Page 35 of Enigma (Pros and Cons Mysteries #6)
“ W hat are you doing here?” Dean’s voice was a mixture of disbelief and professional concern.
“It’s complicated.” Jason shrugged.
“Breaking into your dad’s old medical practice is complicated?” Dean gestured to the other officers to lower their weapons. “Jason, you’re going to have to do better than that.”
Olive watched the interaction carefully, noting how the other officers deferred to Dean despite his obvious personal connection to one of the suspects. He had seniority here, which could work in their favor or against them depending on how this played out.
“How did you know we were here?” Olive asked.
Dean’s eyes shifted to her, recognition dawning. “Olive Sterling. I should have figured you’d be involved in this somehow.” His tone wasn’t hostile, but it wasn’t friendly either.
“I did help stop this entire town from being manipulated out of money by a very convincing con artist.” She shouldn’t have to remind him of the woman she’d helped put behind bars a few months ago, but she did anyway.
She needed to use whatever leverage she had right now.
“You’re right. You did. And for that, we owe you the benefit of the doubt.” He paused long enough to sigh. “We got a call about thirty minutes ago. Someone reported seeing two people breaking into the building.”
“Who called it in?” Jason asked.
“It was anonymous.” Dean stepped closer, his expression growing more serious. “Look, Jason, I don’t know what’s going on here, but you’re my family. Chelsea will never forgive me if I arrest her brother.”
“Then don’t arrest us,” Jason said. “Just listen to what we have to say.”
“But the town will never forgive me if I show favoritism toward family,” he continued.
Dean was quiet a moment, clearly weighing his options. The other officers watched him, waiting for orders.
“You have sixty seconds,” Dean said finally. “And this better be good.”
“Dad’s missing, Dean.” Jason launched into a condensed version of everything that had happened—Lloyd’s disappearance, the attacks they’d survived, the evidence they’d found connecting these crimes to this old office.
Dean listened without interrupting, his expression growing more troubled with each detail.
“Someone kidnapped him from a hospital in Florida, and we think they brought him back here.” Jason concluded. “The evidence in that building might be the only way to find him.”
Dean was quiet, processing Jason’s words before he finally said, “You’re telling me Lloyd’s been involved in some kind of criminal conspiracy for more than ten years?”
“That’s what the evidence suggests.” Olive stepped forward. “And now someone’s trying to clean up loose ends.”
“Which includes silencing us,” Jason added.
Dean looked back at the medical building, then at his fellow officers, then at Jason and Olive.
“This is way above my pay grade,” he said finally. “Even if you’re telling the truth, I can’t just let you walk away from breaking and entering.”
Olive’s heart thumped harder. “Then what are you going to do?”
Dean sighed and pulled out his handcuffs. “I’m going to have to take you in.” He paused, meeting his brother-in-law’s eyes. “But I’m going to try to be as fair and impartial about this as possible.”
As Dean stepped forward to cuff them, Olive’s hands clenched into fists at her sides. The evidence they’d photographed felt like it was burning a hole in her memory—so close she could almost taste the answers, yet completely out of reach at the moment.
Inside the Oasis Police Department, Dean sat across from them at a scarred wooden table.
“All right.” Dean clicked his pen. “Let’s go through this again, but with more detail this time. What exactly is going on?”
Jason shifted in his chair. “Dad’s been missing for two days. Someone tried to kill him and then abducted him from a hospital in Florida. We think whoever’s behind it brought him back here to Texas.”
His eyes widened. “That’s some serious stuff.”
Jason nodded. “It really is. I wouldn’t be here and in this position if it wasn’t. You know me well enough to know that.”
“I can agree with that last statement. However, you thought breaking into a medical building would help you find him how, exactly?” Dean’s expression held doubt.
Olive watched Jason carefully. They’d agreed not to mention the safe or the evidence they’d found—there was too much risk that that information would disappear once it became part of an official investigation. But they needed Dean’s help to navigate the local connections.
“Dad used to keep personal files at his practice,” Jason said. “Patient records, business documents, things that might give us a clue about who would want to hurt him or why they’d bring him back to Oasis.”
Dean made a note on his pad. “Did you find anything?”
“We didn’t have time to search thoroughly before you arrived,” Olive offered.
“And all this was because someone called in an anonymous tip.” Dean looked up from his notes, his brow wrinkled. “Any idea who might have known you were there?”
“We’ve been followed since this whole thing started,” Jason said. “Whoever took Dad has been tracking our movements, trying to stop us from finding him.”
Dean was quiet as he processed the implications. “You’re telling me there’s some kind of organized effort to keep you from investigating your father’s disappearance?”
“There’s an organized effort to keep us away from this.” Olive nodded emphatically. “They haven’t killed us yet—they’ve only tried to slow us down. But that doesn’t mean they won’t get desperate.”
Before Dean could respond, there was a knock on the interview room door. Another officer stepped in and whispered something to Dean. Dean excused himself and stepped outside for a few minutes.
When he returned, he wore a slight smile. “Well, this is your lucky day. I just spoke with Dr. Schmitt, the doctor who runs the practice now. He’s agreed to drop the breaking and entering charges.”
Relief washed over Olive. “He did? Why?”
“Professional courtesy, he said. He knew Lloyd when he bought the practice, said Lloyd was a good man who helped a lot of people.” Dean closed his notepad. “So you’re free to go.”
“Just like that?” Jason raised his brow.
“Just like that. But Jason . . .” Dean leaned forward. “If you really think Lloyd is in danger and there’s some kind of criminal organization involved, you need to be careful.”
“That’s the goal.”
Dean glanced around before lowering his voice and saying, “There’s someone you should talk to, someone who might be able to give you some insight.”
“Who?” Jason asked.
Olive held her breath as she waited for Dean’s answer.