Page 126 of State of Alert

“I believe it would be prudent. Shall I call him?”

He shook his head, as if in disbelief that any of this was happening. “Go ahead.”

“I’ll be back when he arrives.”

In the pit, she stopped at Freddie’s cubical. “Will you please ask Roland Dunning to come in?”

“Did he request him?”

“Nope. I did. Malone just made a great point. He said if it was his wife in our morgue, he’d be camped out in the lobby, asking for updates and offering to help. This guy is pissed off that we requested more of his time to assist with the case.”

“That is an interesting take. I’ll call Dunning.”

“Thank you.”

As Sam was heading back to her office, a female Patrol officer came into the pit. “Lieutenant, there’s an Isaac Erickson here to see you.”

It took her a second to recall that he was Juan Rodriguez’s roommate. “Go ahead and bring him to my office, if you would.”

“Of course.”

“Thanks.”

Sam went into her office and sat, wondering what had brought Isaac to HQ.

The young man who came in looked as if he hadn’t slept for a minute since the last time she’d seen him. His hair was messy, and he hadn’t shaved. Wearing a NAVY T-shirt and jeans, he was the picture of grief. She immediately felt sick with guilt for what he was going through.

“Come in, Isaac.”

“Thank you for seeing me.”

“Of course. What can I do for you?”

“I’ve been hoping to hear something about the investigation, but no one is telling me anything, and I didn’t know what else to do, so I came here.”

“Oh, um, well, we’re not working on that case anymore. NCIS has taken it over since Goldstein’s arrest.”

“Was he the one who killed Juan?”

Sam ached for the guy. “I don’t know anything about that. Have you spoken to NCIS?”

“They won’t return my calls.”

“How about I reach out to them and ask them to get in touch with an update?”

“That’d be good. I’ve been thinking about calling Juan’s mom, but I don’t want to bother her at such a difficult time.”

“Let me make some calls and see if I can get you some info, okay?” She flipped through her notebook to make sure she still had his number from the other day. “I’ll have someone call you.”

“I’d really appreciate that.”

“No problem.”

“Something about all of this feels so weird to me. I can’t explain it. But it doesn’t feel right.”

Sam had no idea what to say to that. She wanted to tell him his instincts were spot-on, but it wasn’t her place to tell him the truth. “I’ll see what I can do.”

“Thanks again for seeing me.”

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