Pataki rolled his eyes. “I can’t wait to hear.”
Ignoring the insult, Natalie said, “Intellectual property.”
Pataki stared at her for a moment before saying, “I’m going to need more than that.”
“I’m saying, taking into account the stolen computer?—”
“The allegedly stolen computer,” Pataki corrected.
“What if the motive was to steal Lionel’s IP?” she finished.
Pataki stuck one fat finger in his ear and twisted, then shook his head. “Like I told you. We searched these kid’s rooms and cars. There was no stolen computer equipment.”
“They could have downloaded everything onto an external drive and dumped the computer,” Natalie suggested.
Pataki tipped his head. “They might have, but we didn’t find it.”
Natalie let out a huff and leaned back. “So what then? You’re giving up? It’ll be filed as just another unsolved cold case?”
“Jeezus. No. It hasn’t even been forty-eight hours since we reopened it as a valid murder case. Homicide will keep investigating. Garland and I will keep our ear to the ground. Keep looking for new information. Maybe some evidence will surface.”
“You could go look in the dump. And maybe if the computer was thrown out and you find it, it’ll have fingerprints on it. Or wait, did you dust the vitamin bottles for fingerprints and compare them to the suspects?”
Pataki glanced at Liam. “She one of those murder podcast nuts?”
“No, actually. She’s not. This is just … her.”
With a sigh, Pataki looked back to Natalie. “We did dust for prints. The apartment was covered in prints which was to be expected since all four told us they’d been there.
“And yes, we dusted the pill bottles for prints. You know whose we found on there? Graves’s and your boyfriend’s here, since he handed the bottles to me.” Pataki tipped his chin towards Liam.
“Why do the police have your prints? Were you ever arrested?” Natalie asked wondering if she didn’t know something about Liam she should know.
Liam rolled his eyes. “I was in the military, Nat. They’ve got my DNA too.”
“Oh. Right.” She turned back to Pataki. “What about seeing if any of the TAs recently bought some potassium pills? Can you get the surveillance footage from all the local shops that carry that brand of vitamin?”
“We looked into that too. The two potassium pills found in the bottles are a brand made and shipped exclusively by Amazon. And before you ask, while we had their computers we checked their Amazon account purchase histories.”
“And? Nothing?” she asked.
“Oh, plenty. But no vitamins. Look, Miss Chase. I know you want to solve this but you can’t think of anything we haven’t,” Pataki said.
Liam stood. “Thank you, officer. We appreciate you speaking with us.”
Pataki stood too and extended one hand to Liam. “Sorry I couldn’t be more help.”
“Yeah. Us too. Nat. Come on,” Liam said as she remained sitting. “Time to go.”
Finally, she stood, defeated, and let Liam lead her out of the precinct. In the car, she slumped against the passenger seat as Liam started the engine.
“I guess that’s it then,” she said.
“That’s it.” Liam nodded. “Wanna grab lunch?” he asked looking too excited given the disappointment they’d just had.
She guessed the reason. “You want to go to The Well?”
His eyes brightened. “Yes.”
