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“We’re listening,” Matt said. They needed a break—any break.
“We don’t have anything more on Conrad James,” Ryder said. “But we were able to restore Rebecca Chavez’s computer and phone. You were right. She’s been tracking Kara since Kara received her FBI-issued cell phone.”
“That was in July.”
“And,” Sloane said, “we have pages of text messages to everyone involved in the grant scheme. Nothing blatantly illegal, but there are a lot of suspicious conversations and text messages that say, for example, ‘call my private cell.’”
“Okay.” Interesting, but not completely helpful.
“There’s also a password-protected file that Vik in IT was able to break. It’s documentation of Bryce Thornton’s obsession with Kara. It goes back more than ten years. Initially, Rebecca had been concerned and watchful, but over the last few months she was clearly fueling his rage.”
“To the point where Bryce outed her and Colton?” Matt asked.
“No,” Ryder said. “We have documentation that Rebecca sent Kara’s and Colton’s files to a television station, acting as a confidential whistleblower and pretending to be Thornton.”
“I’ll be damned,” Brian muttered. “She used him. And killed him. I didn’t want to believe it, but I can’t stop thinking about it.”
“We still need to prove it,” Matt said. “Anything else?” he asked.
“There is one more thing, and it might give you the motive you’re looking for,” Ryder said. “Sloane, tell him.”
Matt and Brian listened to Sloane as they sat outside of Rebecca’s house. When she was done, Matt knew they had enough.
“Outstanding,” Matt said. “Both of you.” He ended the call. “Are you ready?”
Brian nodded.
Matt let Brian explain to Rebecca everything they knew in detail. Brian did a terrific job speaking calmly, without anger, even offering hints of sympathy. Brian talked about her lifelong friendships, the love for her family, how things spiraled out of control.
“I might be able to let this all pass,” he said. “Terminate employment but not prosecute. Because you have done some great things in our office. You were a good agent. But I can’t walk away from murder.”
“What do you mean?”
Taking the role of bad cop—one he didn’t have a hard time pulling off in this case—Matt said, “Conrad James gave you the Colt .45. The same gun used to kill Bryce Thornton.”
“No. No! He’s lying.”
That she went so quickly to that denial told Matt they were on the right path.
“We have your computer and cell phone,” Matt said. “You should know that the FBI has a lot of computer talent. We have retrieved your emails. Text messages. Some vague, many questionable. We will put everything together. Agent Sloane Wagner works for me. She was assigned to your unit to investigate both you and Agent Thornton because we knew the leak to the media came from someone in your office. And there have been some cases that have been ignored, dismissed, deprioritized that are suspicious.”
Rebecca paled. “Brian—”
“I authorized it, Rebecca.”
“I—Oh, God.”
“Bryce was obsessed with all the cases that Kara Quinn and Colton Fox worked,” Matt said. “He had a stack of them in his office, in addition to every case my unit worked. Sloane took a picture of the files on Monday. We didn’t note that one of the files on his desk didn’t fit with the others, until we realized that it was gone.”
Rebecca didn’t speak, so Matt continued. Sloane deserved a commendation for finding the needle in the haystack with this one.
Brian spoke softly. “You know what file he’s talking about.”
Silence.
Matt said, “Bryce was looking at a case you buried related to Sunflower Group Homes. It’s one of the twelve nonprofits run by Zarian and others, but there had been multiple complaints and the group was sent to the FBI for investigation. You squelched it. Bryce pulled the file—I suspect because there was a very loose connection between Chen and Sunflower. Because of Bryce’s obsession with Kara, he looked at everything that may have touched her. He unknowingly uncovered your own crimes.”
She was shaking her head, but she didn’t say a word.
