The moment was over in a flash, and Ava held out the cookie dough container. Holly grabbed it and tried to open the container but faltered.
“She didn’t have enough strength to get the container open, and I had to do it for her.” Ava frowned. “She didn’t have long to live. Why, oh why, couldn’t whoever killed her let her pass in peace instead of making her so very sick at the end?”
“People can be very cruel.” Micha took her hand. “But you know she’s with God now.”
“And she’s not suffering any longer, so that’s a good thing.” Her tone didn’t reflect her words. She missed this woman. That was obvious.
On screen, Ava handed Holly a spoon. Holly scooped out a large chunk of dough but only nibbled on the edges.
“Her desire for the dough was great, her appetite not so much,” Ava said. “And she hadn’t been eating a lot before that. Which is one of the reasons I made the cookie dough. I thought it might spark her appetite, but she didn’t end up eating much of the dough. I left it with her but don’t know what happened to the container as no one ever mentioned it to me.”
“We should see if it’s in the police report,” Reid said, speaking for the first time. Micha had almost forgotten he and Dev were there. “I’ll put out some feelers for that file.”
“Just be careful,” Micha said. “We don’t want the police to think we’re working on Ava’s behalf. Then they’ll think she might be with us and come looking for her.”
“I got it.” Reid sounded a bit testy at the reminder.
Too bad. Boss or not, Micha wouldn’t take any chances with Ava, and Reid would get over it.
Micha shared their visit to the armory. “I know you’re already checking with the locals, but can you check with your fed contacts to get us a look at those videos from Squib’s business, too?”
“I’ll look into it,” Reid said. “But don’t hold your breath. This is bound to be an ATF investigation, and I only have one contact there. She’s a by-the-book agent, and I doubt she’ll break any rules for me. For anyone actually.”
Micha assumed the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives would handle this investigation, but he’d hoped Reid had developed more than one contact with them over his years as an agent.
“If I strike out with her,” Reid continued as if he’d read Micha’s mind, “I’ll check in with a few buddies still in the Portland office to see if they might have someone who can help.”
“What about you, Colin, or Dev?” Micha glanced between them. “Either of you have someone you can go to?”
Colin shook his head. “We didn’t deal with ATF in the cyber division very often.”
“Not me. I was just a lowly deputy, not some hotshot agent.” Dev chuckled.
Reid rolled his eyes. “We all had our jobs to do and you did an outstanding job.”
“Oh, I know.” Dev blew on his knuckles and rubbed them over his chest. “Just can never resist the chance to mess with a fed, even if it’s a former fed.”
The guys laughed.
Micha wanted to join in, but he couldn’t. Not when he felt like he was striking out at every turn. He couldn’t keep letting Ava down all the time. There had to be something else he could do. “Maybewedon’t look at the files.”
“Not look at the files.” Colin squinted at him. “I don’t follow.”
“Yeah, what then?” Reid asked.
“We find a way to make it worth an agent’s effort to look into it for their personal gain and do the work for us,” Micha said, warming to his spontaneous idea. “If Buck is busted with that cache, it would be big enough for the local media to cover, and the agent could spin the story as alook at what we did to stop a mass casualty eventkind of thing.”
“That might work.” Reid’s eyes lit up. “Yeah. Yeah. It actually could be the ticket. Not for my contact. She’s established herself and will probably blow me off. Still, I’ll float the idea with her. And then, if she doesn’t bite, I’ll find a young, hungry agent.”
“You think that’s really doable?” Ava asked. “Because I would feel so much better if someone in law enforcement knew about that stockpile of guns.”
“I do,” Reid said. “But it might not go as fast as you would hope, and you will continue to need a protection detail.”
Reid wasn’t telling Micha something he didn’t know. “You still good with the two of us staying here in Portland with her?”
He nodded. “I can work with it.”
“What about the suspects’ vehicles?” Micha asked. “Find anything?”
