Deadly Testimony (Safeguard #2)(73)

Huh. At least he wasn’t angry with her. It could be a lot worse. Plus it was good to know they’d been doing their own work keeping the pressure off her and Kyle.

“I believe in maintaining positive relations with organizations like Centurion Corporation’s Safeguard Division.” Nguyen cleared his throat. “Keeps us all on our toes. Doing things differently. It’s good to make sure we don’t get too full of ourselves.”

Not a bad perspective to have. It was something she imagined Diaz and Harte thought about all the time.

“We’d like to continue working with you in the future.”

There was an emphasis on the pronoun. It did her ego some good to hear it. But if anyone was going to hear her decision first, she owed it to her commanding officer.

“Contracts go through Diaz,” she responded automatically. People were starting to fill the hallway. There must be a break in sessions.

“All right.” Nguyen was still amiable. “We’ll want to debrief though, once the trial is over.”

“Where?” She was not going to be thrilled to be stuck in an interrogation room down at the police station. This smelled like a potentially bad situation. “And do I need my lawyer?”

Nguyen held up his hands, palms out. “I meant it when I said we want to maintain positive relations with Safeguard.”

She’d talk to Diaz and have the Centurion Corporation legal team on hand anyway. It never hurt to be prepared.

“I’m more interested in the explosives set in the city while you and Yeun were missing.” He tugged at his suit and rolled his shoulders. “Obviously, there’s more than the usual criminal element in town.”

Edict was definitely not the norm in terms of private contract organizations. Most of their contracts were valid and legal, as far as Lizzy knew, but they’d definitely crossed the line with anything having to do with their current main contract holder.

“Talk to Phoenix Biotech about that.” She didn’t know whether it’d be the time to discuss the events around Maylin’s sister’s disappearance.

There’d been some discussion with the federal government but she hadn’t been a direct part of it. She’d only given reports on the day Edict paid a visit to the Centurion Corporation’s Training and Recovery headquarters outside Seattle, and the following incursion on Phoenix Biotech’s facility.

“We intend to,” Nguyen assured her. “We want to know the right questions to ask though and the Centurion Corporation seems to have clashed with the people Phoenix Biotech has hired twice now.”

True.

“Talk to Diaz.” She was done.

Nguyen was being friendly. He could definitely take a harder approach and she’d have stood her ground anyway.

It wasn’t that she didn’t want to cooperate. To her, Diaz was the head of Safeguard. She wasn’t going to decide what was and wasn’t said to the US Marshals or any other potential partners. Not her pay grade. Not her issue to be worrying about today.

“You’re closer to this than he is.” Only a slight edge betrayed Nguyen’s frustration. “You’re also more personally invested in the situation.”

He was wrong there. Diaz had every bit as much reason to be watching Phoenix Biotech and Edict very closely.

“I’m not permanently assigned to Safeguard.” Generally not something the man needed to know. But she figured it wouldn’t hurt to give him the heads-up. He came across to her as a man who would continue to pursue every lead until he found out what he wanted to know. That’d include showing up at the Safeguard offices looking for her. “I was retained for this contract, but the decision is still outstanding as to whether I’ll be reassigned to a new fire team for Centurion Corporation or permanently assigned to Safeguard Division.”

That was about as far as she wanted to go with the sharing though. The man did not have any reason to know the decision was hers. Both Harte and Diaz were waiting on her answer by end of business today. She’d come to the court house to keep an eye on proceedings even if she remained outside the actual courtroom because it’d given her something constructive to do while she wrestled with the pros and cons.

Stay or go?

Nguyen sighed. “Fine. I’ll talk to Diaz. Do I need an appointment too?”

“Probably not.” You know, she could probably be more diplomatic here. She was supposed to be working on her interpersonal skills. Kyle’s charming smile came to mind, the one he used on people when he was about to talk them into doing something they didn’t initially intend to do. “But it’d be appreciated as a professional courtesy. Once you’ve got the date and time set, I can try to be in the office too so you can talk to the both of us if it’s appropriate.”

Nguyen grunted, somewhat mollified.

She needed more work on the circumspection, probably. Could consider the way she worded things. Maybe.

Sometimes simple meant clear communication.

Sometimes getting things done meant it was impossible to keep it simple.

Well, she’d have to grow past using Post-it notes if she was going to stay in this line of work.

*

There was a crush of people heading out of the courtroom. It’d been one of the longest days of Kyle’s life and he wasn’t sure it was over yet. A few steps outside the courtroom, he saw two men waiting in the hallway. Hard to miss them.