He contemplated her for a long time, then said, “Tell me what you know.”

Jo didn’t waste any time now. She told him everything she’d discovered since she’d last seen him. When she finished, the detective sat with arms crossed, rocking slightly. He had a good poker face, she’d give him that—she couldn’t tell whether he believed her or not.

“You’ve harassed quite a number of people,” he said.

Jo shook her head. “Did you talk to Atchison? He’ll confirm at least some of what I’m saying. The guy’s scared, but he knows something’s going on.”

Holton uncrossed his arms, leaned forward, and opened the file. She’d been through this routine before, where a detective questioned her about her background. There were things in her past that others never discovered—highly classified information—and this would be no different.

But he managed to surprise her.

“What happened in Colorado?”

It was her turn to lean forward. “What do you know?”

He again surprised her by being straightforward, which she hadn’t expected.

“There was a situation at a biolab,” he said.

“What do you know about that?” Her nerves tightened.

“You were involved in a bad situation. Two men were killed, but a man named Dale got away.”

Jo stared at him. He knew more than she’d thought, and all of it was bad news for her. If Holton had gotten that much information, how much more might JD Babineaux have discovered?

Something crept into her bones, deeper than she’d felt in a long time. Fear.

“I’ll ask again,” Holton said. “Why are you looking into those people from the bank?”

“If you know about what happened at the biolab, you know I’m in danger,” Jo said. “My family as well. If you’ve been checking around, someone from that biolab might’ve also figured out I was at the bank, and they’d wonder about my background as well. That’s why I was asking questions, and that’s why you need to look into Babineaux.”

He ran a finger back and forth across the folder, not saying anything. The air in the room grew stifling as she waited on him.

“What I need is for you not to interfere in my investigation,” he said at last.

“I have to protect my family.”

“We can do that, if need be.”

She shook her head. “I’ve been down that road before. If Babineaux’s involved, you can’t help me.” She related to Atchison’s fear.

Holton scratched his nose. “You need to stand down and let me handle things. If you don’t, I can make things difficult for you.”

“I’m not breaking the law by talking to people.”

He breathed heavily through his nose. “Maybe not, but I want you out of my investigation, understand?”

She kept talking, trying to get him to realize that there was more going on, something with JD Babineaux. He had her go over what she knew again, and as she did, he stared at her, stony-faced. She kept trying to convince him she was on to something, but she finally gave up. Her path lay elsewhere. If she could get out of the station, there was more she could do—more that she had to do. Holton had researched her background, which had probably raised red flags. And she was sure Dale would have been keeping tabs on her. She went with a different tack.

“Fine,” she said. “I’ll leave town.”

Holton nodded, but once again, she couldn’t tell if he believed her.

“A squad car will take you to your car, and I’ll handle things from here.”

Jo didn’t argue, and the detective stood up and left her there. Several minutes later, the same uniformed officers came to the interrogation room, and they quietly escorted her to a squad car.

The drive back to Atchison’s neighborhood was quiet. They dropped her beside her car, and waited until she got in and pulled away from the curb. The headlights of the squad car remained in the rearview mirror as they followed her toward her hotel, and she didn’t bother losing them. She couldn’t be sure, but she wondered if someone else was tailing her as well. She gripped the wheel hard.

Things had taken a bad turn.

CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

Kline stood in the living area of his spacious suite and stared into the backyard. His rooms were located at the far end of the mansion, overlooking JD and Lydia’s swimming pool, one window at an angle where he could also look up to the balcony of their main suite, on the second floor. It was late, and their windows were dark. They’d finally gone to sleep.

Good.

Kline had seen them both briefly at dinner. The tension between them could’ve been cut with a chainsaw. He had no idea if they’d argued, or what had happened—he didn’t ask—but he’d worried that whatever was going on would put JD in a mood, and that the boss would want to leave for the evening.

Thankfully, that hadn’t happened. Kline had been serious when he’d said that JD needed to keep his liaisons in check. Even though he’d told JD that things were going well, they weren’t.

