Page 9 of Fatal Betrayal

"And Neil is a friend of mine who wants me involved. You heard what he had to say."

"Yes. He wants you to look over my shoulder to make sure I don't screw up. But you're going to get in the way, and I can't have that."

"It's not your choice."

She became acutely aware of the passing time and the curious interest from the nearby patrol officer. "I need to get back to the office."

"I'll go with you."

"No, you won't. This is a legal investigation, Cooper." As she finished speaking, Flynn came through the front door.

"Ready to go?" he asked.

"Yes."

"Hold on," Cooper said, a hard, determined note in his voice. "Neil asked me to help, and that's what I'm going to do, with or without your cooperation, Agent Hart."

Flynn's eyebrow shot up at Cooper's words. "Excuse me. Who are you?"

"Dr. Cooper Bradford. Mr. Benedict asked me to consult on the case. I have some experience with profiling and criminal behavior."

"Dr. Bradford," Flynn echoed. "I'm familiar with your work. You don't think much of the FBI, do you?"

"That's not important right now, Agent…" Cooper gave Flynn a questioning look.

"MacKenzie," Flynn supplied.

"My only goal is to find Elisa," Cooper said. "We don't have to be adversaries. We're on the same page. I can be a helpful liaison between your office and the family. They trust me. They know me. They want me involved. And I can't imagine why I would be anything but an asset to you."

Flynn turned to her. "What do you think? It's your call."

She debated her options. "Mr. Benedict made it clear that he wants Dr. Bradford to be his eyes and ears. I don't want to waste time arguing over this. If Dr. Bradford can help, then that's a win for everyone."

"All right," Flynn said. "Why don't you come to our office, Dr. Bradford? We'll go from there?"

"Good," Cooper said.

Since Cooper was clearly going to be involved, she needed to square things away with him before they went any further. "I'll ride with Dr. Bradford," she told Flynn. "I can fill him in on what we know so far."

"Then we'll regroup at the office."

She followed Flynn out of the house, with Cooper at her heels. As Flynn hopped into the SUV, she immediately regretted her decision to go with Cooper, but there was no way to avoid the inevitable awkward conversation that was coming.

They ducked under the police tape and walked down the block to Cooper's vehicle. As they walked past the neighbors, her gaze swept the crowd, looking for anyone who seemed out of place, or overly curious, but no one jumped out.

Cooper's car was a silver electric SUV, which clearly had cost some money. Apparently, writing books about tearing down law enforcement protocols was lucrative.

She got into the car, feeling irritated, angry, and nervous. She had a lot of reasons to dislike Cooper, but he had even more reasons to dislike her.

As he slid behind the wheel, she couldn't help taking a closer look at him. He'd filled out his long, lanky teenage frame, with broad shoulders and an athletic build. He was a man now—a very attractive man with brown hair and sharp green eyes that had always seen her a little too well. But his gaze now was more hardened than it had once been. He'd lived through a lot of years, a lot of pain. And there was a part of her that really wished she could have taken away some of that pain, but she was the last person who could do that.

"We need to talk," Cooper said, his assessing gaze meeting hers.

"We don't have time to rehash the past. There's a child missing."

"Exactly. We need to work together."

"We don't need to do that," she countered. "I'm an FBI agent. I'm trained in finding missing children, and I'm extremely good at it. You are a psychologist. You may have insight into why someone is a criminal, but you don't know how to catch them."