the environmental readings from the air quality monitors, comparing dust suppression logs against the day’s output.
She reviewed the tailings pond pH levels.
Water treatment discharge compliance reports were provided to her daily.
She signed off on the community engagement calendar, which included a literacy program at the local school, a weekly supply delivery to the clinic, and updates for the quarterly stakeholder meeting.
Everything looked clean. On paper, it was exactly the kind of report an ESG Officer wanted to see—steady compliance, no deviations, no spikes.
She stared at the summary of reports. Yeah, it was clean. Almost too clean, and that poked at her more than if there were glaring discrepancies. Discrepancies were worked and cleared up. Discrepancies were expected. Discrepancies were why she was doing the job she was hired to do.
She filled her coffee cup and went back into her office, acknowledging those who had made it into work already. She sat down behind her desk and opened the first report again. What was it that wasn’t adding up? Or rather, why was it adding up perfectly?
Her father’s name lit up her phone. She glanced at the clock. It would be about ten at night there. Typical. Her father never stopped working.
Riley straightened and hit accept. “Good morning, sir.”
“I just got off a call with one of the board members. They’re pleased with the ESG optics this month. How’s the PR work coming along?”
Riley kept her voice even. “I just got here, so any congratulations should go to the staff that was here before me.”
“Whatever. You’re in charge now. Handle it however you want. Give me a rundown of what you actually know. I hope you do know something by now.”
She hated the way he dismissed any comment she made that didn’t fit his agenda and belittled anything she accomplished.
She ground her teeth for a moment before speaking as concisely as she could.
“We’ve had excellent compliance across all reporting categories.
Our engagement programs are on schedule.
The school literacy program is expanding next term, the medical supply shipments to the clinic have been consistent, and the reclamation project on the south site is exceeding its vegetation regrowth targets.
Community relations remain steady. There have been no protests and no formal complaints.
” Informal, yes. They handled those at the site level.
Nothing that had been briefed to her needed to be up-channeled.
“So, you’re doing your job,” he said, brisk and distracted. “Keep it that way. The optics matter, Riley. Don’t let any of those feel-good programs slip. That’s your department’s job.”
“I’m on it,” she said and ended the call before he could push further.
She took her cup of coffee and turned in her chair to look out the window at the plant.
Why did she let her father affect her? Her therapist said it was because she’d always looked for his approval and never really received it.
Well … duh. She rolled her eyes. But why did she need it?
That was the question the doctor had asked.
She still didn’t have an answer. Because she’d never had it?
Because he was everything in her world, her ideal, her hero.
She blinked and smiled slowly. No, he wasn’t.
Talon was her ideal man. Talon, who was strong beyond measure yet kind and gentle.
Talon, who did thankless work to protect innocents and worried that he’d let people down.
He was a real man. Her father was … he was a user.
He used his money, people, connections, influence …
anything he could to improve his status, wealth, and power.
Wow. She blinked and took a sip of her coffee.
She’d have to tell Talon about her early morning revelation.
It was a truth bomb that cleared away a lot of the confusion and worry about her plan to dig.
Taking another sip of her coffee, she turned to her computer.
Discrepancies made sense. Perfection was …
impossible. But there was a time and place for her digging.
Right now, she needed to handle the daily load.
She turned back to her work. With the PR updates done, she moved into her usual internal checks.
This was where she deviated from her standard.
This site should have been her priority, but she couldn’t help revisiting the reports that had initially raised her concerns.
Riley opened the export compliance reports for Bolivia and Indonesia first. Her last days before she’d left had been filled with frantic emails, flagged discrepancies, and half-written summaries pointing to inconsistencies in weights, declared values, and mineral classifications.
She wanted to finish the work, gather all the necessary information, and get everything settled.
The files loaded in a clean sweep of perfect rows.
Everything reconciled.
Riley frowned, leaning closer. This was wrong.
Shipping weights matched invoice values to the decimal.
No fluctuating grades, no missing bills of lading.
Sanitized. She clicked the file icon to view her notes and found they’d been deleted.
She kept her notes in a password-protected file.
Leaning back, she stared at the reports and felt fury at the audacity of her father.
He was the only one she’d told about the discrepancies.
He would be the only one who could have accessed her folders.
He had access to everything. What was he hiding?
What was the goal in hiding what she’d found?
She still had paper copies of the reports.
She’d brought clean copies with her and left the ones her father had seen at his house.
Her training had taught her that clean data wasn’t a sign of efficiency. It was a sign someone wanted you to believe it. She right-clicked the Bolivia report and checked the version history. Modified: Two weeks ago. By: Admin.
Her pulse ticked faster. Admin accounts weren’t supposed to be used for report entry—certainly not for historical edits. That was IT’s catchall for bulk uploads. She clicked through Indonesia. Same modification date. Same Admin signature.
Someone had gone in during her transition to her assignment and wiped the slate clean.
She minimized the window just as a knock sounded at her door frame.
Webb leaned in, big shoulders filling the space, a cup of coffee in one hand. “Hey. You’ve been buried in that thing since you came in. What are you working on?”