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“What are your thoughts on Dr. Kolsby?” Theo asked as they walked toward the front door. He opened it, allowing another cold gust of wind to enter the foyer. Brook grimaced when she realized that she’d left her gloves in the van. She tucked her hands in her coat pockets as they began their trek to the Jeep parked behind Hadley’s unmarked cruiser. “Do you think he knew all along?”
“I’d like to say that he didn’t know, but we all sense when things aren’t right with our lives…when we lose balance. He definitely knew something.”
Brook thought back to that cold day when Sally had agreed to follow Jacob.
While Brook had never really said her fears about Jacob aloud, Sally had to have sensed the evil that surrounded him. The darkness that lived inside of him. While they hadn’t continued to follow him that day off the highway outside of Peoria, there really hadn’t been any need.
They’dknown.
What they hadn’t known back then was that knowledge was power.
Chapter Thirty-Five
Brooklyn Sloane
December 2022
Friday — 4:24pm
Colorfulwrappingpaper,shinybows, and numerous strings of ribbon were strewn all over the sitting area in the foyer of S&E Investigations. Holiday music spilled from the sound bar on Kate’s desk, and several glasses sat half-empty on the coffee table as voices carried down the hallway. Most of the team members were in one of the offices off the kitchen.
Brook had paid the building maintenance department to come in last night and remove one of the interior walls that separated two spare offices. That space would now be used as a common area for the team, which freed up space in the kitchen and kept them from having to crowd around one small table. There was a large, comfortable couch for Bit to use when pulling an all-nighter. She had to wonder how long it would be until he discovered that it was a pull-out. There was also a matching recliner on one side of the room while a massage chair that Sylvie never would have purchased for herself was on the other.
In addition, there was a workout area, of sorts. A small set of free weights, a treadmill, and a punching bag had been brought in and assembled on the other side of the room. The only thing that Brook had to worry about over the past few days was keeping the others from opening one of the two doors until it was time for the big reveal.
“You’re not very good at this present thing, are you?” Graham asked wryly as he flicked open a large garbage bag.
“What do you mean?” Brook asked as she picked up some discarded wrapping paper. “I thought I killed it.”
“How do you plan on topping those gifts next year?”
Graham smiled as he held open the garbage bag.
She crunched the paper into a ball and tossed it in.
“I will have you know that I listen to our employees,” Brook reasoned as she went about collecting some more trash. “Sylvie has been going on and on about those massage chairs, Bit is always using Theo’s couch to sleep on when working late, and Theo and Kate complain all the time about having to pay for gym memberships. I listened, gathered information, and bought presents based on their personal needs. I aced this whole gift-giving thing.”
“I was in need of an office?” Graham asked skeptically as he had to swiftly move the garbage bag to the left in order to catch her next throw. “I will say that I like the black bookshelf with the leatherbound classics in alphabetical order. It does go with the modern décor we have going on here.”
Graham’s words brought her up short, because she hadn’t even realized that his wife had done something similar right before she committed suicide. His good mood didn’t indicate that he wasn’t offended, and she hadn’t decorated the spare office next to hers with that thought in mind, either.
She’d simply needed something similar to what she’d bought the others so that they didn’t know what she’d actually purchased for him. She was still debating on whether or not she should give it to him. As he’d already mentioned, she wasn’t that good with the gift exchange thing.
“You need a place to work out of when you are in the city,” Brook countered, attempting to keep their conversation light. She wasn’t used to tiptoeing around such sensitive matters. Usually, it was other people who worried about what was said in front of her. “You own fifty percent of the business, so it only made sense.”
It didn’t take them long to tidy up the waiting area and take the gifts that she’d been given into her office. Graham had piled his on the couch near his suit jacket. As he walked beside her, he held up the coffee mug that Bit had given her with four capital letters on both sides—BOSS.
“Did you see his expression when he opened Sylvie’s gift?” Brook asked as she set down the essential oil kit that Sylvie had given her. Each scent had something to do with relaxation, as if Sylvie was trying to hint at something. “I wouldn’t be surprised if that antique doll wasn’t the same one from that house in Northern Illinois.”
“I don’t think I’ve ever seen Theo laugh that hard. I do believe that he might have pulled a muscle,” Graham said as he headed back out of her office.
She went ahead and set the rest of her gifts on her desk, smiling at the unique fingerless gloves that Theo had bought her. She had a feeling that he was secretly hoping for her to turn down her space heater so that it wasn’t so hot in her office. That wasn’t likely to happen, but she didn’t mind him trying to change her mind. Not if she kept getting presents like the fingerless gloves.
“Here you go.” Graham held out her glass of Moscato wine that she’d been nursing throughout the gift exchange. Speaking of her favorite wine, Kate had given her a handblown glass ornament in the shape of a wineglass, which Brook had immediately hung on the Christmas tree in the foyer. Brook hadn’t had the heart to tell Kate that she didn’t have a tree at home. “To another closed case.”
Brook touched her wineglass to his preferred whiskey glass with a light clink. His glass had his military title etched into it, which had been a gift from Bit. In Graham’s other hand was a small, gift-wrapped box with a gold bow stuck perfectly on top.
She slowly raised her gaze to his.
