Anniversary Day (3 page)

He got an automated acknowledgement. This kind of request was routine, although not something that usually happened while on the scene. Usually the detective got the auxiliary information back at the precinct.

“Here you go.” She came back, carrying two mugs by the handle. They steamed. She set his mug down in front of him, then put one in front of her place. She smiled at him again, which struck him as really strange, considering there was still a dead man in her front room, a dead man she claimed she knew.

“Thank you,” Nyquist said, and smiled back.

As she sat down, he looked at her shoes. Clean. He hadn’t expected that. He had expected some dried blood on the bottom. Anyone who had gone near that corpse would have blood on their shoes.

“What’s the name of the gentleman in the front room?” Nyquist asked.

“He’s not a gentleman,” she snapped.

Again the mood shift was sudden, the vehemence almost tangible.

“My mistake,” Nyquist said calmly. “What’s the name of the man you called us about?”

“Callum,” she said as if she didn’t want the word to pass through her lips.

“Callum what?”

Her eyes narrowed. “Why?”

Why? He’d never been asked that before at this stage of an investigation. “Just so that we can put the right name on the files.”

“Sheel,” she said as if it were top secret.

“And he’s been bothering you,” Nyquist said.

“You have no idea,” she said.

“You want to tell me about it?” he asked.

“Boy, do I ever,” she said, and began to talk.

Three

The woman—Alvina—had only been talking for ten minutes, but it felt like two hours. Nyquist had wrapped his hands around the coffee mug and tried not to think about its slimy exterior. She had been going through a list of grievances against this Callum Sheel, and at this point, Nyquist wasn’t sure if they were real grievances or imagined ones.

At this point, he wasn’t sure it mattered.

Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Palmette move into the kitchen. He cursed silently, then sent her a message through his links.

Back off. She’s talking
.

I’ll just listen and record from in here
, Palmette sent back.

No, you won’t
, he sent.
Back off. That’s an order
.

The woman stopped talking. He wasn’t sure if that was because she heard Palmette in the kitchen or if his expression had changed, letting his irritation at Palmette show.

“You don’t believe me,” the woman said.

“Oh, I do,” Nyquist said. “He stalked you.”

“Yes! That’s the word.” Then she peered at the kitchen. “You hear that?”

Get out
, he sent to Palmette, but she hadn’t moved. Dammit.

“That,” the woman said in the calmest voice. Then she stood. “He’s in the kitchen.”

Crap. It was exactly what Nyquist thought. She was delusional.

She moved quicker than he expected, crossed the distance between her chair and the kitchen door in five seconds, maybe less. He stood, but not fast enough. She had already gone inside, her hand finding a knife as big as her forearm, and it looked like it was covered with something.

She wielded it like a pro, and Palmette, surprised, didn’t grab her weapon. Instead she raised her hands like a victim.

Nyquist grabbed his weapon, but kept the muzzle pointed downward. He didn’t want the woman to see it if he could at all avoid it. He wanted to keep what little trust he had built up.

“Alvina,” he said softly.

“I told you he’d be back,” she said. “I
told
you. He’s right there, and he’s going to call for help. House! Off!”

And suddenly everything went dark. She had a smart house, despite the state of that public wall link. A smart house set to make sure she had the advantage, not anyone else.

Get out of the damn kitchen,
he sent to Palmette.
Now!

“Alvina,” he said out loud. “I need just a little light here so that I can see him. I’ll help you with him.”

Faint light rose above Nyquist and the woman. The rest of the kitchen was in darkness, although even from this distance, he could see Palmette’s shadowy form.

Alvina moved forward, slashing. He heard a crash, and a grunt. It didn’t come from Alvina.

We need the ambulance team in here now
, he sent, relationship with the crazy woman no longer a concern.
Right now
.

Door’s closed and sealed,
someone sent back to him.

Great, he thought. Then he sent,
Do what you must to get in here. I can’t open it at the moment
.

Alvina had moved farther forward. He couldn’t tell if the form he saw belonged to Alvina or to Palmette. He couldn’t use the laser pistol. He stepped into the kitchen, his foot hitting fallen dishes, clattering them.

Someone—Alvina?—whirled. He raised his pistol—

And something banged.

But bang was too small a word for that sound. Something happened—a collision, an explosion—something so loud that he felt the concussion as if it had actually hit him.

He staggered sideways, and then staggered again, keeping a grip on his pistol. Someone screamed, and this time, the lights—all of the lights—went out.

He sent,
What the hell was that?
but no one answered.

Palmette?
he sent.

Still no answer. His head felt different. It took a moment to realize that all of his links had been severed.

Had Alvina done that somehow? Was that the concussive feeling he’d had? If so, how the hell had she managed it? Only the highest end security systems had the ability to sever all links, including emergency links installed into emergency service personnel, like him.

“Alvina,” he said, and then the building rocked again. Thudding or pounding or something so intense that he staggered into the counter, and the pistol fell from his hand.

He grabbed the edge of the counter—more slime, and it interfered with his grip, making him lose his balance.

He slipped in the fallen cups and plates, feet sliding out from underneath him, landing on shards of pottery and something else. It kept shifting beneath him, and then something fell on him, and more somethings fell and more, and a loud, booming crack resounded throughout the building, and that was when he realized it was all coming down on top of them.

Something had destabilized the building and it was collapsing. No matter how crazy Alvina was, she had nothing to do with that.

He crawled away from the kitchen and headed toward the table, keeping his head down, hoping nothing more would fall on him.

It was a vain hope. Bits of the ceiling had landed on him, pieces of wallboard. His hand gripped a chair leg and he let out a small sigh of relief. He found the table, and miraculously, there was nothing beneath it but carpet.

