“I’ll try to make this quick.”

“Take your time.”

As she made her way inside, her hip and her neck ached like a bitch.

She knocked on the door to Malone’s office. “Ready?”

“Yep. He’s in interview one.”

“Is Faith here?”

“Waiting in observation.”

As they made their way to the interview rooms, Faith came toward them.

“Stand down,” she said. “He took something. EMS is on the way, but he was foaming at the mouth and convulsing.”

“How in the hell did this happen?” Malone asked.

“I assume he had something with him just in case he needed it,” Faith said.

EMS arrived a short time later and declared Lawton dead.

Fucking hell. Just when they were getting somewhere.

Sam and Malone interviewed the Patrol officers who’d been assigned to guard Lawton after he entered the interview room.

Officers Keeney and Watts were familiar to Sam and had earned her respect in earlier investigations.

“We uncuffed him as we always do once they’re in the room,” Keeney said, “and a minute later, he was convulsing.”

“You did a thorough search on the way in?” Sam asked.

“We did,” Watts said, seeming rattled. “Pockets were emptied, his wallet and phone confiscated. All the usual stuff.”

“Let’s get a warrant to dump the phone,” Sam said.

“I’ll take care of that,” Malone said as the EMTs wheeled Lawton to the morgue. “First thing tomorrow, I need you to brief the media on what happened with Dominguez earlier and now this.”

“Okay. I need some time to figure out how losing Lawton impacts the case.”

“Yeah, that’s fine, I guess. Brief when you’re ready. Go ahead home. I’ll take care of updating Cooper and Farnsworth on what happened with Lawton.”

Sam didn’t need to be told twice. She hadn’t even removed her coat, so she headed for the main door and was in the warm back seat of the SUV in a matter of minutes. “Our guy took his own life. Let’s go home.” Frustration beat through her like a bass drum. Spencer had been dead nearly a week, and she was no closer to answers than she’d been when it first happened.

She called Gonzo.

“Hey,” he said, sounding sleepy.

“Lawton just offed himself in interview one—before we talked to him.”

“Whoa, really?”

“We’re back to square one with nothing more than we had a week ago.”

“I’ve got a few things that may come to fruition.”

“When?”

“Soon, I hope. It’s tough, Sam. These people operate in the shadows. Their whole goal is to steer clear of us, not to grab our attention.”

“I wanted to be able to tell Spencer’s family, when I see them at the wake, that we got the people who poisoned him.”

“We’ll get them, but it might not happen as quickly as we’d like it to.”

“We both know there’s a big chance we’ll never get them. This isn’t like other cases. We need criminals to help us, and how likely is that to happen?”