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fifty.
    â€œFor reasons you’ll figure out in a little bit.”
    Typical runaround. “Right.” She slunk back in the chair and gave him the stink eye. Immature? Yes. But it was the only thing she could do at the moment. Dislike clogged her throat. No way she’d win this war of wills, but she’d try to make it as uncomfortable as possible for this knucklehead in the meantime. She folded her arms across her chest and tried not to wince at the soreness across her chest. “Ask away.”
    â€œWhen was the last time you spoke to your father?” He had that cool, confident air about him as if nothing short of a bomb exploding on the seat next to him would ruffle his feathers.
    She couldn’t read his expression and wasn’t sure if that was a good thing or a bad thing. “I was six when he went to prison. You do the math.”
    â€œYou never visited him?”
    She gave him her best ‘you’ve got to be kidding me’ look. “Don’t try to tell me you haven’t looked at the visiting records. When I say I haven’t seen or talked to him since he went into Stateville, I’m telling you the truth.” She placed her fingertip on her lip and chewed on the end. “Which reminds me, could you tell me again how he got out? Stateville isn’t talking.”
    â€œI’m not at liberty to say. But let me show you something.” He stopped any protest she might have with an upraised hand. Opening a briefcase, he pulled out a DVD and popped it into the machine in the room. “I might be wrong, but that looks a lot like you going in to see him a couple of months ago. In fact, we have the same identical footage that shows you were there on a regular basis for the last six months. Does that change your story?” Before she could respond, he huffed out a breath, the first real sign she was getting to him. “I already ran it against your work record. You were off duty during all these times.”
    â€œPause that thing.” Something foreign and scary slithered up her spine. She glanced at the picture in which she saw herself, except it wasn’t her. She had this irrational urge to touch the screen as if that might conjure up the truth somehow. She’d done a lot of crazy things, but visiting her father and then lying about it wasn’t even on the radar screen of possibilities. “Can you blow that up?”
    â€œWe can’t do that with this machine. Are you denying it was you?”
    â€œOf course it wasn’t me. I told you the last time I saw him was when I was six. Besides, I’m a police officer. I know they videotape visits at Stateville.” Why would anybody want to set her up? And for what? Helping him escape? Is that why they weren’t talking? They thought she was an accomplice to this? “I assume this person signed in as me.”
    â€œNot exactly. But you—I mean she used a fake name and address that led us to a vacant lot in Oak Park. And let’s face it, even your own mother would believe that’s you on the tape.”
    â€œAnybody can get fake IDs these days. You’ve got to know that.” How or why would this work in anyone’s interest? She’d never stepped over the line. Ever. Sure she’d skated into the grey sometimes, but it was always about getting the bad guy behind bars, not getting them out.
    Malone shrugged. For the first time since she’d laid eyes on him he loosened up ever so slightly. “Hey, he was your father. It seems natural that you might want to reconnect with him. I get that. There’s no crime in seeing your long-lost father, considering the circumstances.”
    She ground her teeth. This guy was giving her the combo special—good cop, bad cop rolled into one.
    â€œAnd I told you I never went there. Don’t you get it? Cheesh. I thought you Feds were the smart ones.” She shook her head. “I never went to see him. I