The suspect realized too late how the question sounded.
Danny leaned back.
“You still think I’m the detective you need to worry about.”
Baez almost smiled.
The suspect’s voice hardened.
“She’s reaching.”
Danny didn’t answer.
He didn’t have to.
Baez continued.
She laid out the inconsistencies one by one, never rushing.
Each question connected to the previous answer.
Each contradiction limited the suspect’s next escape.
When he denied one statement, she returned to another.
When he claimed confusion, she reminded him of his earlier certainty.
When he accused the detectives of twisting his words, Baez calmly repeated his own wording back to him.
The louder he became, the quieter she became.
That difference began to control the room.
“You’re trying to trap me,” he snapped.
“No,” Baez said.
“I’m giving you chances to explain yourself.”
“Same thing.”
“Only if the explanations don’t work.”
Danny looked down for a moment, hiding his reaction.
The suspect noticed.
“You think this is funny?”
Danny shook his head.
“No.
I think you made the same mistake a lot of people make.”
“What’s that?”
Danny nodded toward Baez.
“You thought quiet meant harmless.”
The room went still.
For the first time, the suspect looked at Baez without contempt.
Now there was anger.
And beneath it, fear.
He attacked the partnership next.
“You two rehearse this? Good cop, bad cop? She plays reasonable, you play crazy?”
Baez’s expression barely changed.
“You really need everything between us to be an act, don’t you?”
“I’m saying I know how cops work.”
“No.
You know how you expected us to work.”
She closed the folder halfway.
The suspect immediately watched her hand.
“And that expectation is why you kept watching Danny while I was watching you.”
His breathing changed.
Baez saw it.
Danny saw it.
The suspect tried one final denial.
“You have nothing.”
Baez pulled the last relevant page from the folder.
“Then this should be easy.”
She asked him to account for the part of his story that could no longer fit the established timeline.
He answered quickly.
Too quickly.
Baez asked one follow-up.
