"No."
"Then why didn't you tell them who you were when they stopped listening?"
Maya looked at him for a long moment. "Because once they stopped listening to you, I needed to understand why."
Paul closed the property inventory. "The black drive isn't here."
Maya turned toward Harland again. This time, Harland was no longer looking toward Isaiah's room: he was looking directly at her.
Harland did not approach Maya immediately. Instead, he turned away from Isaiah's room and walked toward Captain Ruiz and the department attorney who had arrived only minutes earlier.
The conversation began quietly, but Maya recognized the change in strategy almost at once: he was no longer trying to control the emergency department; he was trying to control what the investigation would become.
Paul noticed it, too. "He's moving fast."
"He has to," Maya said. "The longer this stays about what happened here tonight, the worse it gets for him."
Paul glanced toward Harland. "So, he'll make it about you."
Maya did not answer, because Harland was already doing exactly that.
The department attorney, a gray-haired man named Thomas Keller, listened while Harland spoke in a measured voice. There was no anger in his tone now, no urgency, and no trace of the man who had ordered a false lockdown less than an hour earlier.
"My concern is straightforward," Harland said. "Deputy Inspector General Williams is the mother of the individual involved. She returned to the hospital with state investigators after a personal confrontation with Officer Mercer. Whatever happened at the reception desk, she has an obvious conflict."
Ruiz looked toward Maya; Keller followed his gaze. "Has Miss Williams personally handled any evidence?"
"Not the black drive," Harland said. "Because apparently nobody can find it. But she directed the intervention, received Mercer's badge, and initiated the preservation process."
Maya crossed the corridor before Ruiz needed to call her over. "If you're discussing my conflict, I should be part of the conversation."
Harland gave her a polite smile. "That is precisely the problem. You're already part of too many sides of it."
Keller raised a hand before either of them could continue. "Deputy Inspector General, nobody is suggesting you fabricated what happened at the front desk. But your son is the person detained, and you were directly involved in the confrontation. If this develops into a larger misconduct case, defense counsel will challenge every decision you make from this point forward."
Maya knew he was right. That was what made Harland's move effective.
Paul joined them. "The evidence team is already separate."
Harland looked at him. "She activated you."
"She had lawful grounds to request preservation."
"She had a son in restraints."
Paul's expression hardened. "Those two things can exist at the same time."
Keller nodded. "They can, but we still need to protect the investigation."
Harland leaned back slightly, as if he had finally forced the room onto terrain he understood.
Maya looked at Paul. "You take operational lead."
Harland's confidence flickered. Paul stared at her. "Maya—"
"—you take evidence coordination, witness interviews, digital preservation, and anything involving Isaiah's property."