He leans back in his chair. “This whole mess… all of it… I can’t complain about any part of your writeup, but Liam, you take risks. Risks that are hard to account for. I know you did what you had to in order to protect Jesse, but these risks… you need to be careful. You need to call things in. You need to tell others what you’re doing and when you’re doing it. You told me you were stepping out, you were going to the hospital. I should have known better.”
“I’m aware I took more risks than I should have. But I was confident.”
“Confidence can’t always save you. Just… be careful. You’re going to have to go through a mandated stress debriefing with a licensed psychologist.”
I cock my head. “Excuse me, what? Why?”
“It’s now mandated. Anyone in an officer-involved shooting is required to do a one-on-one session where a psychologist will check your fitness for duty. Chief Taylor believes that you went through a very stressful situation and will not take no for an answer. You will not bully your way out of this. It’s one session. You will survive.”
“I might not,” I grumble. “What if I claim that it’ll cause me more stress to go?”
Michaels ignores me. “Neither of you were here for the debriefing, although I’m sure you’ve heard it from Pérez or Nye. What was supposedly Whitaker’s body was exhumed, and it was found to belong to one of his past victims. At this point, we have been unable to determine how many victims were Whitaker’s and how many were killed by the people working with him, like Richard, Zach, and Tate. While we believe that all of the people working for Whitaker have been accounted for, at least based on what Richard has told us, we can’t be certain. I fear this is a case that will likely stay open for a while as we determine how many were involved.
“There are also uncertainties, like the reason why Whitaker would have had Zach killed. Nye has suggested that maybe Zach was going off course, killing on his own and Whitaker didn’t permit it, but we’re unsure at this point. I’m just relieved that everyone is safe.”
We’d been concerned that Richard would say something about Jesse’s past with Whitaker, but he never has. My guess is that Whitaker never shared that one of his got away, that someone would choose to leave him. Jesse has expressed this worry to us as well, but for now, we have to keep moving on like we know nothing about it.
“Honestly, Gabriel is our only concern,” I inform Michaels.
“Not just Hyde. Everyone.”
“Mostly Gabriel,” I say, and Michaels gives me a look. I ignore the look since I care very little about any of his looks.
“Is that all?” I ask.
“For now. Let’s see what we can do about tracking down Whitaker’s other victims.”
“I have my doubts you’ll ever find them. The man himself was extremely calculating and intelligent. Where he failed wasthat I don’t believe it was the killing that thrilled him, it was the control over other people, whether they were the men he’d manipulated or his victims. Have you talked to his mother?”
“I haven’t, but I saw the recording of Nye speaking to her. She’s quite the woman.”
“Was she surprised by his tendencies?” I ask curiously.
“Let’s just say she wasn’t the easiest person to talk to. No matter what we asked, she’d brush us off, get irritated by us, or say something shitty about us. Nye has the patience of a saint and managed to get a few decent words out of her, but I’m afraid the rest of us would have simply gotten cussed at more. When he asked her about identifying the body, her explanation was that it’d been so long since she’d seen Whitaker that she had no damn idea what he really looked like anymore and assumed it was him.”
“I wonderwhyhe faked his own death. Was he close to being found out by someone else?” Gabriel asks.
“Not sure, and no one has come forward. The only person we can ask about that is dead.”
“If you find a way to resurrect him, I’d like to kill him again since I’m still not over him hurting Gabriel,” I announce.
“And this is why I wouldn’t have said no to you having a counseling session, even if it wasn’t required,” Michaels says. “Don’t say that shit in front of the chief, you hear me? She hasn’t been around your sarcastic ass long enough to know when you’re making the darkest of jokes.”
“Wasn’t a joke,” I mumble under my breath because of the way Gabriel is looking at me. “We done? I have claustrophobia and this room is too small.”
“Your office is the exact same size,” Michaels says.
“Huh.”
“And yes, we’re done.”
“Oh good,” I say as I stand up and open the door for Gabriel.
“Paige?”
I look back at Michaels. “Yeah?”
“You did good. You saved a lot of lives.”
