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Fancy watch guy lifted his chin. “Jasper Hollingsworth.” He pointed at the last man, the redhead, who had a mouthful of biscuits and gravy, the container at his chin. “That’s Dakota Masterson.”
She smiled. “Nice to meet you all.”
“Got an update on the case?” Gage asked.
“Here.” Before she could answer, the sergeant handed her a full mug of coffee. “Cream or sugar?”
She took it, careful not to spill like the total dork she could occasionally be. “This is good. Thanks.”
“Let’s go over what you’ve got.” Gage tossed his napkin and walked out of the room.
Clare followed, slipping the flash drive out of her pocket. “Can I plug this in?”
He frowned, now beside the table. She realized it was one of those huge computers the twins loved. Peter and Simon were obsessed with gadgets, and she had to routinely deny their equipment requests when they said,Because it looks funin the reason they needed it column.
“Plug it into the PD system?” Gage stared at her. “So your people can hack the department network? I don’t think so.”
“You think I’d do something like that?”
“I don’t know anything about what you might do.”
Clare held her tongue. She could be a professional, civil enough they got along for the duration of this case. She could suck up all her feelings about Gage and the way he’d dropped her like a hot potato. Do the job. “Then maybe you have an air-gapped computer. If you’re worried about a security breach.”
“Sarge!” He yelled so loud she started, then his eyes narrowed.
Liam appeared at the door. “Yeah?”
“Get me the alligator.”
The sergeant headed for the office to grab a laptop while Gage said, “Does that flash drive have what you found on it?”
Clare might as well tell him. “Despite listening to four thousand audio samples over the weekend, I didn’t manage to identify the suspect.”
Liam snorted. “Must’ve been fun.” He powered up the laptop.
Gage dragged it over to in front of him on the table. “Thanks.” His tone very clearly said,You’re dismissed.
Liam flicked his smirk over to Gage and said, “Coffee?”
“No thanks.” Gage didn’t look up from the screen. He held his hand out, and she put the flash drive in it. “The bank surveillance has no audio, and no one recorded what happened inside. So we only have your word for it on what the suspect said to you.”
“Then you have everything you need, because I recounted it word for word.” She sipped her coffee and tried to rein in the need to defend herself. She had no idea why he’d broken up with her. He didn’t know what’d happened to their baby, and she did need to tell him. But the reality seemed clear. He’d never cared about her. He just got what he wanted and ended it when she betrayed him by getting pregnant. Like that meant she was diseased.
“Great. We’ll work with this today and see what we can come up with.”
“I’ll let you know if Vanguard comes up with anything on the clothing.” They’d have to not only track down where it was purchased but get credit card records and work through the transactions until they were sure who bought the clothes those men had been wearing. “Because the paint from the van is so generic, there’s no way to narrow it down. Same with the tire tread they left on the road when they peeled out.”
“What about DNA?”
“We’re processing it, but there are over three hundred samples so it’ll take time.” They would be markedly faster than the local lab the PD used, which was generally backed up three weeks.
Clare finished her coffee. “I’m going to grab a refill.” Mostly just because she needed a break from him. The way he was would help her be professional, but the hurt she had buried so long ago seemed to want to leak out anyway.
She poured from the carafe and blew out a long breath where no one could see her take a moment.
“You want any of this food?”
Clare turned to find the fancy watch guy—Jasper Hollingsworth—behind her. She was pretty sure he was related to Senator Hollingsworth, but she’d only seen the guy on TV. “I had a smoothie earlier, but I might snag a pastry closer to lunch.” She leaned against the counter. “So what’s it like working with Gage?”
