Chapter 7
Detective Ibrahim Hamed strolled through the halls of the Lightman Group offices completely unsure of where he was supposed to be headed. There was nobody at the reception desk. It was outside of their regular business hours and so there was no expectation of needing someone there. Ibrahim had never been here before. The place was much bigger than he expected. The hallways were wide and open, the waiting area was small enough, he passed by one office with glass walls and huge bookcases with glass doors, but there was nobody in there. He continued on, peaking around corners and through the few open doors along the way. This was a million miles from the packed open plan office of the police precinct. This was a nice place.
"Hi, Detective Hamed?"
Ibrahim smiled wide in relief and recognition. "Ms Torres! Hi. Great, I was starting to get lost in this place."
Torres returned his smile easily and asked, "What brings you here?"
"Oh, um, Detective Wallowski is out following a lead on the case, she asked me to stop buy with the updated files and to tell you guys that Ms Townsend was released this morning on bail."
Torres took the folder from the young detective with thanks.
At that moment Dr's Lightman and Foster rounded the corner with Trevor Byron between them.
"Thanks for your time, I'm sure we'll be in touch. We'll call your boss with an update on your case today," Lightman said to him, having noticed the detective standing with Torres.
"Goodbye, Dr Lightman," the man replied tersely, finding his own way out from there and leaving the four remaining figures standing.
Hamed's eyes followed him down the hallway until he disappeared around another corner. "Who was that? Something to do with our case?"
"Different case, but also involved a pickpocket. Could be connected."
Hamed turned to look at the last place he had seen the man and returned his attention to Lightman with interest. "Right, Captain Mallory mentioned you might have new leads for us. Wallowski is chasing it down now, she was headed to the hospital to follow up."
"I'll go and update our new client, if you guys want to go ahead and compare notes?" Foster suggested, heading back to her office to allow the others to put the connecting pieces together.
They wouldn't tell Ibrahim everything about the case, just that there was a woman in hospital following a suspected attempt to steal from the man. They would leave out the details about the call girls and the congressman for the moment. The police would surely find these details, but unless there was a connection they would not cross contaminate their business. They would certainly be looking into the possible connection themselves.
The girl was awake. But she wasn't talking. She wasn't yet fit to be discharged from the hospital, and Wallowski was playing a waiting game now. It felt like a wasted trip. She was able to get a report from the hospital about the injuries the woman had endured, and she was able to take a look at the woman. The only other valuable information she had gotten was the name that she had given to the hospital upon waking. Georgina Stanovich. That was all they had to go on.
Wallowski had returned to base in order to run some checks on their latest suspect, and to cross reference any possible connection with Philipa Townsend. There was nothing obvious that showed up. And so the next step was to get Lightman in to do his thing.
The doctors had said that Georgina would likely be kept in for another night for observation, and then released at some point the next day. They would likely request a statement from her down at the station, but they wanted to get an assessment from Lightman too. They would wait until she had rested and would send a team to speak with her the following morning before she left the hospital.
Gillian had called Congressman Pryce and updated him that there may indeed be a scandal upcoming about his aide, but it may not be about him assaulting a thief in a bar. He was less than pleased with the development and when assured by Gillian that they were definitely on to something bigger in relation to Trevor Byron's behavior, he had thanked her for their efforts and asked that they dig deeper. He had not wanted details until they could prove there was something to report. When Gillian had alluded to his potential violent behavior towards sex workers he had cut her off, asking only that he be informed should his aides activity threaten to be revealed publicly. It seemed that the congressman had no issue with the immoral and illegal activities of his aide unless it threated his own reputation.
She hung up the phone and pinched the bridge of her nose and took a deep breath. When she looked back up, Cal was standing in the entrance to her office.
Cal slammed the door hard enough to make Gillian jump even though she was watching him do it. She admonished him silently and moved into the house shaking her head with amusement.
"EMILY! We're home!"
Emily appeared in the doorway to the kitchen, still in her pyjamas and eating ice cream straight from the tub. "I told you, I'm not hungover dad."
Cal narrowed his eyes at her, looking for signs of deception.
"You have fun last night?" asked Gillian.
"Yeah. It was good. Sorry if I woke you."
"You didn't wake me," she said pointedly while turning to look at Cal.
"Sorry I got home so late, dad. I went to Katie's house and there were a few of us. By the time I realised how late it was, it was too late to call."
"And you definitely weren't drinking?" he asked sceptically.
"I was driving, dad. I drove myself home. Nobody was drinking."
Cal examined her face closely before declaring, "Yeah, alright. Good girl." And grabbing the ice cream out of her hand.
"Hey!"
"What? You woke me up at five o'clock this morning after a night of being worried sick about you. I deserve this more than you do."
Gillian took the ice cream out of Cal's hands and handed it back to Emily, moving swiftly through the kitchen to open the freezer and grab another couple of spoons.
