Ah. Javi stopped, let the doors swing shut behind him, and tucked his phone in his pocket. “Is that a problem, Sue?” he asked.
She blinked and nudged her glasses up her nose. “Personally or professionally?”
“Professionally,” he said.
“Then no,” she said. “My job is to keep this office running, Agent Merlo. My personal feelings aren’t relevant to that.”
Saul would have asked her what her personal feelings were anyhow. That was probably why she liked Saul better. Lara had almost definitely invited Ms. Daly to one of her barbeques.
“Good,” Javi said. “I won’t keep them waiting, then. Is there anything I need to deal with now? Or can it wait until this evening?”
She shuffled her folders. “I need your signature for these acquisitions.” She dealt the red folder to him. He flipped it open and leaned over her desk as he scanned, ticked, and signed the forms.
“The lab still doesn’t have anything on the residue in the bottle,” she said. Javi paused midsignature and glanced up, irritation pinching at his forehead. She shrugged. “It got bumped by a case in Los Angeles. I called in one of Saul’s favors to expedite it, but that still takes time.”
He nodded. There were advantages to working in a resident agency—he wouldn’t be there otherwise—but there were also advantages to being near enough to the lab to pitch your case to the techs in person. He signed the last form, tapped them together neatly, and handed them back. “What about the files I requested?”
She returned the folder to her stack and shifted it closer to her body.
“I’ve uploaded Saul’s—Agent Lee’s—case files to your server. Anything where there was no custodial jail time or where the suspects have been released. Also all the old death threats that he used to get. Most of them are… performative, but that doesn’t mean there’s no feeling there. It’s quite a substantial package. Do you still think it’s relevant?”
“The investigation is ongoing,” he said. “I’m not shutting down any avenues of investigation yet.”
Her eyebrows ticked up one precisely measured space. “Not my area of expertise.” She turned, set the folders neatly back on her desk, and checked her wristwatch. “I’m going to take an early lunch today, and since this is my own personal time? That boy didn’t do this, Agent. You should keep that in mind.”
Piece said, she left. The heavy glass doors swung shut behind her. Irritation bubbled in the back of Javi’s throat. He could taste it as he stalked into his office, logged in to his computer, and accessed the server. He jerked his fingers over the keys as he input his password and sent the files to his tablet to read later. Why did everyone act like he wanted William Hartley to have done something horrible to his brother? Hewantedto believe Billy was innocent. His gut said there had to be another explanation.
The evidence said otherwise, and following the evidence was his job. Saul was the one who taught him that.
Flying stop at the office done, he logged off and headed back downstairs. He texted the Sheriff that he’d be there in fifteen minutes, but he made it in twenty. When he got to the station, the press was already there, squinting against the wind with the sheriff’s department shield as their backdrop.
“Special Agent Merlo, do you have any comment on why the Hartleys were brought in?”
“FBI Agent Javier Merlo has arrived at the police station just minutes after the missing boy’s family were escorted inside.”
“Drew Hartley has been missing now for three days. Should the police have been looking closer to home?”
Javi “no commented” his way past them. A camera flashed as he went through the door, and a distracted part of his brain wondered how the image would be framed the next day. Hero or dupe?
There was a different person behind the desk than there had been that morning. Javi had to check his watch to be sure enough time had passed that there had been a shift change.
“Agent,” the young man said as he stuck a pen behind his ear, “the Hartleys are in the interrogation room, and the sheriff is waiting for you.”
“Thanks,” Javi said. “Could you check in with them, get them water and coffee if they want it?”
The man—if Javi cared to squint, he could have read his name tag—looked briefly surprised but nodded his agreement.
There was no point trying to discomfit Billy by leaving him thirsty. It would just alienate the family more, and one way or another, they were still victims. With the press outside, it was important to remember that.
Javi headed down to Frome’s office and let himself in, announcing himself with a perfunctory rap of his knuckles against the door. He registered the growl of voices through the glass and wood, but it was only as he stepped inside that he realized that it was Frome disciplining Cloister.
His brain tripped over that word, all dark heat and slap-pink skin, but it wasn’t in the sexy way.
Frome was so angry the veins stood out in his temples and bubbled as his blood pressure went up, and Cloister was… flat… slouched down in the office chair, arms crossed, and his lean, still not-pretty face completely expressionless.
“…you get a lot of leeway because you’re one of the sheriff’s department’s best dog handlers, so don’t start failing at that, Witte. Not if you want to keep your job and your dog.”
Cloister blinked and waited.