He crouched under there, listening to things fall. A wail had started from the direction of the kitchen, and beneath that, a voice. He thought maybe it was saying his name, but he couldn’t tell.

His ears ached, and everything rocked, and he wondered how long it would be before he died.

Four

The shaking stopped, the building stabilized, but the keening continued. Something fell onto the mess beside him, but it was a solitary fall, like a water droplet in the sink, waiting for the last possible moment to let go of the faucet and plummet to the ground.

Dust rose around him, making him cough. The air smelled foul, worse than it had when he got in here, and his eyes watered. Something was burning, and he couldn’t tell if it was in here or outside.

He reached into his pocket, removed a small face mask to cover his mouth and nose, wishing he had thought of it earlier. It wouldn’t keep out the stench, but it would keep out the particles. Then he reached into his other pocket and found the emergency light he’d bought years ago, and transferred every time he changed suits. He’d never needed it before. Indeed, one of his partners (and he couldn’t remember which one) always teased him for having so many supplies on his person.

But he never knew when he was going to need them. So he carried them.

And now he needed this one.

He clicked it on. Dust, dirt, and shards of broken mugs had slid under the table. He moved the small light to look out from under the table. Chairs had fallen, and bits of the ceiling or the wall (he couldn’t tell) had fallen on them. Some areas were mounded. Others weren’t.

Dust rose everywhere, filling the air with particles, which told him that the circulation system had either collapsed or shut down. Or both.

The moaning continued, along with some rustling as someone tried to move.

He reached for his pistol, but he had lost it in the chaos. He tried his links again. The silence that greeted him was disconcerting. It made him think of childhood when he was alone in his head, before they had installed links, before he went to school. He could have a thought and even try to force it out of his brain as a send, but it felt as if the thought bounced off the interior of his skull, trapping it inside.

He pulled himself out. The whimpering got louder and, it seemed to him, had a tinge of fear.

He wasn’t sure who he should call for. Palmette or Alvina? Palmette was his partner, but Alvina was dangerously unstable.

“Hey,” he said, deciding to call on neither of them. “Anyone’s links working?”

The rustling got louder, then something toppled, falling in a tinkle of glass.

His hands were covered in grit. He looked at them, saw shards of glass embedded in the protective covering he wore for the crime scene. He was probably covered in glass and who knew what else. If he crawled, he’d get even more on him. Eventually the sharp things would break the protective layer, and he would get injured.

Still, he couldn’t exactly stand on the pile of debris, not with it shifting underneath him.

He moved some debris and found the floor. It looked uneven to him, but he wasn’t sure if that was his own perception. He stood, and used the light.

It hadn’t been his perception. The floor was canted. One of the walls had collapsed toward him, resting on the table and other bits of furniture. The ceiling had fallen there as well, revealing part of the next floor. That’s what some of this debris was—stuff from the second floor.

He turned his light forward, and his breath caught.

Alvina was moving, and she had the knife clutched in her fist like she was about to bring it down.

She was close to Palmette’s last position.

And the whimpering had stopped.

“Alvina!” he shouted. “I need you! Callum is over here!”

She turned, her eyes wild, her hair, face, everything, covered in dust.

“Where?” she asked, the edge in her voice terrifying all by itself.

“Here!” he said, keeping the light in her eyes so that she couldn’t see anything. “Behind me.”

She staggered toward him, tripping on the debris, extending her hands to catch herself. For a moment, he thought—prayed, really—that she had dropped the knife, but she hadn’t.

She waded through the debris as if it were knee-deep water, lifting her legs, moving forward with an intense momentum.

He didn’t have the pistol, and he was no match for that knife, but he had his cuffs. He pulled them out of his belt and held them loosely in his left hand.

“Where?” she asked, so close to him now that he could smell her, the sharp odor of sweat combined with the rusty scent of blood.

“He just dove under the table,” Nyquist said.

Her eyes narrowed. “I’ll get him,” she said as if they were conspirators. “You stay here.”

She bent down, and he shoved her forward, half wishing she would impale herself on that damn knife. Instead, she squealed and turned slightly, up toward him, still clutching that stupid knife.

But he was too quick for her. Years of practice subduing everyone from the wiriest to the biggest attacker. He shoved his knee into the middle of her back, then put all his weight on her, not caring if he broke something.

He grabbed her knife hand first. She tried to wrench it away from him—and she was strong, one of the strongest he’d ever fought. The crazy ones always were. His training partner had told him that, and damn if the man hadn’t been right.

She kept struggling, using her other hand to try to get purchase on that canted floor, so that she could turn around and use the knife.

He slammed her knife hand against the ground over and over again. Just when he thought she would never let go, he heard something snap. Finger, knuckle, he didn’t care. The knife clattered, and he yanked her arm backwards, grabbing for the other at the same time.

He got them both and shoved them into the cuffs, setting them on high. He didn’t care if they shut off her circulation. He didn’t care if they ended up cutting off her hands and killing her—not that they could. There were fail safes for that, fail safes he didn’t know how to override.

She started kicking as the cuffs tightened, and then she started bucking. He almost fell off her. He reached for his other set of cuffs, but they were gone.

This woman was going to be the death of him. Or of Palmette.

He grabbed something out of the debris pile. He wasn’t sure what it was because he had dropped his light as he fought with the woman, but whatever he grabbed was jagged and big and filled his hand. He brought the thing down on the top of her head with such force that her head bounced against the floor, not once, but twice.

And she stopped moving.

He didn’t see if the blow had killed her. He didn’t care. He tossed the jagged thing far from the table. If she was badly injured or dead, he would come back here and find something jagged that sort of fit, press it against the wound, and then drop it near her.

No one would notice.

No one would care.

Not after what she did to Palmette.

Or what he thought she did to Palmette.

He wasn’t sure.