Chapter 22
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
Saturday afternoon, on a weekend break from the team—and especially Gina—Jane sat with Sullivan and Williams in a downtown chowder shop.
The pair had a lunch break, and since Jane wanted to know more about how Scott had been acting and what the mood was like in the office, she’d bribed her friends with famous clam chowder.
“I feel so used,” Williams complained as he slugged down a second bowl of the soup.
“No, please, eat up. My wallet can take it,” Jane said, not meaning a word of it.
Sullivan grinned. “Good. Because I have some dish for you on Matthew.”
Finally. Info on Scott.
“Man, I hate that guy,” Williams muttered and continued to eat.
“Tell me.”
“Well, apparently, he caught you stalking him.” Sullivan’s wide smile made Jane groan. “Or so he thought. He felt badly about accusing you at McGrath’s because he saw you with your date.”
“He told you this?” Jane had a tough time believing Scott would have confided to Sullivan.
Williams grinned. “Nah. She was snooping and overheard him talking on the phone to his buddy upstairs. Not having the full context, she had to listen for a long time to understand it all.”
“Ah. Well, good. So he doesn’t think I was tailing him.”
“Well, not at McGrath’s.” Sullivan snacked on cheese bread. “But following him from the dry cleaner and library? Oh yeah. You stepped in that one, kiddo. Oh, and I’m getting dessert today too.”
“Count me in,” Williams added. “By the way, Harding Fellows, your convenience store robber who emphatically says he’s not connected to the Mazzucas in any way, shape or form? That guy?”
“Yeah?”
“Well, after you and your, I’d say sexy but I don’t want to get accused of harassment, so I’ll just say classy, FBI lady friend—who hates you by the way—left, I heard he started singing in exchange for protection.”
“Wait. You talked to Gina?”
“No. I talked to Officer Mendoza, who was in the room with you when classy FBI lady interrogated Fellows.”
“Oh. Mendoza, built like a brick wall?”
Williams nodded. “Apparently, classy FBI lady wasn’t singing your praises to the other detective, who happens to be a friend of hers. Mendoza owed me one, so when I called down there, I heard all about it.”
“What did you do to her?” Sullivan asked Jane.
“Nothing. She’s just jealous because she was Air Force and not a Marine.”
“Ah, interagency competition.”
“The Marine Corps is not an agency,” Jane said, repeating what she’d been telling the two since she’d known them. “Anyway, I couldn’t care less if she hates me. I just want to find out who killed Dan and what Matthew’s been up to.”
“I’m a little confused,” Williams said. “I thought you were suspended.”
“I am.”
“So how are you involved in all this?”
Sullivan poked him in the ribs. “She nearly got shot by Fellows. Hello?”
“I know that.” Williams flushed. “But how does she know classy FBI—”
“If you call Gina Holtz ‘classy FBI lady’ one more time, I will kick you under the table. Hard.”
Williams snickered. “Fine. Gina Holtz, star of the cyber team in Houston for a bit. But she wanted something spicier and transferred out of her old field office a year ago. Rumor has it she’s been attached to a bunch of special projects.
” He studied Jane. “You wouldn’t happen to be working with her on anything, would you? ”
Sullivan huffed. “And if she was, she wouldn’t tell us.” Sullivan turned to Jane. “Although she should.”
Jane gave in to laughter. “You two crack me up. No, I’m not officially working.” Not exactly a lie, but she didn’t want to involve these two in her “off the books” work. “I’m helping out a friend of a friend with something.”
“Ah.” Sullivan nodded. “I knew it. You can’t not be busy.”
She ignored her. “Honestly, I’m going out of my mind trying to solve the thing with Simmons. I need more on Matthew to make anything stick. Tell me about him.”
“Oh, please, Williams, this is all you.” Sullivan glanced at him.
“The guy’s an egomaniac, a dictator, and a narcissist. What did I leave out?
” He snapped his fingers. “Oh, right. He needs to be medicated to calm the frick down. He’s been in our faces about everything.
Tracking movements, getting reports on top of reports and involving himself in all of our cases.
I mean, he’s the SSA, but he’s micromanaging so hard I’m surprised he can breathe with his nose stuck up our collective asses. ”
“Rob,” Sullivan chastised, but the humor in her eyes told Jane she didn’t mean it. “Yeah, Jane. What he said. He’s gotten worse since your stalking. I think you shook him up.”
“Good. Tell me, is he into any cases I might not be aware of? Anything you can think of that I could look into while I’m waiting for OPR to find me innocent?”
“You could sneak in and look through his computer,” Sullivan offered.
“I was being serious.”
“So was I,” Sullivan said. “Look, it’s been close to a month. Don’t you want to come in and get an update? Then maybe Matthew gets distracted, and you get a shot at looking through his computer while Williams or I keep an eye out.”
Jane didn’t know. That seemed like a big step up from just following the guy. And if she got caught, she could kiss her job goodbye. “Wow. You really went there.”
Sullivan shrugged. “Just a thought. But either way, I want dessert. And I want it now.”
“The cheesecake looks fantastic.” Williams smacked his lips. “I’m so hungry.”
“You had a gallon of chowder and seventy loaves of bread.” Jane frowned. “This is why I hate picking up the tab with you two.”
“Hey, you don’t drink. We’ve got to make things even when we can.”
Sullivan nodded.
“Fine.” Jane ordered dessert. Perhaps something sweet would detract from the bitterness of being no closer to getting her job back.
And she wasn’t due back to the Code Blue investigation until Monday.
She really hated time off. Maybe a distraction on Bainbridge Island would help.
Or not, she thought when she arrived at the ranch only to find Hal and Joe stewing about the attempt at McGrath’s that her cousin had blabbed about, in addition to somehow learning about the incident at the gas station.
All the care made her queasy. Jane hated being the center of attention, no matter what Gina might think.
Hal demanded she start wearing a tracker at all times so he could find her if need be. Joe came close to tears while hugging her, worried for her future, and mentioned calling in Uncle Chris every other sentence.
Oh man, Monday couldn’t come soon enough.