“Put the gun down,” Peter said. “It’ll be okay.”
“No, it won’t.” The shooter shook his head sadly. “You don’t know what’s coming.”
Then he raised the pistol and fitted the barrel under his chin and pulled the trigger.
7
Peter sat shivering in the open rear door of an ambulance, head bent and aching, a silver foil blanket wrapped around his shoulders. It was full dark, still raining, and the temperature had dropped enough for him to see his breath. His knee bounced to the beat of a metronome only he could hear. Behind him, KT sat on one of the jump seats, arms wrapped around Ellie on her lap.
With all the police on the street around them, Peter figured mother and daughter were safe enough. But he’d still positioned himself so that anyone trying to harm them would have to go through him.
He’d already stripped off the body armor June had given him, and the EMTs had supplied an ice pack for the bruise on his chest, which throbbed in time with his heartbeat. The adrenaline comedown had hit him hard. He wanted nothing more than to close his eyes. But every time he blinked, he saw the shooter jam the gun under his own chin and blow his brains out.
He knew from experience that it would stay with him. Like theother memories lingering after eight years of war and the things he’d done afterward.
He had good reasons for all of it. He’d wanted to help people. He’d tried to do the right thing. But sometimes it went wrong. Sometimes people died.
—
The police had come late, but they’d come in force. Along with a couple of pop-up tents with drop-down side panels to keep the rain off the cops and the body, someone had brought coffee for Peter and KT and hot chocolate for Ellie. Two detectives named Kitzinger and O’Donnell had already taken their statements separately, going over the events of the afternoon at least three times to make sure there were no fault lines in their stories. Peter had tried hard not to be separated from KT and Ellie, but Kitzinger wasn’t having any of it.
He was glad he’d made that first 911 call, which had established his desire for police involvement from the jump. He was also grateful that he hadn’t actually shot the guy, because that would have ratcheted up their professional suspicion. Even with witnesses to confirm his story, the cops would have taken him to the station for sure. The white static, which was what Peter called the post-traumatic claustrophobia that had showed up after his war, would flare up like a wildfire in a tiny police interview room.
Now he turned his empty coffee cup in his hands while his mind tried to make sense of the dead man’s words. He was supposed to kill the lady, he’d said. Because he’d gotten some kind of message. From who? And why? And why had he ended up killing himself?You don’t know what’s coming. He’d seemed a little unhinged, to say the least.
Thinking about all of this, Peter had listened while KT had told the police about the stories she’d been working on, trying to figure outwhy she’d been targeted. The Microsoft CEO interview she’d done that afternoon. A piece about OpenAI’s investment in data centers. A postmortem on a failed hardware startup. An analysis of startups acquired by the Big Five, and what happened afterward. And a dozen other stories she’d barely looked at, including a whistleblower who’d reached out for a conversation but never showed up for the meeting, and something about an oddly secretive group of tech bros who may or may not be into guns.
She and June could get into that later. Or tomorrow.
Tomorrow would probably be better.
—
Behind him, Ellie wore her mom’s orange raincoat, and KT still wore Peter’s. He heard KT murmuring to her daughter, then she came to sit beside him in the open doorway of the ambulance.
He asked, “Are you okay?”
“No. I want to scream.” Her voice was quiet as she stared out into the darkness. “But I have to keep it together for Ellie.”
Peter was familiar with that process. “You can freak out after she’s gone to bed. If you like, we can get drunk.”
“Oh, we’re definitely getting drunk.” She turned to look at him. “You seem fine. How is that possible? He shot you point-blank, you could have died. You watched him kill himself.”
“I’m not fine,” he said. “I just have more experience processing this kind of thing.”
“What do you mean, more experience?” Ellie had left the jump seat and crept up behind them.
“Hush, Ellie.” KT reached for her arm and pulled the girl to sit between her and Peter. “That’s not your business.”
“It’s okay.” Peter turned to Ellie. “I fought in two different wars. I’ve been shot at before.”
She peered up at him, wired from her large hot chocolate. “Did you kill anyone?”
“Eleanor Grace Thorsen! Peter, I am so sorry.”
Peter might have punched a civilian who asked him that question, but Ellie was only thirteen, and she’d been through a lot in the last few hours. She was practically a combat vet herself. Peter figured she deserved an answer.
“Yes, Ellie. I killed people. That’s what happens in war. Why do you ask?”
