Merciless полностью

I watched him walk away. Then I forced myself to seek out Sophie. I sat in the dirt next to her, at a loss about how to help her.

Wasn’t long before she was leaning on me. Just her head on my arm. She stopped rocking. Her tears continued to fall.

So did mine.

Finally, she wiped her nose and her eyes on her sleeve. “I’m tired, Mercy.” Her voice was a breathless rasp of defeat.

“I’m sure you’ve spent the last day without getting much rest. You want me to take you home?”

“No, John-John will need to. It’ll help him if he can fuss over me.”

“What can I do?”

I sat very still as Sophie’s back straightened and she looked me in the eyes. Her lip wobbled. She firmed it and bit off, “Find who did this to my daughter.”

“I will. I promise. And if you need anything…”

“I’ll let you know.” Sophie touched my face, almost absentmindedly, the way she used to when I was an awkward teenage girl. “How is the Sheriff?”

“Well, he hasn’t left me yet.”

She tsk-tsked. “You’re strong, Mercy. But I like that you don’t have to be so tough with him. You’re a good match. Now with Lex living there… you have a family of your own. You need that more than you know.”

This woman I should be giving comfort to… was trying to comfort me. More tears fell down my face. “I miss you.”

“Ah, I miss you, too. You and your grumpy ways.”

I blurted, “Then why did you quit?”

She patted my cheek. “Because I thought it was my job as Penny’s mother to make her last few months bearable. As much as she claimed she was getting better and the herbal medicine eased her pain, I only had to look in her eyes to know she was lying. She was dying. I just can’t believe it came to this…” She briefly closed her eyes, then those sorrow-filled black pools were back on mine. “I never put much stock in the way John-John interpreted that vision. I want you to know that had nothin’ to do with me leavin’, no matter what he says, hey.”

I held my breath.

“I believe the reason he saw the darkness surrounding you was because you’re the only one to make this right. But you’ll need to return to that dark place it took you so long to get out of, takoja. Don’t let the blackness swallow you up again.”

My skin became a mass of goose bumps.

Then Sophie was on her feet, shuffling away.

John-John spoke to her before heading toward me.

I stood and waited, my head so fucked that I felt I’d drifted to another plane of existence.

“Unci doesn’t blame you, but I do.”

And… I crash-landed right back down to earth.

“She didn’t have the vision. I did. I won’t put a rosy spin on it.”

“I will figure out who did this to your mother. Not because I need to prove that your vision painting me the big, bad monster is wrong. You seem to have forgotten I’m the good guy. Go ahead and use your anger, John-John. You’re entitled to it. But don’t direct your anger toward me. And keep one thing in mind.”

“What?”

“This may not be the end to your family troubles, but the beginning. You might not like what I turn up when I really start to dig.”

“Don’t get dirt on my grandmother. Stay away from her. Don’t call her. Don’t stop by. Don’t send her flowers. Don’t bring her food. Don’t do nothing. Leave her be. It’s my job to protect her. Even from you. Maybe especially from you.” His trench coat made a dismissive flapping sound when he whirled around.

Took a long minute before I could move. Before I could breathe.

Ironically, I found my cool detachment in his heated words.

For the first time I noticed the crowd.

Gawkers were a part of crime scenes, something I hadn’t really paid attention to or understood until I took a psych-ops class at Quantico. The crowd was a comfort of sorts. It allowed humans to connect after a tragedy, letting them show sympathy while at the same time allowing for the thank-God-it-wasn’t-me sense of relief. But all too often with a violent crime, the orchestrator of said crime came to the scene and fed off that shock and horror.

I took a more in-depth look at the dozen and a half people milling about. The crime-scene photographer discreetly snapped photos of the crowd. Probably wouldn’t mean much as far as comparing this case to the other two, since this scene was public while the others had been off the grid.

Another round of sorrow rolled through me as Penny’s body was loaded into a black bag and lifted into the ambulance.

Shay ended his phone call and ambled toward me.

“That was Director Shenker. Given your close association with so many members of the family-”

“He’s pulling me off the case?”

“No. Take a deep breath, Gunderson. We think it’d be best if Carsten and I handled the family interviews this afternoon. Shenker’s requiring you to take the remainder of the day off, but he expects you at the VS offices on Eagle River tomorrow at the usual time.”

• • •

I went home.

Dawson was working.

Lex was at Doug’s house doing yet another school project.

I went for a ten-mile run. I could’ve run another ten.