Snippet #2682067

Rosemary nodded. "Exactly," she said to Ben, trying to think of what it could be that Whelan was hiding. The missing girl's circumstances were far too suspicious to deny that Expercon had something to do with it. "And if those friends in high places even have an inkling of our mission it could all go downhill very fast, so this mission is top secret." This was more directed at James. She knew Ben wouldn't go around talking about it, but James was new -- he hadn't yet had the protocol buried in his mind. "We don't know how far Whelan's net of people goes," she muttered and frowned to herself. If he did have a friend in the agency, this whole mission could go haywire. No, that was daft. Whelan was powerful, but the agency was extremely tight on security. Rosemary shook away the thought and focused on Ben's question about bringing down Expercon.

"I don't know," she admitted. "Bringing down Whelan might not mean totally destroying Expercon, but it would greatly depend on what information we collect." She pressed a button on the remote, removing Charlotte Groves' picture from the screen and turning it off. "The scandal of the century," she smiled at Ben. "That's worth coming back for." And she was glad he had. She knew she would have worked equally as hard were she with a different team, but the success rate improved dramatically having Ben here. Besides, she enjoyed working with him.

James exhaled loudly, snapping Rosemary's attention back into the room. "Wow," he said. "I have to admit, I feel like I'm being thrown in the deep end. I figured my first mission would be, I don't know, helping find out the password to some computer or something, not bringing down a multibillion dollar company -- or at least, the man behind it." He ran a hand through his already unkempt hair. "Where do we start?" He looked at Rosemary and then at Ben. He assumed that while Rosemary was an expert in the chemistry side of it, it was Ben that would be training him.