“So I see. Going somewhere?” he said.
“Thinking about it.” She shoved something else into the bag.
“Why?”
“What is it to you?”
He understood her words for what they were—a defensive mechanism. She’d put two and two together and come up with the idea that leaving was probably the safest thing she could do for everyone.
A noble thought, but bullshit.
“The dead man,” he said, opting to cut right to the chase. “How is he connected to you?”
She turned then. The expression on her face was one he hadn't seen before. It wasn’t the controlled composure of the cool professional investigator. This was more open. Vulnerable. It made his chest tighten further. The need to protect this woman rose up from somewhere deep within, strong and powerful.
She exhaled and sank back on her bed, looking exhausted.
“I don't know,” she said. “Not exactly. But that picture Halcyon posted was a crime scene I worked.”
Patrick quietly sucked in a breath, but Morgan didn’t appear to realize she’d slipped and confirmed her membership in the forum. That, more than anything, proved she was more rattled than she was letting on.
“And then,” she continued, “then I remembered that I’d seen him again shortly afterward, talking to my supervisor in the parking garage.” She looked at her hands. “I don't know what the connection is. I just know it isn't a coincidence.”
“Okay,” he said. “Talk me through it.”
“Patrick—”
“You have a theory, and it's gotten you as far as a half-packed bag.” He held her gaze. “Talk me through it. Two heads are better than one, right?”
Something shifted in her expression. Surprise, maybe. Like she was so used to dealing with and solving problems on her own that she didn’t know what to do with his offer. He silently urged her to take a chance and trust him.
“Everything I have is circumstantial,” she said carefully. “A face in a photograph. A conversation in a parking garage. A body on family land.” She paused. “Theory, not fact.”
“Then let's start with that.” He moved the bag from the center of the bed to the floor and sat down. “Start from the beginning. What case were you working?”
She stood for a moment and paced. He could see her thinking about it. What to say, how much. Organizing thoughts to present in a methodical way. He waited patiently, giving her space to sort it out.
She sat back down beside him.
“A death that wasn't as cut and dried as what it appeared to be at first glance,” she said. “I refused to close it. That's what got me the leave.” She looked at the window. “I thought it was just about me not following orders. Taking too long. Someone making a point.” A pause. “I don't think that anymore.”
“No,” he said. “I don't either. How does the dead guy fit in?”
“I don’t know yet. I just know that he does,” she said, frustration lacing her voice.
“Then come on. Let’s get some answers.”
She perked up at that. “What answers? How?”
“We’re going to take those prints and that hair sample you got to someone who can find out who that guy is. Once we know that, we can figure out what, if anything, he has to do with your case and why he was in Pine Ridge.”
Morgan looked at the bag on the floor. At the window. At him. “Why?” she asked. “Why are you helping me?”
He shrugged, sensing that she wouldn’t accept an explanation that included things like, “because I think you might be mycroie” and “because every instinct in my body is screaming to keep you close, keep you safe.” What he went with was, “Because I want to, and because I can. Isn’t that enough?”
She sat with that for a moment. “Okay.”
“Okay. Let’s go.”