Nononono.
I dropped to my stomach on the floor and peered under the bench. It wouldn’t be the first time Cosmo had hidden there, away from prying eyes. What was that? I shuffled closer and extended my arm beneath. My fingers touched something soft. I inched it forward until I could grasp it.
The breath whooshed out. It was the bear Cosmo favored of all the toys I’d brought him. He hadn’t let go of it ever. He’d even taken it with him to the bathroom.
Bear clutched in my hand, I exited the room and took the elevator back to the third floor. Agents glanced up from packing up their desks, but I ignored them and stalked over to Knight’s office. I slammed the door open. He didn’t even spare me a glance and continued his phone conversation.
“Yes, sir. All information will be passed down to the DEA’s office.”
I paced in front of his desk, my stomach churning and roiling. What had they done with Cosmo? I hadn’t even gotten the chance to see him one last time. He must have been so scared. I’d promised him I would see him today, and now he thought I’d broken that promise.
“What can I help you with, Neely?” Knight put his phone down and finally looked at me.
I swallowed back the words threatening to come out. Cursing him to hell would surely end my days as a detective.
“Yes?” He smirked. “Is this your way of telling me you’re going to miss us working together? Do you eat steak, Hunter? I can take you out for—”
“What did you do?” I barked.
“Look, I know ideally we should have talked, but we got our instructions to break down this site, and we’re going through with it.”
I shook my head. “I don’t understand. Your meeting with the governor. We were supposed to—”
“We? I think there was a misunderstanding there, Hunter. The governor wished to speak to me alone.”
I inhaled painful air into my lungs. “You already met with him.”
“I did. I made sure I commended you for your work on the case. Without you, we would never have found Virgil and confirmed that he’s dead.”
“And?”
“And what? Our task force came together to track down a serial killer, and we did just that.”
“So you just scrub the facility of any sign you were here?”
“Exactly.”
“And Cosmo?”
He stopped putting things in his briefcase. “What about him?”
“What did you do to him?”
“About as much as expected. We transferred him to jail where he’ll be officially charged for his role in this.”
“And what role is that? To help us find the killer? You can commend me all you want for solving the case, but you know damn well Cosmo is the one to be commended. Cosmo, who we still know nothing about.”
“What’s there to know? He had evidence that man killed people, but he didn’t turn himself in to the police. Instead, he took a joyride in a vehicle that belonged to one of the victims.”
“Did you watch the same tapes I did? Saw the notes they made about him? Because we should be trying to find out who Cosmo is. We should try to help him find a normal life, not throw him in prison.”
“Tell me something, Detective. Is that what you were trying to do when you broke into the facility in the middle of the night?”
I froze but forced myself to stay calm. “I didn’t break in. You gave me security clearance.”
“You visited him at an unauthorized hour.”
“I wasn’t aware that there was a time slot to investigate the case.”