Page 187 of Chameleon Killer

Alisha exhaled. “Twenty-minute break.”

Brewster spoke immediately. “We need to continue.”

“No.” Alisha began closing her legal pad. “My client needs food, caffeine that hasn't been used to remove industrial paint, and a bathroom.”

“I don't need⁠—”

She looked at me. I reconsidered. Right. “Yes. All of those.”

“Ten minutes,” Brewster said.

“Twenty.”

“Fifteen.”

Alisha stood. “Twenty.”

Ortiz coughed into her fist. It sounded suspiciously like laughter. None of us commented on that as we left the room.

The hallway outside possessed the ambiance of every civic or government building I'd ever visited.

Gray carpet. Beige walls. Fluorescent lights specifically designed to destroy hope. Someone had placed two vending machines at the far end as if cheap calories could compensate for the utter despair housed here.

Alisha marched us into a smaller consultation room and shut the door. Then she turned on me.

“What part of I represent you did you interpret as please antagonize the federal profiler until his eye twitches?”

“I didn't see an eye twitch.”

Flint pinched the bridge of his nose as he nudged me into a chair. “Thumb.”

I looked at him and he rubbed his thumb against his index finger.

“That's his tell.”

My eyebrows rose. “You saw it too.”

“Yes.”

Alisha stared at both of us. “I hate journalists.”

“You represent a media company,” Flint pointed out.

“Clearly, I’m into masochism.” She put both hands on the table. “Listen carefully. You two are not investigators for purposes of what happens in that room.”

“That feels unnecessarily restrictive,” I said.

She ignored me.

“The FBI has compromised evidence. CPD is unhappy. Everyone is territorial. Nobody knows how that surveillance feed was created, altered, or delivered.”

“I know.”

“Do you?” Alisha leaned closer. “Because you seem remarkably eager to give them additional material to fight over.”

That shut me up, for the moment.

She continued. “You asked for counsel because you recognized you couldn't trust the environment.”