The kid doesn’t answer, just stares hard past her left ear.
Collins clears his throat. “I believe Chief Hauser asked you a question.”
She wants to roll her eyes, to tell Collins that she’s just fine on her own with this shrimp of a kid, who can’t be more than seventeen. Shedoesn’t need his Bad Cop act. She can practically sense him puffing up his chest.
She holds out her hand for the package and he gives her a hateful look as he places it in her palm.
“Where’d you get it?” She’s still aiming for a tone that feels conversational. They need these kids to open up to them if they’re going to learn anything about the drugs. Hollow scare tactics aren’t going to cut it. She’s got to toe the line between authentic yet firm. None of this cop caricature crap that Collins is pulling.
The kid cuts his eyes across the bonfire, then back to Callie. “I don’t know.”
Now, time to press a little. “Look. I’ll level with you. I’m doing you a favor, here. Lots of dirty drugs circulating these days. But it sounds like you’re not feeling too chatty out here among your friends. I could take you into the station, where we could talk properly? Or if you wanna help me out now, we can skip all the formalities. You let me know. We would have a lot to discuss if I take you in. Possession charges. Underage drinking. Would you like to do that?”
“Get some, Matty, she’s hot!” She swivels to see which one of them said it, but her eyes fall on one of the girls. A petite blond sitting on a rock. Layla. The girl from the paintball field. The girl with the braid puts her hand on Layla’s shoulder, leans in to whisper in her ear. Layla groans, shakes her head. The firelight shows the shine of her eyes. Sweat glistens across her collarbones. She’s used recently. No surprise there, but Callie can’t help but feel a pang. She turns back to the boy.
“Where’d you get it?” she asks him again.
“Usually I buy from a guy named Johnny.”
“Where do I find Johnny? Can you tell me anything else about him?”
“He’s older… he hangs out at the gas station on Route 12 sometimes. But someone else got this for me this time. Look. I mean it. I don’t know.” She doesn’t believe the lie but he manages not to give himself away completely until his eyes dart across the fire, to Layla.
Ah.
Callie and Collins divide the kids up. She gives the girls a ridehome, Layla and her friend Amanda. She drops Layla off first, at a tidy Colonial with a minivan parked in the driveway, the porch festooned with wind chimes that ting in the breeze.
“What was she on?” Callie asks Amanda, as they watch Layla fit her key into the lock.
“She snorted something. The green bag.”
“Heroin?”
Amanda gives a little nod, turns her face to the window, but not before Callie catches a tear streaking down her cheek in the rearview.
“She’s been in a lot of trouble this year. I’m pretty sure there’s an older guy she works with who has her dealing, but she won’t tell me. She knows I get mad when she takes this stuff. It’s not like it was before.”
“What do you mean?”
“People started buying the green bags back when they were just selling mushrooms. That was fun. But we haven’t been able to get the mushrooms again since the end of the summer. A kid I know from Collingswood, though? He bought some stuff two weeks ago and overdosed. His shit was salted with fentanyl. He’s fucking dead.” The redhead had been trying so hard to sound older, in control, but her voice cracks on the worddead. A copycat, Callie thinks. She’s seen it before. One guy starts making cash, another, less connected, less experienced, jumps in to grab a piece of the pie.
She feels for this girl. How helpless she must feel. Just like Callie, when she first saw Jane in the hospital, bruised and swollen, numbed out on morphine.
“Where does she work?” Callie asks
“A plant nursery. It’s called Eden Grows”
“I know it,” Callie says. She’s never been there, but she’s seen the logo plenty of times. On T-shirts she’s washed at Damien and Jane’s house. The bumper sticker on the back of Lorraine’s car. Eden Grows is the name of the nursery Luke owns.
CALLIE
Frank comes into the station bright and early the next morning—she knows before she sees him by the bravado of the greetings. Shouts ofChiefandHey, boss.Even Della dips her head when she sees him, girlish and deferential.
He raps the doorframe of her office but doesn’t wait for her response before he strides into the room, pulls out a chair. She’s got a copy of her grant application on the desk and he reads it, raises his eyebrows.
“Drones? Interesting… lots of trouble with privacy violations though, right?”
“Not if they are used responsibly.” She crosses her arms, finds herself wondering again why Frank doesn’t use all this free time to help out more at Damien and Jane’s. Drones could have been used to scan the woods for Jenna. If they had them. If they had been prepared.
