Dr. Gregory Eastman had hired men to do his dirty work. He’d taken Zoey Daviess, the sister Zoey had raised, that sister’s identical twin thatBonniehad raised, and Bonnie herself.
That connected the Colesons to everything going on in this fucking town in yetanotherway.
All the strings kept leading in one direction now.
But what did it mean? And where in the hell was that little girl?
He was going to find her—and get her to the family who would actually give a damn about her. And not leave her out there with men who thought nothing of killing the innocent for their own greed.
Ten minutesafter Dom had left her, someone knocked on the glass door of her lab. Madison jumped a good six hundred feet. Her heart stopped racing when she saw the woman standing there.
K.J.’s badge was practically bright and shiny and new. The woman around Madison’s own age had just been promoted to detective recently, Madison thought. Though she’d been doing the job of a detective for a while now. She’d be good at it, too. Most people hadn’t even realized she wasn’t a detective already.
Madisonreasonablytrusted her. It was that whole “trust no one” vibe that coated the entire TSP now that had her doubting people she’d once considered her friends. “K.J., what can I help you with today?”
“I think I’m here to help you, actually.” K.J. dropped her bag on the table near the door where non-lab personal belongings were only allowed. “I was assigned to help you go through the paperwork found on the Guietyn Road robberies case.”
That case had been cold for four years, and everyone fully believed the suspect was dead now. Why would they waste K.J.’s time with that? “Why?”
“Wichita Falls thought someone needed to spend some time on that one, and then bring it to their lab. Another…waste of manpower, in my opinion. But what do I know?”
Madison agreed. That had happened a lot lately. Wichita Falls was doing anything and everything they could to waste Finley Creek’s manpower—so that they could justify making cuts later. Everyone had expected it. Wichita Falls—aka Rhonda Hamler—had it out for the Finley Creek post.EspeciallyMajor Crimes.
The people out of Wichita Falls had an agenda all their own. “So…where is the hot new guy who has been following you around?”
“Detective Trace is hopefully chasing squirrels up the next tree. Guy has a real stick up his ass. It’s a seriously nice ass, but…so not my type.” K.J. smirked at the major crimes detective who had just walked in. “Lila should go for it, though. If the guy isn’t dirty or anything. You want Trace, Li?”
Detective Dodson almost snarled. Interesting. Lila Dodson was usually pretty quiet and laid back. Madison didn’t think she’d ever seen the other womansnarl.“Not in this lifetime. Guy has a serious attitude. I’m not sure how he ended up here in the first place. He can so go back to where he came from.”
Well, Madison knew the current Major Crimes theories. No one trusted this new guy who’d been brought in from the Austin post after what had happened to Brett Miller. That night.
All eyes were on Finley Creek now. And they all knew it.
Lila was a recent transfer in, too. Madison hadn’t forgotten that, even though shethoughtshe could trust her enough.
That was the worst part—not knowing who was dirty or who had your back. Who you could count on. It tore everything apart.
Then again, maybe that was what Wichita Falls was after?
Destroy the Finley Creek TSP from within?
“What can I help you with, Lila?”
“I need the transcripts from…the Barratt/Grundenman case,” Lila said, quietly. She was not a loud woman at all. She just sort of quietly did her job and went on. She’d transferred to Major Crimes a year or so ago; Madison hadn’t had a lot of opportunity to get to know her well. Lila and K.J. and Ashlie were friends, though. They were always together. “I need you to create log-in credentials for me. Chief Marshall sent me to you.”
She held out the form needed. Madison checked it quickly—some evidence and procedural forms had been altered lately. The lab wasn’t taking any chances.
K.J. and Lila were talking while Madison dealt with creating the specific log-ins for Lila. Normally IT logins were the ITdepartment’s domain, but this was one of the servers Madison ruled. Only a handful of people even knew it existed.
They were all trying to keep it that way.
Apparently, Lila was one of them. “Here. Are you looking for something specific?”
“Trying to track down Grundenman’s movements over the last four years. And see who he came into contact with,” Lila said, as Ashlie came in. She was filling in for Pete again tonight. “Acardi asked me to trace Grundenman as much as I possibly could. To see if we can isolate where he’d take that little girl. Acardi is focusing on Grundenman—I’m focusing on finding the kid. He asked me to handle it personally. For…Heather and her family.”
27
Hope looked at Cashlyn,certain she hadn’t heard her niece right. Sometimes Cashlyn said the strangest things. Cashlyn had definitely gone off the deep end this time. But…things had been insane since what had happened to Heather and everything. “She heard this?”
