She opened her mouth to shriek. A hand clamped over her mouth. The figure yanked her around, one hand at her waist, the other around her neck, pulling her back against him.
"Shhh," a man's voice said. "You're okay."
She struggled to turn around, managing to catch a glimpse of dark hair before he grabbed her shoulders, propelling her down the steps and into the shadows behind the trailer. Then he pulled her against him again, his hand ready to clamp over her mouth, waiting until she gave him cause.
Adele's footsteps sounded across the trailer floor.
"Karl?" Robyn whispered.
"Shhh, yes. You're okay."
"How -?" She'd been about to ask how he found her, then remembered the phone call and Hope overhearing the background noise.
He leaned into her ear. "Count of three?" He pointed to a narrow dark strip behind the row of trailers.
He started counting. On three, she ran, with Karl behind her. She tried to glance back once, but he gave her a shove, hissing for her to keep going.
Finally they reached an exit marked Staff Only manned by a pimply teen. Still pushing her forward, Karl grabbed the gate.
The kid lowered his magazine. "Hey, are you -?"
"Staff."
Karl prodded her through. Again, she tried to slow, to talk, to turn and look at him, but he shoved her, even less gently this time, with a gruff "move."
Now she could see why the fair had been crammed into one end of the park. The other was hilly and wooded. When she squinted, she could make out a sign telling cyclists to stay off the footpath. That was where Karl took her, onto that path and into the woods.
They'd gone about fifteen feet when his steps slowed to a walk.
"This looks like a good place," he said. "Suitably nondescript. She won't find you here."
The voice, no longer distorted by whispering, was not Karl's.
Robyn turned. Behind her stood the young man she'd followed that afternoon. The one who'd attacked Karl.
FINN
If this partnership was going to work out, Finn needed to be a lot more careful what he let Damon overhear.
After Officer Kendall's body was removed, Damon had circled behind Finn, trying to eavesdrop, and he'd gotten into earshot at the worst possible moment.
"So… a shoulder shot," Damon said – again – as Finn drove toward the fairgrounds.
"It's one of the safest places to be shot. The bullet usually passes through – "
"You said that. But this usually part. What if it doesn't pass through? Is it only safe if it does? Can something go wrong?"
"It's usually nonfatal – " Finn caught the qualifier even before seeing Damon's wince. "It's nonfatal."
Damon leaned over to check the speedometer, clearly no happier with what he saw there than he'd been with Finn's answer.
"She said she was okay," Finn said.
"Bobby would say that if she'd been run over by a truck and could still crawl from the scene. Did she sound -?" He broke off with a disgusted snort. "You wouldn't know."
He meant Finn didn't know Peltier, but Finn didn't imagine that clip of annoyance in Damon's words. His wife had been shot and Finn was moseying along, having deemed her life unworthy of sirens and an ambulance.
Explaining why he was proceeding cautiously would mean telling Damon what Peltier said, that her shooter was still hot on her trail. Whoever was following Peltier had already proven himself ready to kill her and anyone who got in his way. So Finn wasn't about to tear in there with a full squad car escort. He'd called his lieutenant, who'd coordinated it from there. A backup team would cover exits discreetly while Finn searched inside for Peltier.
Had Finn made the right call? He hoped so. Peltier had sounded calm and rational on the phone and, from everything Damon had said, this was normal – she wasn't in shock. Finn trusted she could keep herself safe, whether it took him ten minutes to get there or fifteen.
And if he was worried about why the line disconnected? And who'd been that voice in the background? More things Damon didn't need to know.
"Promise me you'll get her to a hospital?" Damon said.
"That would be standard procedure."
Damon watched the light pass, then looked back at Finn. "She might argue. She'll want medical attention – she doesn't take risks like that – but she'll downplay the injury and try to get the interview over with first. That's how she prioritizes."
"I'll tell her we can conduct the interview at the hospital."
"Good. Efficient. She'll like that."
Damon turned back to the window. Finn thought about what it must be like for him, wandering alone in limbo for six months. Then, when he did find someone who could hear him, he had to talk about his wife without really talking about her, to a stranger who didn't know her, whose only interest in her was as a subject in a case.
It was different where Finn had come from. There, you were part of the community. You knew Bobby Miller was having a tough time with his parents' divorce and it would be enough to give him a stern lecture and make him pay for the broken window. Just like you knew that Ray Thomas, bawling in the drunk tank, might very well be telling the truth when he said he was sorry, but if you let him get away with it, next time the Sooners lost a game, he'd take it out on his wife's face again.
Then Finn came to Los Angeles.
To survive here, Finn had to squelch that part of himself and emulate Joe Friday. Just the facts, ma'am.
Now, riding with Damon, Finn realized how much he hated this, how much happier he'd been back on that small-town force. It wasn't in his nature to be cold and clinical, and it was gnawing away at him like frostbite. But there was little need for his gift back home, where more than one homicide a year would be a crime wave. If Finn was going to make proper use of his abilities he had to stay in L.A. and dream of the day he'd be back home, driving his squad car, asking his passenger "so how's your wife?" and knowing the answer mattered.
"Flashing lights ahead," Damon said. "Either that's the mother of all accidents or we've got ourselves a carnival."
Finn followed his gaze to colored lights twinkling beyond the next block.
"Something tells me I'm about to do a disappearing act." Damon's fingers silently drummed the armrest. "If I do, when you find her, don't tell – " He inhaled sharply.
"Don't tell her about you."
"Yeah."
Finn turned at a hand-drawn parking sign.
"It wouldn't be right," Damon said finally. "She'll have a lot on her mind and that would just freak her out."
"I need her to trust me – and telling her I see ghosts, even yours, isn't going to help."
A tight laugh. "Yeah."
"Later, though, we could… figure something out."
Damon nodded. After a few seconds of silence he said, "Sure. If it works out. That would be good."
Five minutes later, Finn was flashing his badge at the ticket girl and stepping inside the fairgrounds. The backup team hadn't arrived, but Damon was still at his side.
"Maybe whatever power decided to let you help me is going to let you see her," Finn said.
"Or maybe it means she isn't here." Damon shook his head. "Damn, I'm a regular ray of sunshine tonight, aren't I?"
But as they walked to the midway, Damon's mood did grow sunnier. The bounce returned to his step. He started singing along to a song playing at the rides. His gaze scoured the crowd, hope sparking in his eyes every time he caught sight of a blond head.
"So where are you supposed to meet her?" Damon asked.
"Here."
"I meant where here."
"She didn't specify."
Damon stopped walking. Finn slowed, waiting for him to catch up. He didn't.