Chapter 4

"Can I ask you something?"

Foster and Torres had headed out into the field to see if they could orchestrate a chance meeting with Brackly's accountant. Loker had gone off to check up on his study. It was just Turner and Lightman in the lab space they used for working cases.

"Uh oh," Cal joked, but Mark could see clearly the tension that crept into his body at the idea he was about to be forced into a personal interrogation. "If it's about where I was when Torres called earlier, the answer is: none of your business."

"It's not about that, but you saying that makes me curious," Mark noted with interest. "No," he moved on with determination regardless, "It's about something else."

Lightman gave him his patented 'well go on then' stare so Mark got to the point.

"I haven't had the cops called on me since I told you about it."

Mark had told Cal about his neighbors in what used to be Gillian's home a several weeks previously. It was a predominately white area in the heart of Georgetown. The more nosey residents were prone to calling the police whenever they saw something they felt was out of place. In their view, seeing a young Black man in the area, despite knowing full well that Mark lived there, was cause for alarm. Mark had had to prove he lived there on more than one occasion since he had moved in, and he knew damn well he was lucky to have the cops believe him when they showed up. He knew that Cal was scared for him when he mentioned it, and even though he had told his boss and friend to leave it alone he also knew that Cal was unlikely to have done so.

When it became apparent that Mark believed he had made his point with his vague but to the point statement, Cal inhaled sharply just so that he could exhale an impatient, "And?" at his young friend.

"What did you do?" Mark asked as though the question had been obvious all along.

"What makes you think I did something? What could I have done?"

"I tell you about my problem, you offer to intervene, I ask you not to, and all of a sudden the problem seems to have disappeared?"

"Maybe they're just getting used to having you around?"

"They've been a little nicer to me too, but in a really cautious way. And not a 'he's going to rob, rape and murder us' way either. I mean, nice, and curious, but afraid to ask me anything direct about myself. And when Laila stays with me they get weird about it, like they think it's weird, but not in the usual 'he's an active black father? The news told me they don't exist' kind of way. I mean, genuinely confused. You told them something. I know you did."

They had a staring competition for a few seconds until eventually Cal caved in.

"Alright, fine. I went over there after we talked. Made sure to bump into some of Gill's more chatty neighbors, and brought up the topic of you living there."

"What did you do?" Mark asked, impatient for the truth now that he knew for sure something was up.

"I may have," Cal said with a casual innocent waving of his arm between them, "Started a rumour that you're in the witness protection program for being the heroic saviour of a CIA agent."

"…. You did what!?"

"Don't tell Foster."

Torres lowered her sunglasses down the bridge of her nose as something caught her attention across the street. She appraised the sight before deciding that whatever it was, it wasn't the guy they were looking for. She raised the sunglasses back to shield her eyes from the sun behind her companion.

Foster stirred her coffee and passed the tiny milk jug across the compact café table, all the while looking around with feigned casual interest in their surroundings.

They had decided that the best place to scope out their newest subject was at the café opposite the building where they knew the accountant worked. It made the most sense for a chance encounter. Plus, it meant they got a late lunch in.

"Lightman's really not setting us up?" Ria asked while she stirred her coffee and watched Gillian while Gillian watched the building across the street.

Gillian spared her an amused glance and turned her attention back to the reason they were there, "Pretty sure. He's enjoying himself though. Watching you two get all paranoid about it."

"Enjoying it too much for it not to be a trap."

"How could he have known you would take on a case like this without checking in?"

"We've taken on cases before," Ria defended indignantly.

"Yeah, but not like this. Usually cheating couples and small change stuff. I think he's enjoying seeing you two take a risk. Either way he wins. He either gets all smug about it not working out or it works out and we get paid."

"You don't think we can solve this?"

"I think you can. Of course you can. You've led on way tougher cases than this. And so does Lightman. If he didn't, there would have been yelling."

"Hasn't been all that much yelling in the last six months," Ria pointed out, obviously making an implication.

Gillian managed not to blush too obviously, turning her head towards the street to avoid eye contact she managed to hold back the smile as she replied, "Oh he still yells when he wants to," dismissively.

