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assault in the parking lot. Ingram recorded her statement on a digital recorder. Not distracted by having to make his own notes, he listened intently, stopping her to clarify points or ask questions. Gwenfound that talking about the event helped work out the poison left there by her own fear. It didn’t leave her feeling clean, but it helped her feel better about herself. She hadn’t done anything wrong, and she didn’t deserve to live in fear. She could go home and face Paul and tell him she’d done what she could to nail Tarbell.
    Ingram played back Gwen’s statement while he took notes and made sure she’d remembered everything that happened. Deborah made her own notes, no doubt in preparation to give a report to Pace’s president. Pace was really pulling out the stops. It should have filled Gwen with a warm, fuzzy feeling of security, but it didn’t. It was too much. Corporations didn’t hire private security consultants to investigate violence in the workplace. For Bill Gates, yes, but for Gwen Farris, she didn’t think so. Ingram and Deborah were conferring with each other when Gwen stopped them.
    “This is too much, too expensive, to be standard policy. There’s something you’re not telling me.”
    Neither Ingram nor Deborah rushed to dispel the accusation. Ingram exchanged a look with Deborah before going back to his note taking. His message was clear. It wasn’t his question to answer.
    Deborah looked uncomfortable. “Yes, you’re right, Gwen. There is something we’re keeping from you. We’re trying to prevent something from occurring that happened six years ago.”
    “What?”
    “A murder.”

CHAPTER FOUR
    L uke Morgan had strangled his coworker,Laura Porter, in her Baltimore apartment. Laura’s roommate found Morgan hunched over Laura’s body. Morgan bolted but the police picked him up at home packing a bag before he skipped town.
    Ingram outlined the tragic events to Gwen. He didn’t put a gloss them, but he didn’t do anything to play them down either. Laura and Morgan had worked together at Pace’s research facility in Maryland. Morgan had been attracted to Laura, but already engaged, she spurned him. Morgan wouldn’t take no for an answer and began harassing her at work and in her private life. She reported him to Pace and Pace warned him off, but took the matter no further, even after Morgan continued to follow her. Morgan’s fascination escalated until he was following her home at nights and watching her at work. Her relationship with her fiancé broke off. Morgan took that as a sign of love, but when Laura spurned him again, he killed her. The story left Gwen cold. She liked to believe Tarbell couldn’t cross the line Luke Morgan had crossed, but the knife and the hate he so clearly communicated didn’t seem like good signs.
    “I won’t let the same happen to you,” Ingram said. “No one has even come close to being hurt since my association with Pace.”
    “People are our assets,” Deborah said. “Pace will do everything it can to protect them. Handling incidentslike these is cheaper in the long run.”
    “Cheaper?” Gwen asked.
    Deborah’s expression changed as she realized she’d said the wrong thing, but also realized she couldn’t duck the issue. “Laura Porter’s family sued Pace for negligence and won five million in damages. That provoked a study to be conducted as to what workplace conflicts cost Pace each year in lost man hours, loss of industry knowledge, legal costs, resignations, firings, and hirings. It added up to millions every year across its US and Canadian facilities.”
    Deborah wasn’t wrong when she called Gwen an asset. She was a dollar figure to Pace. She tried not to take it personally. She traded her knowledge for a monetary sum. It stood to reason a corporation would see her in financial terms, but it failed to make her feel any better about her position.
    “I know how this sounds,” Deborah continued, “but I want you to know the