Something Morgan prided herself on, but it obviously made the state trooper uncomfortable. Then Harding flipped open one of the manila files. To a blurred shot of Morgan leaving the scene of Deputy Bob’s murder.
The cubicle suddenly felt small and intimate, almost as intimate as killing Bob had been. Morgan felt distanced from the person she’d been back then. It didn’t feel like her, not at all. The girl who’d killed the deputy had been totally in Clint’s thrall, unable to think or act for herself. If she hadn’t killed Bob, Clint would have killed her. Simple self-defense. Only the law would never see it that way.
Nor would they understand what it truly was: survival of the fittest. Bob had been fooled by Morgan’s youthful appearance, thought she was a lost little girl who needed his help. Morgan glanced from the photo to Harding and saw that the state trooper would not be similarly taken in.
“Is this you?” Harding asked, tapping the photo of the pony-tailed little girl dressed in a bulky snow coat and puffy hat. The girl could have been half Morgan’s age, and other than the same dark hair and eyes, there was little resemblance to how Morgan looked now.
Morgan shook her head, not committing anything to the record. She assumed they were being recorded, even if they weren’t, it was always best to think and act that way. “I’m not sure how I can help, Corporal Harding.”
“You can start by cutting the bullshit,” Harding said without raising her voice. She didn’t need to, given that their chairs were mere inches apart.
The fabric-covered cardboard that created the cubicle’s walls gave a false sense of privacy. Despite the fact that Harding hadn’t raised the volume of her voice, her tone had cut through the conversations surrounding them and Morgan felt the focus of all of the law enforcement officers in the room suddenly on her.
“You are not under arrest,” Harding continued. “Not yet. Give me a reason—” She stopped herself, her gaze on Morgan’s face, obviously realizing threats were not the way to get what she wanted. “Give me a reason to believe you,” she pivoted, “and we can bring in Clinton Caine. Together. Something we both want, correct?”
“Correct.” Morgan liked Harding. She was a lot like Andre, except not as warm and fuzzy—no, wait, not Andre, Harding reminded Morgan of a less-seasoned, younger version of Lucy Guardino. “Jenna Galloway didn’t send you to get me, did she?”
Harding hesitated, deciding on her play, then led with the truth. “We followed you from her office. We’ve been surveilling Galloway and Stone for three days now.”
“On the advice of Lucy Guardino.” Morgan wasn’t asking a question, but Harding answered with a slight nod before she caught herself. Now things were making more sense. Lucy might not be here in person, but it was clear she was directing the manhunt from afar. Keeping her family safe—both by staying away and by staying involved. A balancing act only Lucy could pull off.
Morgan leaned forward and grabbed a pen from the caddy beside the phone. “Okay, then. Let’s start with this map.” She began to circle areas of potential usefulness—bolt-holes Clint might turn to if Gibson hadn’t been able to provide an adequate hiding place for him and his comrades…if the escapees were even still together. Clint would go off on his own as soon as the others lost their usefulness, but that was assuming Clint was the one in charge.
The balance of power in a small group could influence so many things: how fast they moved, how they divided themselves, if they hid out or tried to put more distance between themselves and the authorities… Morgan hesitated, her pen hovering over the map. How would Lucy approach the problem?
“Tell me about the others,” she asked Harding. “The men who escaped with Clint.”
“Dead-eyed killers, each of them,” Harding answered. “Brothers, Pete and Paul Kroft, serving life for a spree of home invasions that left seven dead, including an eighty-two-year-old great-grandmother, who they raped and burned alive.”
Morgan started to force her expression into a semblance of the shock a Norm would feel, but when Harding raised an eyebrow, she dropped the act. Professional courtesy, in a way.
Harding continued, “I understand you found intel about possible IEDs at the Radcliffe residence? The younger Kroft brother, Paul, he’s former military, used pipe bombs to gain access or as threats during several of their crimes. Liked to put a suicide vest on the children and make the adults go to the bank with his brother, withdraw their life savings. And then they’d kill them all anyway.”