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“I’ll help,” she said. “But tonight, I want you to go home, have a drink, relax. If you make any accusations against Kara Quinn while you’re on probation, it’s going to be a negative mark on your record. Whatever you find, give it to me, and I’ll figure out how we handle it. Agreed?”
He appreciated that she was trying to help him, but sometimes he wondered if Rebecca was just placating him.
“All right,” he said.
She rose, walked to his doorway. “For what it’s worth, I think you’re right.”
“About?”
“Chen. She arrives and he dies the same day? Proving it—that’s going to be difficult. Anyway, I’m going to walk you out.”
“But let me—”
“I know you, Bryce. If I leave, you’ll stay until midnight, and that won’t be good for you. You need a good night’s sleep. Look at the details fresh in the morning. Maybe by that time, LAPD will have more evidence.”
“Or maybe we can take over the investigation.”
She smiled. “I’m working on it.”
Tuesday, October 8
16
Kara liked Sloane Wagner.
She was smart, even-tempered and methodical in her presentation. Even though she was a rookie agent reporting to two SACs, she possessed a gravitas that held the room. She knew from Matt that Sloane was thirty-five and had served twelve years in the Marines after college. A woman in the Marines was badass, Kara thought. She was smart and pretty with long black hair, golden brown eyes, high cheekbones and light brown skin.
Last night, Matt had given Kara all of Sloane’s reports, which she had read into the wee hours. The interesting points she highlighted—that Bryce Thornton had been looking at specific LAPD cases, even though there was no federal component.
Sloane didn’t waste time. “I hope you have all read my reports. I know we don’t have a lot of time, but if you have questions, please let me know. For now I am focusing on Agent Thornton’s review of MRT cases, after discovering a copy of a file from the New Orleans office that Matt indicated was one of his cases.”
“Not specifically mine,” Matt said. “The Lafayette office ultimately took lead, but I’m in the paperwork.”
“So am I,” Kara said.
Matt nodded. “There’s no reason for him to be looking at it. How would he even know we were working a case in Louisiana?”
Brian Granderson made a note. “I should ask him, or Rebecca, but I’d like more information before I bring either of them in for a discussion.”
“I took pictures of all the files on his desk. I didn’t have time to go through each one, but highlighted the case numbers.”
“These are all MRT cases,” Matt said, flipping through the enlarged photos that Sloane provided. “This is the Seattle jurisdiction, when we were in the San Juan Islands...the Patagonia case, the Liberty Lake case. These here?” He tapped one of the pictures. “Dammit, this folder is from when I ran the Resident Agency in Tucson.”
Kara was also looking through Sloane’s report. “He has some old LAPD cases here as well—but I can’t see the file names.”
“He printed out my case files,” Matt said, clearly angry. “As if he’s investigating me.”
Kara looked at him pointedly. “Aw, now you know how I’ve felt for the last ten years.”
She said it lightly, but she was just as angry as Matt. Because Bryce Thornton hated her, he now had Matt in his sights. She didn’t want her problems to bite Matt on the ass.
“Honestly,” Kara said, “he’s probably doubling down on his investigation into me, and you were caught up in the net because you brought me onto your team. And filed the complaint that landed him in front of OPR.”
Sloane said, “I can go back to his office and look—”
“No,” Brian interrupted. “Too risky. I have legitimate reasons to walk through the office, so I’ll stop by and talk to him about an active case, see what he’s working on, and then find out what I can. What else do you have?”
“I’ve been monitoring the individual cases and physical movements of both Thornton and Chavez,” Sloane said. “Last night, they were both in the office until 9:40 p.m. They left at the same time.”
