Page 6 of The Beachside Cafe 2
His face relaxed. “I’m glad to hear that, Jaymee.”
Her heart didn’t stop slamming in her chest all the way to Alex’s laboratory
.
FOUR
The moment they stepped into Alex’s lab, Jaymee was once again fascinated by the energy the young man exuded. She would have loved for him and Cheyenne to get together. But it wasn’t matchmaking time.
She and Cameron walked quickly down the long hallway to the lab and entered through the double doors. Jaymee was a little surprised that the doors were cracked open. When she went in, she knew Alex was waiting for them and suspected Cameron had called him when he was in the parking lot waiting for her.
“Close those doors, please,” Alex called out. He was once again dressed in a white lab coat, looking like an official scientist to Jaymee. “You two doing good?”
“As good as can be expected, Cameron said, hopping down the curved metal staircase to the lower level where Alex was working. He was moving quickly around the lab, moving from one monitor to another.
“Doing pretty good considering,” Jaymee said, following behind Cameron.
“Good, good, good,” Alex murmured, bending over a keyboard and tapping the keys frantically.
Jaymee would swear he typed 80 or more words per minute. He would be a fantastic secretary.
The thought made her grin wide. She and Cameron stopped in place and watched Alex move around the lab. Jaymee looked around, fascinated by all the tubes and liquids and Bunsen burners and everything a good scientific lab needed. Alex had inherited the lab from his uncle and though he was only 26, he was a brilliant scientist and well-known in those circles. His main focus was drugs and pharmaceuticals. He researched them and developed them just like his uncle had before he passed away.
“That second vial you gave me,” Alex said, speaking quickly and moving at the same speed he was speaking. Although he was speaking quickly, his voice was soft and smooth. “It was something different from the first, like I told you before, with only a few compounds switched. You know that the first drug contained chemicals that will paralyze a person. That makes them viable to being manipulated and moved without being able to fight back.”
“Correct,” Cameron said, crossing his arms over his chest. Jaymee was impressed with his appearance once again.
Alex crossed the room and stopped, remaining still in front of a computer monitor. He tapped a few keys and moved the mouse. “Come look at this.”
Cameron and Jaymee went over to flank him, all three pairs of eyes on the computer screen.
“What are we looking at Alex?”
Jaymee scanned the two graph images placed side by side on the large screen. There were names attached to the statistics that Jaymee didn’t understand. They all sounded very scientific. Possibly some Latin thrown in for good measure.
“This,” Alex pointed at the graph on the left side, “is the compound mixture that was in the first vial. I know you don’t know these names but look here. This compound has a 50% saturation rate in this graph and a 65% saturation rate in this one. That means it was more potent in the second than in the first. And take a look at this.”
He switched the graphs for two more and pointed at one bar and then another.
“This one? Not in the first one. This one is also not in the first one. But the first has two compounds that aren’t in this one.”
“So the second had different compounds swapped,” Cameron said, his eyes steady on the screen. He had one hand up, cupping his chin. He chewed on his bottom lip. “Why would they do that?”
Alex shook his head, taking a step back from the computer. “I don’t know but my best guess is that the first one didn’t work. Either that or it didn’t have the effect that was intended.”
“But what effect are they even trying to achieve?” Jaymee asked. “And what does this have to do with Doug?”
Cameron turned his head to look at Jaymee. “I think we know that now, Jaymee, don’t you? Give him the flash drive. See what he thinks.”
Jaymee nodded. She pulled the flash drive from her back pocket and handed it to Alex, who took it with a look of curiosity.
“What’s this?”
“It’s not that I don’t see the connection here, Cameron,” Jaymee said quickly. “It’s how Doug is involved that bothers me. I get that he knew about this drug business but how was he involved in it?”
“Those are definitely the questions we need to answer, Jaymee,” Alex said, lifting the flash drive in the air in front of him and shaking it at her. “And we will find the answers. Don’t worry about that.”
He turned and moved to one of the computers behind him. “Let’s just plug this baby in right here and…” He let his words trail off as he clicked on the appropriate icon to bring up the contents of the flash drive.
