He waited with uncharacteristic patience.
“So maybe we could have made a difference before. If we’d been in the game, I mean. Maybe this darkness would never have been able to build up. Maybe those people yesterday wouldn’t have died.”
“Regrets are useless,” he reminded her. “We can’t fix what’s behind us, only what’s ahead of us.”
Reno sent him a faintly surprised glance. “I didn’t think you had any regrets.”
“They’re useless. You heard me say. Look, I’m not a cop. You’re not a cop. Neither one of us has any experience with law enforcement. We’ve been living our lives—”
“—hiding from the world—”
“—day to day, just like most everyone else. Nobody asked us to suit up and get into the game, and if we’re honest we’ll admit that neither of us was even paying attention. Like most people.”
“Bishop asked us.”
“Actually, he didn’t. Or, at least, I never heard him ask any of us. He found us, and he wanted to know if we were up to joining the SCU or that civilian outfit of his, Haven. Clearly, none of our little group was. But he still kept tabs, didn’t he? He put us up in that so-called group home. Where we didn’t feel quite so much like freaks. He visited when he could. Couple other SCU and Haven people visited. They offered advice, talked about their experiences. We did a few experiments of our own. But in the end we all went in different directions, and for most of us it took less than a year. Does that sound like a team to you?”
“It sounds to me like we were mostly scared,” she replied.
“I wouldn’t argue with that. Scared, anxious, wondering how on earth we could possibly fit into the world.”
Reno decided to leave personal matters out of it for the moment. “And now?”
“Now something other than Bishop forced the issue. Maybe it took a cosmic kick in the ass to get us here, but we’re here. Maybe we’re even a team.”
Surprised, she said, “If you knew that and were willing, why the hell have you been a pain in the ass about it?”
“I didn’t say I was willing. I said I was kicked in the ass and now I’m here. In the game. I don’t know any more than you do about what happens next. Or how I’ll feel about being in the game when this is over with, assuming we survive. And neither do you.”
“Huh,” Reno said slowly.
“Turn left ahead,” Dalton told her.
THIRTEEN
THURSDAY, OCTOBER 9
Archer didn’t immediately realize that the SCU team he’d called in to help had more or less vanished. He didn’t realize for several hours, in part because he and Katie went to talk to Stacey Bowers and that took time because neither of them wanted to make the awful situation even worse for her.
Not that she was able to help them. She had not noticed any sign from her husband that suicide was in any way on his mind, or even that anything was bothering him, and she maintained with absolute assurance that Sam would never kill himself. Never.
When they returned to the station, both discouraged and both tensely anticipating bad news of some kind since the overwhelming events of the day before could not be the end of it all, Archer met briefly with the doctor and okayed moving Jim Lonnagan to the hospital, where he’d be kept sedated and under restraints, at least for the present.
A temporary measure, the doctor had noted.
Archer didn’t know what the hell a permanent measure would be, and hoped to God he wouldn’t have to make that call.
After supervising the transfer, via ambulance, of Lonnagan to the hospital, Archer went into the conference room, where Katie was sitting with postmortem reports spread out around her and her gaze fixed on the big map of the valley pinned to one of the boards.
As Archer came into the room, she said, “Jill’s working fast. She’s done the postmortems on the three Gardner kids.”
“Anything we didn’t already know?”
“Not really. Though she does agree that Luke Gardner was probably killed at least a couple hours before the other kids were killed. Says Ed Gardner was killed last; she’s working on his post now.”
“And when was the other stuff done?”
Steadily, Katie said, “All the postmortem injuries happened within a couple of hours of death.”
Archer tried not to imagine how horrifying that scene must have been. And had to imagine, of course.
“Leslie Gardner is now officially in a coma,” Katie continued. “And the docs say it’s a deep one. Beyond that, they aren’t offering anything we didn’t know before. They don’t know if or when she’ll come out of it, or what shape she’ll be in if or when she does. Though I guess we can make some educated guesses based on Elliot Weston and on Jim.”
“Yeah. I guess.” He looked around. “Where are our federal friends?”
“Looking for the bad guy,” Katie replied.
Archer lifted a brow at her. “The bad guy? You mean the bad guy who apparently used some kind of crazy energy to persuade a woman to murder and dismember her husband and kids, a real estate agent to murder two strangers, Sam Bowers to kill himself, and Jim Lonnagan to nearly kill his wife? That bad guy?”
Katie nodded, and said immediately, “I had to put two deputies and the front desk on incoming calls. A lot of calls, Jack. People are scared. They have a lot of questions and no answers. Except word seems to have gotten around that as horrible as the deaths have been, the killers weren’t in their right minds when they committed the crimes. People are asking if it’s something in the water or the food supply; I guess that’s a lot more likely than . . . energy.”
“You think?”
She cleared her throat. “We have reports of the same sort of things we already know about: tension, headaches, the feeling that their heads are stuffed full of cotton. A few have mentioned their skin crawling. Tempers seem to be unusually short, and we’ve had some calls about loud disagreements and fistfights. Other than recommending that everyone be . . . cautious and vigilant, skip the caffeine, and see a doctor if they’re worried, there isn’t a whole hell of a lot we can tell them to help them protect themselves. Even assuming the threat’s still high, so far we have no idea if there are any visible symptoms to watch out for.”
“I hate assuming,” Archer muttered.
“Yeah, me too.”
“Hollis and Reese didn’t have anything to say?”
“I told you, Jack, they’re out looking for . . . the cause. The rest of their team should be getting settled in the hotel, and then they’ll be out searching as well.”
“For this energy monster.” It was clear that, today at least, Archer had had second thoughts about what he’d been told the night before. With rest and time to think, he was far less likely today to just accept whatever he was told.
Katie sighed. “Jack, I know how hard it is to believe something like that. But we both know what happened yesterday was not in any way normal. And absent some other explanation, doesn’t it make sense to listen to people with a lot more experience than we have with—weird and crazy?”
“Nothing in this entire situation makes sense.” He sighed. “But you’re probably right. Now tell me how we’re supposed to write this up in our reports.”
That actually hadn’t occurred to Katie, but she was nothing if not quick on her feet. Even when she was sitting down.
“Let’s . . . not put speculation in our reports. Just the facts. I mean, unless and until we have more than speculation.”
“Uh-huh.” He sighed. “Every car we have out patrolling?”
“Like we decided last night, yes. Everybody is under orders to look for anything that sticks out to them as different or unusual. And the guys on the call-in lines know to take any complaint as serious. The last half-dozen deputies are still out talking to friends and family of the victims. The dead victims and the ones still alive.”
“I know Jim’s still out, and the doctor apparently means him to stay out for the time being. Weston?”