32
Luke
My feet felt like they were floating above the ground. I still couldn’t believe that I was going to be a father.
A dad.
A kick to my ribs jolted a breath from my lungs.
Even listening to Newgate chatter away to anyone who would listen couldn’t put a damper on my mood.
“Hey, man. Did you enjoy your days off?” Monroe stopped by my desk.
“Yeah. Yeah, I did.” I could feel the goofy smile spread across my face that I had to rein in. “Thanks for covering my shift yesterday.”
“It was no problem.” He stood by my desk awkwardly for a moment, “Alright, well.”
“We’re good, Matt,” I told him with a quick head nod. He returned my gesture before walking back to his own space. We were still making progress on what the dynamic between us looked like. It was never going to be not shitty, what he and Jules did, but it was in the past. And I was happier than I’d ever been, thanks to their indiscretion, so there was nouse holding on to any animosity.
I was working my way up the unread emails from oldest to newest. The Massachusetts State Forensic Lab had sent a report. I quickly double-clicked to open it. It wasn’t about the Karrigan case like I had hoped, but it was a hit on an open investigation.
“Monroe. Come here,” I called from across the room. “Did you see this?” I asked as he looked over my shoulder to read the report. Written clear as day, Tyler Cress’s DNA was a match to the evidence found at Geller’s Pharmacy.
“No. They must have sent it to you since you submitted the evidence.” I gave him a minute to read through it. “Fuck yeah. A fucking break, finally.”
“I knew that dude was trouble,” I said. He may have gotten away with the assault on Daisy—for now—but he wasn’t getting out of this. “The second person in the video has to be Owen Hayden. Those two are inseparable.”
“In the earlier break-ins, there were three of them.”
Instantly, I knew. What a fucking idiot I was.
“And who ran with that crowd up until about four months ago?” I asked, leaning back in my chair.
“Ryan fucking Redmond.”
“Let’s pay him a visit.” I grabbed my jacket off the back of my chair, not waiting for Monroe to catch up. He followed me outside a second later, getting into the passenger seat of the department’s SUV.
Despite the fact that some of our evidence wasn’t exactly on the up-and-up, and Redmond’s lawyer had been made aware of that, Ryan was still being held without bail in the county jail.
Monroe and I signed in and were chatting with the wardenwhile we waited to see if Redmond would talk to us. I had no issue with waiting for his attorney, but I hoped it was sooner rather than later. Now that I had something to go off, I wanted to keep the momentum going.
One of the guards popped his head into the office a few minutes later. “Redmond is willing to talk. He’s in room 3C. He said he doesn’t need his lawyer.”
“Thanks,” I told him, turning back to the warden. “Appreciate your time, Warden Shea. We’ll let the guard know when we’re all done in there.”
Monroe followed me to the interview room, where a guard was standing by the door.
The small room was furnished with a table and four chairs. The overly bright fluorescent lights lit up the space. Redmond was sitting at a table, his hands in cuffs, while another guard waited inside the room with him.
“We’ve got it. Thank you,” Monroe told him, effectively dismissing him.
“Ryan. Thanks for agreeing to meet with us. Are you sure you don’t want a lawyer present for this conversation?” I asked him.
“My lawyer’s trash. It wouldn’t make a fucking difference if he was here or not.”
Okay. I honestly couldn’t blame him. His lawyer had been notified about the suspicious evidence over two weeks ago, and he still hadn’t filed a motion to dismiss based on that alone. It may not be successful—we had other evidence linking Ryan to Alana—but any decent lawyer would at least shoot his shot.
“Listen. We’re not here to talk about Alana…” I started.
