Wicked Sexy (Wicked Games #2)(87)
Downs tosses back the antacids.
Crunch. Crunch. Crunch.
“Huh. Developed it yourself? Impressive.” Over his shoulder, he asks the quadruplets, “Guys, did we know about this InSight thing?”
The one who’d been chewing the toothpick in the other room—at least I’m pretty sure it was him, they all look so freakily alike—says, “It’s in the report, Deputy Director.”
Downs turns back to Miranda with an apologetic smile. “Sorry, Ms. Lawson. You’re not a stickler for titles, I’m not a stickler for reports. I like to leave the paperwork to the bean counters, if you know what I mean. I more of a big-picture guy.”
“I do know what you mean. I’m the same way myself. Leave the details to the underlings, I always say, it’s the big picture that really matters.”
“Exactly! That’s exactly what leadership is!” He slaps his palm on the metal arm of his chair. “Well, I can certainly see why you’re the big boss around here, I’ll tell you what.”
When Miranda smiles, pleased by his compliment, I realize Downs is doing his Columbo impression to soften her up, make her think he’s a bit of a doofus, get her to let her guard down.
It seems to be working.
Hurry, Downs. Hurry. I turn and pace the other direction.
“All right, Ms. Lawson, I’ll get out of your hair in just a moment. Sorry to bother you again, we’re almost done. Let’s recap. A few weeks ago, this Killgaard individual contacted you via email with a threat of extortion, yes?”
“Yes.”
“And after you received that threat, you took the appropriate precautions to prevent any breaches in your network, yes?”
“Yes.”
“And then he somehow got in anyway, yes?”
“Yes.”
His questions are coming faster. Her answers are easy, automatic. They’re getting into a rhythm.
“And once he was in, he demanded more money, yes?”
“Correct.”
“And that’s when our rapid response team arrived to help, yes?”
“Yes.”
“And then Connor and Tabitha West arrived, correct?”
“Yes.”
“After which there were several communications between Tabitha and Killgaard, am I right?”
“Yes.”
“And the information gathered from those communications led to a team being deployed to Miami, yes?”
“That’s right.”
“And when did you first meet S?ren Killgaard?”
Miranda answers without hesitation, “Two thousand seven.”
I stop dead in my tracks. Deputy Director Downs stares at Miranda. The quadruplets tighten their grips on their guns.
It’s several long moments before Miranda realizes her mistake. When she does, her face drains of color.
“No. Wait. I-I didn’t…I meant—”
“You meant that you first met S?ren Killgaard in two thousand seven.” Downs speaks evenly, quietly, with a dangerous edge to his voice, the friendly, aw-shucks act vanished. “Mr. Hughes, it appears your gut instinct was correct.”
Miranda shoots to her feet. “No! That’s not what I meant! I was confused!” Outraged, verging on hysteria, she looks at Downs. Her eyes bulge with fury and desperation. “You were deliberately misleading me! You were trying to put words into my mouth!”
Like a deer that suddenly recognizes it’s in the hunter’s crosshairs, Miranda skitters back from her desk, panicked, arms flailing, stumbling awkwardly in her high heels, bumping first into her chair and then the wall of windows.
Downs rises. When he snaps his fingers, the quadruplets leap into action.
You’ve never seen four men in trench coats move so blindingly fast.
Stoic, her mascara-streaked cheeks pale, Miranda sits at her desk in handcuffs.
She’s waived her right to have an attorney present in exchange for a promise of leniency for her cooperation. She changed her tune of innocence as soon as she had a few shotguns jammed in her face.
The quadruplets didn’t take kindly to finding out she’d been hiding knowledge of the man who murdered nine of their own. Law enforcement folks are funny like that.
The quadruplets, Downs, and I stand in a row in front of her desk, bristling and seething as one.
“Let’s pick up where we left off,” says Downs. His entire demeanor is that of a man barely holding himself back from committing an act of violence. His hand rests ominously on the butt of his sidearm, a fact Miranda doesn’t miss. Her face bleaches a paler shade of white.
“You met him in two thousand seven. Where?”
She sniffles, looking down, somehow still elegant and regal despite the handcuffs and raccoon eyes. “In Seattle. I was attending the annual meeting of a professional women’s organization called Ellevate. I’d recently founded my own studio and had been invited to speak about young women in business.”
“What about them?”
Miranda looks up at Downs, a glint of defiance shining in her eyes. “About how difficult it is for them to be leaders because of all the cocks blocking their path to the top.”
With a heavy dose of snark, one of the quadruplets observes, “Feminist.”
She snaps, “You try fighting against the patriarchy as a woman in this country and see how far it gets you! If you don’t have a dick, the boys club won’t let you in unless you’re twice as smart and ten times as ruthless. And even then they’ll call you a bitch and a cow and a frigid, stuck-up twat, all because you’re simply better than they are.”