"Yeah, he just doesn't seem to want to so much these days, I guess."

Gillian didn't bother to answer, knowing that Ria was looking for clues as to where Gillian felt her relationship was. In credit to Ria Torres, she was doing a lot better with tact in recent times. When she started working for them that was a concern. She had a tendency to just blurt it out as she saw it. She had grown in maturity and consideration for others over the time they had worked together. She had made her point though and decided to leave a companionable silence between them as she followed Foster's gaze.

"That looks like our guy," Torres said suddenly and stood from the table. "Excuse me," she grinned before moving across the street for her chance encounter.

Gillian took the small box from her pocket and attached the earpiece, setting up the tools they had brought.

Across the street, Ria walked directly into the path of their target with her head buried in her phone screen.

"I am so sorry," she declared as she barrelled into the man, causing him to loose his balance slightly.

"Hey, you should watch where you're going," his irate reply gave the first indications of what kind of person they were dealing with.

Ria tried to turn on the charm and stop him from moving away. "I'm really sorry, you're right," she opened her eyes wide, batted her eyelashes at him and twirled a loose strand of hair around a finger before letting it go. She looked him up and down with appreciation and said, "Hi-" in her best bashful tone of voice, trying to introduce herself and start a conversation.

"Excuse me," he said, cutting her off, as he tried to move passed her to cross the street.

"I'm Ria," she continued, "I really am sorry. I'm usually much more aware of my surroundings, you know? You have to be to be a woman all alone in a city like this."

"Well, it's good to hear that," he said as he tried to dismiss her. "I'm gonna go," he said as he pointed to the café where she had just been, "just try to look where you're walking?"

"Yeah, of course," she demurred. "Actually, I was wondering if you could help me? I was supposed to meet a friend at this café, I'm running late because I couldn't find it. I got the wrong bus and… anyway… It's called 'Parkers'?"

He looked at her like she was stupid, sighed, and pointed behind her. She turned to look and then turned back to him with a giggle. "I don't believe it. Amazing, thank you so much."

The man shook his head and began to walk in the direction of the café, clearly trying to dismiss her. She wondered if maybe Gillian should have been the bait. Or Loker maybe. She moved to walk along side him as they crossed at the pedestrian traffic lights.

"I'm Ria, by the way."

"You said."

"It's just, I didn't get your name."

"That's right."

"Oh. Ok. I'm sorry, I didn't mean to bother you."

"That's fine."

They continued walking, both heading into the café. He went ahead and ordered his drink and when it came time to pay Ria stepped forward and said, "Oh, hey, I've got this. Least I could do."

He looked at her confused, and begrudgingly accepted her offer.

"For bumping into me?"

"You seemed pretty annoyed by it."

Her words seemed to make him reassess his behaviour. "I… look, I'm sorry. I don't mean to be rude, just, stressed I guess."

She nodded and then the barista called her forward to make her own order. By the time she had paid, he had found a seat in the corner of the café, indoors. She made a show of looking around, and despite there being plenty of free tables she didn't take one. She took out her phone, making a show of checking it and sighing dramatically. Then she approached his table.

"My friend left already. She had another appointment. Do you mind if I sit here?" she asked and immediately sat at his table without waiting for his answer. He looked in exasperation around him at the empty tables that surrounded them.

"So what do you do?" she asked him. His patience was fraying.

"I'm an accountant."

"Oh, wow… sounds…"

"Boring?"

"Maybe," she laughed flirtatiously.

Finally he cracked a smile. "Yeah. It is."

"I'm studying law."

"Really?"

"I don't look like a law student?"

"That's not what I meant. I just… that sounds more interesting than accounting."

"It's not. My dad wanted me to be lawyer. I ignored him, took another course, but now here I am. Doing exactly what he wanted."

"Why?"

Ria knew she was in now. Daddy issues. It was always daddy issues with these guys.

"Oh, he wanted me to get involved with the family business, contract stuff. I told him I'm not my sister, but I don't know. Maybe I should have been an accountant instead."

