“So act like it then!” Paul yelled back. “Michael will have left a clue somewhere—something to tie him back to this shit with his wife. Maybe to something bigger. We’ll find it and take him down.”
“He doesn’t get to go to prison, that’s too good for him,” Elijah gritted out.
Paul slid into the seat next to him. “So, maybe he doesn’t go to jail,” he said his voice lowering. “Maybe something else happens to him instead.”
Elijah let go of his head and looked over at his friend and partner. “What are you saying, Paul?”
Paul glanced around him, making sure no one else was in ear shot. “After everything he’s done, maybe we make him really pay.”
Silence fell between the two until Paul’s cell phone rang loudly, breaking the silence. He pulled it out, briefly registering that it was Annie.
“Hey, Annie, what’s up?”
Annie was like an excitable child on the other end of the cell. “Where the hell are you?”
Paul sighed. “I’m with Elijah.”
“Good, because I need you to get him back here asap.”
Paul looked over at Elijah. “Why? What’s happened?”
Elijah frowned and stood up straighter, his stomach already sinking at the thought of Delores and the state she’d been in when Michael had gotten him kicked out of the hospital again.Had something else happened to her?He wondered.
“Christine Seager’s mom just came in,” Annie said, “apparently, Christine admitted to her last night that she had been stealing meds, swapping shipment numbers, switching things. She’s been working with a small-time dealer, though she won’t say who that is yet. But she said that he works for someone much higher up.”
Paul features hardened, stress blanketing his features. “Where is she? Where’s Christine?”
“We don’t know, we’ve got a warrant out for her right now. Her mom said that after they’d talked, Christine left and she hasn’t seen her since. But Elijah was right, Paul. He knew straight away that she was involved in the Medco case,” she laughed, “his instinct is always right.”
“Ain’t it just,” Paul replied, chewing on the inside of his cheek as he spoke.
“She said she thinks she can convince Christine to give us a statement, revealing exactly who the dealer is, but, and this is the cruncher...she’ll only tell Elijah. She trusts him, or at least her mother does.” Annie stood outside the interview room where Christine’s mother was sat. It seemed that whatever Elijah had said to Mrs. Seager had worked and she’d finally put the pressure on Christine to come clean about everything. Now if she could just get Christine to say everything on record. “So you better tell Elijah to get his ass back here, right now,” Annie said.
“I’m with him now, I’ll tell him,” Paul looked at Elijah while he spoke, and Elijah frowned harder. He’d been listening to the conversation—or at least one side of it, and Paul now had his full attention.
“You better. This case is ready to crack wide open and only Elijah can do the cracking,” Annie laughed again, noticing that Paul wasn’t laughing back. “Everything okay up there?”
Paul didn’t reply. His thoughts were running a million miles an hour while he thought over the Medco case. He and Annie had been working on it together for months but they were nowhere near getting answers. The place was being robbed blind right under the owner’s noses and Paul and Annie had been getting closer again and he’d had hopes of rekindling something between them. It had all been working out perfectly for him. Until Michael had messed up big time. Paul had been reassigned and Elijah put on the case.
“Paul?” Annie said his name louder, turning her back on the interview room. “Did you hear me? Is everything okay up there?”
Paul frowned and laughed lightly. “Sorry, yeah, just thinking about all of this. Everything’s fine. Anything else?”
“Well yes. Get this. Have you ever met Christine Seager?” Annie asked.
Paul sighed heavily and he looked away from Elijah. “No, it was you and Elijah who went to interview her, remember?” he said feeling uncomfortable, the food he’d eaten on the plane ride over here souring something awful inside his stomach. “But I think I remember Elijah mentioning something about her looking a little like Delores Stanton.”
“A little alike? She’s the spitting image for Delores!” Annie stared through the small glass window on the door to the interview room. She felt sorry for Christine. She’d clearly been taken advantage of. She felt even worse for Mrs. Seager, who looked ready to have a heart attack she was that anxious.
But it was Michael Stanton’s wife that held her pity. Her husband hadn’t just gone out and found a younger woman to have an affair with, he’d actually picked someone who was a younger and more vulnerable version of Delores. And by the way this case was rapidly unfolding, it was all for the sake of money.
Paul stood beside Elijah now. Elijah was watching him thoughtfully, trying to work out what Annie was telling him. Elijah had known Paul long enough to know when the man was stressed and worried.
“What exactly are you implying, Miles, because I know you’re reaching for something,” Paul said, turning his back on Elijah who was watching his every move.
“I’m surprised Elijah hasn’t mentioned something to you about this,” Annie said, shocked.
Paul looked over at his friend with a heavy sigh. “He’s been a little pre-occupied.”
