The precinct smelled of wet wool and burnt coffee.
Lydia sat across from Detective Miller. He looked like a man who hadn't slept since the Mercer files landed on his desk. He pushed a manila folder across the table without preamble. The edges were frayed. A coffee ring stained the top corner.
"Mercer's people didn't wait for the warrant," he said. "They were in the lobby at four in the morning with three hard drives and a physical index. Usually when a place like this hits the fan we're fighting for a week just to get a staff roster. These guys gave us biometric logs for the last eighteen months."
Lydia flipped through the redacted statements. Methodical. Dry. "No pushback? No legal stalling?"
"Not a word."
She looked at a photo clipped inside the folder. A wide shot of the facility hallway. Steel, glass, lighting that cost more than the precinct's annual supply budget.
"You don't sound thrilled," she said.
"I've been doing this twenty years, Park." He reached for a foam cup of coffee and changed his mind. "When someone hands you the keys and tells you exactly where the bodies are buried it's because they've already finished the landscaping. Every statement matches the logs. Every log matches the biometric sweep. There's no friction."
"Maybe there isn't a cover-up," Lydia said. "Maybe Mercer meant what he said about Protocol Zero."
Miller looked at her. "Maybe. But these parent statements — they all sound like they were written by the same lawyer. They aren't angry at the school. They're angry at the breach. They talk about the Aris situation like it's a power outage."
He tapped the folder.
"I've got a doctor in custody who won't talk, an institution that won't stop talking, and a dozen families who want this to go away as fast as the paperwork will allow. I'm not saying there's a crime in the cooperation." He stood. "I'm just saying I don't like the way it feels."
Lydia closed the folder.
"I need to see the original statements from the boy," she said.
"Talk to the DA." The meeting was over. "And Park — if you find a hole in this, let me know. Because right now the only thing I have is a case so perfect it's making me sick."