He laughed at her, and she figured she'd managed to hit a nerve somewhere in there.

"I get you. Trying to live up to the family name, huh?"

"Ugh, yes. It's the worst. What about you?"

"Nothing to tell. I'm good with numbers. I became an accountant. Now I work with numbers."

"Anything interesting?"

"No. A few big clients, mostly business people, mostly older. Pays the bills."

This was the dullest man on the planet. She smiled at him and twirled her hair again.

"Anyone famous?"

"No."

Like pulling teeth. How the hell was she going to crack this guy?

"So. You must see a lot of guys try to scam the system, huh?"

Feet first. All in. Why not? WWCLD – what would Cal Lightman do? Ok probably not this. She couldn't see Foster from where she was sitting, but if she had to guess she'd say the poor woman had spat out her coffee by now.

"Excuse me?!"

"I'm kidding. Mostly. Law student, you know? Always curious about anecdotes like that."

He settled himself again after his reactive outburst, but his initial reaction told her that he was either outraged at the very suggestion that he would work for anyone like that, or that he was upset at being potentially caught.

"People always want to know how they can extract the most profit from their accounts. As an accountant, I try to make sure nobody goes to prison for putting a decimal point in the wrong place or something. I'm not an independent accountant, I work for a firm. trying to 'scam the system', as you put it, would land a lot of people in a lot of trouble."

That was a deflective answer. There was truth in it, but there was potential for something hidden. This guy was smart. She wasn't going to get the full picture from him just by flirting with him at a café.

"Hey, I can see you're not interested," Torres offered, "Thanks for sharing a coffee with me," she continued as she stood, "If you ever want to grab a drink or something, give me a call", she finished, taking a pen from her bag and writing her phone number on a napkin. Maybe if playing the long game would work if they couldn't get any further today.

Torres took her leave of the quaint café and headed outside to catch up with Foster who had already begun to move away as soon as Torres began to wrap up the conversation.

"He's good," Gillian started graciously, "Gave nothing away, presuming there's something to give away."

"No he's not, I just didn't get the questions right."

"You did fine. We should have been able to get more information on the guy to figure out the set up. Maybe Loker would have been better."

"You think so too, huh?"

"I don't know. Weird that he's not attracted to you is all. Best guess would be he's into guys."

"Well, what do we do now?"

"Head back to the office, see if the guys have anything more to go on. Come up with Plan C. Could be that there's nothing to find."

Owen Pickford was impatiently fidgeting at the front desk when they arrived back. He had been standing there arguing with Heidi for several minutes, insisting that Doctor Lightman update him on the case he had hired him for. Finally, despite assuring him that their team was working diligently on his case and that someone would meet with him if he would take a seat in the waiting room, Heidi eventually caved in and went to find Lightman or better still, Lightman's assistant Anna.

"Mr Pickford."

The voice of Ria Torres stopped his quiet ranting

"Miss Torres."

Ria gestured towards her companion, "This is Dr Gillian Foster."

Gillian stretched her hand to greet the man and said, "Pleasure to meet you. We're glad you're here actually, we were hoping to gather a little more detail from you to help with your case."

Pickford looked between the two women and bit the inside of his cheek, "I appreciate the effort, but don't you think if you've had no success that we should be asking the owner of this place to take my case?"

"I am the owner of this place," Foster replied shortly. "Co-founder. And we're not magicians, Mr Pickford, we're scientists. We need information and evidence and the ability to research, if you want an answer to your question."

Ria had to fight to keep the proud smirk off her face.

"Now, if you'd like to find an answer to your question, would you mind accompanying my colleague Ms Torres to the interview suite?"

Ria's posture straightened up and she found herself looking dumbfounded at Foster. She had expected Foster would be taking over from there, using her authority to get the information from the man. Gillian turned to her friend and inclined her head kindly.

"Ria? I'll stop by in a few, I want to check in with Lightman and then the lab first, give them an update."

"Of course."