After leaving the office, Kline had talked to his various contacts, assessing what law enforcement knew and making sure that Damek, his man at the bank, wasn’t doing anything foolish, anything that would bring attention to himself or to Kline. So far, no one knew he’d hired Damek. That was good. There had been no indications that he and his team had done anything but lie low, so low that no one had discovered them.

Yet.

Kline looked at a crystal glass in his hand, filled with soda water and a lime. The simple concoction made him feel as if he were drinking something with alcohol. Kline allowed himself the occasional drink, but he rarely got drunk anymore, and only when he wasn’t on the job. That wasn’t often these days. He rarely took a vacation, either, in part because he liked JD and Lydia—he felt a deep loyalty to both of them—but more because he liked the work.

He was an ex-Marine—hell, everyone in his type of position was—and he’d spent time after his service working freelance. He’d been around the world, and he’d worked for a lot of people, none of them particularly upstanding or honest. Some had been downright scum, if he was honest. JD fit somewhere in the middle, and that was fine for Kline. He wasn’t in this business to serve the world or to do good. He got paid very well, and he was great at what he did. In his early forties now, he figured he only had a few more years before retirement—if he chose to retire. Maybe he’d find some small island and just disappear, and then probably drink himself into oblivion.

Kline had never figured he’d live a long life; given what he did for a living, odds were he should’ve been dead by now. If he made it to retirement, he’d either need therapy for all his memories, or he’d drink himself to death quickly. He didn’t care which. But that was a way off still. He had bigger problems now.

Moving away from the window, he sat down on a couch that faced a large-screen TV. A basketball game was on, a replay, but he wasn’t watching it anyway. He took a sip of his drink and thought.

His contact at the bank had another problem. He wasn’t getting any more information. The investigators who were working the bank robbery weren’t talking. Kline had pushed his guy, even threatened him, but the man didn’t know anymore, other than that the employee at the bank had talked. Her name was Sabrina Padilla. Kline had done his research on her and hadn’t found anything remarkable. She also hadn’t returned home that evening. His eyes went cold. If she had, she might be dead by now, and she wouldn’t be able to talk to anyone about the robbery. But she was at the station, or so Kline assumed.

He thought about his police contact, a decent man with a gambling problem. He’d do a lot of things for the right price. But this time, he didn’t seem to know much. At first, Kline wasn’t sure if he could believe his contact, but the man had never let him down before. His problem, he’d told Kline, was that he had to be careful. He wasn’t sure if anyone was onto him, knew that he was selling information, or if the investigation was just so big that everyone was closed-mouth about it. For several hours now, Kline hadn’t heard anything from his man. Kline had put out other feelers, but so far, nothing.

He’d known that the robbery would bring in the feds, but he wasn’t worried about that. Hopefully someone with the investigation would start talking, and then he’d hear more about Sabrina. He had to make sure she hadn’t noticed anything at the bank—even the slightest clue—that might give law enforcement an idea who Damek was, or why he and his men had robbed the bank. When Kline heard what she’d told the police, he would be able to act more intentionally. It was likely she didn’t know anything, but he couldn’t be too careful. He’d made it this far by being cautious, by never assuming anything. By never acting irrationally.

He stared at the TV, still not paying attention to the game. It might as well have been randomly generated colors and sounds. If only he could get his boss to do what Kline recommended, especially now. Once they had everything resolved, then JD could see whoever he wanted.

Then there was Trent Fontenot’s research. Who all had he talked to? Kline was working that angle as well. And he wasn’t sure what he’d do when he found whoever had spoken to the reporter. Eliminating that person would be very risky, especially now. But what else could he do? He couldn’t afford to have them flapping their mouth to someone else.

Kline kept thinking through everything that had happened in the last few weeks, assessing whether he was missing anything.

An hour later, the game ended, though he only noticed because the annoying announcer’s voice stopped. Kline set down his still half-full glass and turned off the TV. Then he went into his bedroom. The coming day, like so many, would be long. It was a good thing he didn’t require much rest, because he wasn’t going to get a whole lot this night.

He undressed and slipped under the covers, then stared at the ceiling. A long time later, sleep overtook him.