Page 228 of Chameleon Killer

The typing indicator appeared again. I watched it. One second. Two. Three.

Ask the question you are actually afraid to ask.

I stared at the screen.

I knew the question. Of course I knew. My fingers hovered over the keyboard.

Warren repeated my name, but I pivoted ob my heel and strode out of the office. I bypassed the other agents and cops in the hallway, aware of Warren calling after me.

He’d suspended me. I was leaving.

It wasn’t until I was in the elevator that I typed in my question.

What did you tell Mallory about me?

The typing indicator appeared instantly. My breath stopped. Then the answer arrived.

Nothing she hadn't already begun to see.

Rage slammed through me. I typed faster.

Stay away from her.

The response took longer this time. Ten seconds. Twenty. The elevator dinged as we arrived at the ground floor a split-second before the message appeared.

That’s the part of you she should fear.

I stared as the breath backed up in my lungs. He was baiting me. I recognized that he was baiting me. I had spent my entire professional life identifying escalation strategies, provocation loops, narcissistic injury, displaced aggression.

I knew exactly what he was doing, but I responded anyway.

You don't know anything about me.

Three dots.

I know you followed her after being told not to.

My hands went cold.

The next message arrived before I could answer.

I know you withheld Reardon's second toxicology.

I was striding across the lobby for the exit doors. With my credentials, badge, and Bureau phone out of my hands, I didn’t even have a vehicle here.

I also know why.

The air outside was almost icy against the flush of my face. Raw anger chugged through my system with every thump of my heart. I turned away from the CPD and strode, almost blindly down the sidewalk as the phone vibrated in my palm.

Specificity matters, Elliot.

For the first time since the night began, I understood something Mallory had already figured out. Simon wasn't talking to me because he wanted information.

He already had it. He was talking to see what I would do. And every answer I gave him was another piece of evidence. I began to strip my phone apart. If he was messaging me on it, he could track it. So could the Bureau for that matter.

I dumped a different piece of it into each trash can as I passed it on my way toward the L. The humiliation should have burned. Instead, I felt strangely calm.

When the last piece landed in an overstuffed can, I ignored it and headed up the steps. I had no credentials, no weapon, no phone, and no case.