Gillian had gone straight for Cal's office as soon as Torres had walked off with Pickford. He wasn't there. She had thought he then that he had headed out on another mystery errand, so found herself surprised when she walked into the lab to find him seated with Mark Turner and Eli Loker, the three of them seated around the room with rapt attention on the large projected images on the wall before them.

Loker had managed to dig up a collection of footage of all of the board members at various public outings, town hall meetings, local interviews about the charity. They hadn't noticed her arrival and were bantering back and forth their theories about who was hiding something and what it likely meant, Cal observing the younger men; uncharacteristically silent.

Gillian walked into the space between Loker and Cal to access the keyboard and change the feed on the smaller monitors to the security footage in the interview room where Torres now sat with Pickford.

"Oh yeah?" Cal asked.

"He must have arrived just before we got back," she explained. "No leads with the accountant, by the way. We may have picked the wrong bait. We arrived back to find Mr Pickford looking for you," she said to Cal, turning her face towards him to look fondly at him.

"So you sent him off with Torres?"

"I keep telling you she's a lot like you," Gillian joked.

In the other room, Ria was doing her best to get more information about what was going on with the Charity funds while also leading their client into the type of interview they regularly conducted on their suspects.

"What made you suspect Brackly?"

"He's the smartest one. The most successful. The guy with his eggs in the most baskets. Money is disappearing somewhere, and the most likely place is where it's hardest to track it all down, right?"

Ria nodded. His theory seemed solid enough. She just didn't believe him.

"And in your opinion, is there anyone else on the board, or involved in managing the finances that could be involved?"

Pickford paused to think. There was hesitation for a fleeting couple of seconds, Torres could see it clear as day. "No. I don't think so. I wouldn't suspect Bill either, honestly, except there are irregularities and it has to be someone."

"Could it be a mistake?"

"Doubtful. I don't see how."

"What about the people managing your finances? What about the CFO?"

Pickford showed anger, quickly contained. His shoulders tensed, his mouth tightened. There was a wrinkling at the bridge of his nose.

"I make sure that only the best people are appointed to manage my affairs, young lady. My business dealings are beyond reproach."

"I understand, sir, but we have to ask if we're going to get the answers you're looking for. Do you fully trust the people around you? Do you know everything about them?"

"The answer I'm looking for is what Bill Brackly is up to. That's what you were hired for. "

"No, we were hired to find the truth," came the blunt response from the doorway in a no-nonsense London accent, "because that's what we do," he finished once the two pairs of eyes shot towards him.

Torres looked disappointed by his arrival. Pickford was confused.

"Cal Lightman. How do you do?" He introduced himself. He took a seat beside Torres and slouched backwards without offering his hand. "Can I presume that you've already provided us with full backgrounds of everyone associated to your foundation and your business dealings? You know, to rule out any and all possibilities?"

Pickford looked with guilt towards Torres. He had insisted that they only review one candidate and would only offer information on Brackly and his associates.

"Why Brackly, specifically?"

The question had come from Ria Torres. There was something about the way he reacted each time the man's name was mentioned.

"I told you-"

"You told us what you wanted us to think," Lightman cut him off. "You don't like the man, do you?"

Pickford tensed up his shoulders and scrunched up his face.

"I have known Bill Brack-"

"Known him for years, yeah, I know. There's people I've known for years that I can't stand. You?" he directed his question to Torres.

"Yeah, of course" answered the young protégé.

"Bill Brackly is a close colleague and friend. I'll get you all of the information you asked for sent over this afternoon, but I have to reiterate the sensitivity of this matter. I can't be seen to be accusing-"

"No of course. We handle all of our cases with the utmost sensitivity, don't you worry Mr Pickford."

Pickford left the room with haste and Cal turned, still in his careless slouch, towards Ria.

"Maybe now he'll stop asking for me, eh?" he joked.

"I was handling it."

"I know you were. I got bored… He's hiding something else."

"I know that. You don't think I know that?"

"Just got tired of waiting for you to unravel it," he said as he stood and headed for the exit, "You never used to be so cautious Torres!" he called out as he left.