Just then, a dark thought crept into her mind and she tried hard to brush it away. Were she to do it all over again, there was only one person she would have shot: Travis, the man in Seattle who had sent her running in the first place. She didn’t consider herself a violent person, but Holly was beginning to learn there was a time to flee and a time to stand your ground.
Chapter 10
“You have no idea what I’ve been up against these last few days,” Marengo Police Chief Howard McGinley was telling them. He was a fleshy man, with large beefy mitts for hands and jowls to match.
Nate listened and nodded. Setting aside what had brought him here, he couldn’t help feeling some joy in seeing a familiar face. At one time, many moons ago, McGinley had briefly been a sergeant at Nate’s precinct in Chicago. But the older his friend got, the more he’d begun to realize being a big fish in a little pond had its advantages. Big fish didn’t get flushed down the toilet nearly as often.
“I’m down from ten officers to two,” McGinley went on. His jowls trembled as he spoke, reinforcing the man’s resemblance to Droopy the cartoon dog. “I keep thanking my lucky stars that Brass and Vasquez haven’t tucked tail and run away like the others. Seems like no sooner had the lights gone out than my officers began melting away.”
Doris, who was the receptionist as well as the chief’s wife, made a tisking sound at the back of her throat. “Howard David McGinley, that’s a terrible thing to say. You’re not being fair to those boys.”
McGinley straightened.
Doris rose from her desk, which happened to be facing the front door. That was when Nate and Dakota noticed the gun belt notched about her waist. In the holster sat a Smith & Wesson. “You’re making it sound like all our officers just scampered off. I hate to set you straight like this in front of your friend here, but I’m afraid you aren’t telling Nathaniel the whole story.”
“Nathaniel?” Dakota mouthed, suppressing a giggle.
Nate shrugged.
“See, what my husband isn’t saying is that since the power’s gone out, three of our officers have been gunned down in the line of duty. A single death in a town like ours is a big deal, but three, it’s absolutely unheard of.”
“Not to mention crippling,” McGinley added.
At seven thousand souls, Marengo was about as small as cities came. It was no surprise that incidents of violent crime tended to spike during moments of civil vulnerability and unrest. Nate had seen that firsthand soon after the blackout when thugs had stolen his property. And although Byron and its people had been hit just as hard as everyone else, aside from a handful of isolated incidents―likely perpetrated by the same group of criminals―their bucolic little town hadn’t immediately descended into an orgy of violence and murder.
Nate expressed these very thoughts and when he was done he added a question. “So what is it that makes Marengo any different?”
McGinley rocked back on his heels, his thumbs cupped under his gun belt. “For starters, the locals aren’t the ones stirring up trouble,” he told them. “These last few days we seen a veritable exodus of refugees from our giant neighbor to the east.” He was talking about Chicago, even if he wasn’t willing to call it out by name. “Way I heard it, the lights hadn’t been out more than a few hours before the city went mad. Dead of winter or not, the local cops were vastly outnumbered and tumbling back ass over teakettle to contain the situation. By day two, they had completely and utterly lost control. And it wasn’t just looting and robbery either. You run your finger down a list of federal crimes and I can assure you they were occurring on a scale none of us had ever seen before. The place has gone full Darwinian, excuse my French.” The chief grinned, giant dimples forming in his cheeks. “The innocents were the first to flee, many of them heading out into the freezing cold with little more than acute fear and a torn winter jacket. Some had cars, others were on foot. Neither got very far, I’m sorry to say. As those first few days ticked off the calendar, even the career criminals refused to stay, leaving the city in the hands of the most ruthless and deranged. Seems like everyone else came our way. And with very few exceptions, they’ve done nothing but lie, cheat, steal and worse.”
“That’s why I’m here,” Nate started to explain. He proceeded to tell them about the strange encounter he’d had at Jay’s place.
McGinley plucked a hanky from his back pocket, dabbed his forehead and then stuffed it back. “In the last two years, Jay upgraded most of our cruisers. He’s one hell of a mechanic and an all-round great guy.” The chief pointed at Nate, his index and middle finger pressed together into something that resembled a gun. “If those folks you saw are squatting in Jay’s house, they aren’t the first, nor will they be the last. This last week we’ve seen the population here in Marengo balloon from seven grand to ten times that number, maybe more. I don’t have the manpower to track down the sorry sonsabitches who killed my officers, let alone property thieves. Believe me when I tell you there’s nothing more I’d like to do. But revenge isn’t part of my job description. I get I’m down to only two officers. We’re hurting, no doubt about it. And I’m sure so too is every other department that’s sitting in the dark like we are. You were a cop once, Nate, so I’m sure you understand. Right now, however, my job is to do what I can to maintain the peace.”
“He’s right,” Doris said, leaning on the desk with one hand.
“Course I am,” McGinley shouted back. “But that don’t make me happy. Every hour hundreds more pour into town. Every school we got in town is filled to the brim. High school, middle school, elementary. Heck, even that single room Elenore uses to run the pre-school’s got people camped inside. Problem is, we’re not getting in any supplies.”
Nate crossed his arms. “I spoke to a handful of folks on the West Coast via ham radio and they’re going through the same mess we are.”
That particular bit of news made Doris fall back into her seat.
Gritting his teeth, Nate was beginning to remember why he hated being the bearer of bad news. “I’m guessing by now you’ve heard we were hit with a multi-pronged cyber-attack.”
McGinley’s hanky made a sudden and much-needed reappearance. Three firm dabs and it was gone. “I can’t tell you how many different stories I’ve heard to explain the outage,” the chief said, shaking his head. “Seems the longer you keep folks in the dark, the more outlandish the rumors become. We even had some woman come in squawking about aliens and I wasn’t sure whether these aliens were of the outer space or the Mexican variety.”
Nate and McGinley shared a momentary smile before the solemnity of the moment seeped back in.
“No aliens this time, I’m afraid,” Nate said. “Whoever did this, they hit the financial institutions first.”
“That’s right,” Doris agreed. “We watched it on the news. Was the last broadcast we saw before all this started.”
“It was the opening salvo,” Dakota said, her cheeks slightly flushed.