Page 42 of Shatter

"Aren." His voice is low. "Go."

"Front's clear." A man's voice, deep and unhurried, with a slight rasp. "Diner's dark except the pie case. Owner's truck is out back where you said."

"Gunnar?" Hakon's eyes flick to the second phone, propped in the cup holder.

"Roof of the tire shop." Gunnar's voice comes through flat, all business. "I've got eyes on the lot, and Ulf's in the alley with a cat going through the dumpster for company."

"Tell him I'm not interested in the cat." Ulf's voice, faint, somewhere behind Gunnar's.

I stare at the phone on Hakon's knee.

Four men, spread out in the dark around a greasy diner at two in the morning, for a woman who won't tell them her name.

My throat gets thick and tight, and I swallow hard against it.

I don't understand it.

I don't understand any of them.

"Okay." Hakon picks up the phone. "We're going in."

At the corner of the laundromat, the front lot opens up on my left.

Somebody hosed the asphalt, but under the one working light, a faint brown stain still runs through the cracks toward the diner's front door.

My feet stop on their own.

Hakon steps into my line of sight, blocking it, and waits until I can walk again.

Dale's waiting at the back door.

He's got his windbreaker zipped to his chin even though it's still eighty degrees, and his thinning hair is standing up on one side like he's been running his hands through it.

When he sees me come around the corner of the building, he goes still.

His eyes move over my face slowly, over the black eye gone from plum to a sick yellow-green.

Then down to the gauze on both my palms.

His mouth opens, and nothing comes out.

His face crumples like a paper bag somebody stepped on.

"Oh, Katie-girl." His voice cracks down the middle. "Oh, sweetheart."

He takes a step toward me with his arms coming up.

I flinch.

My shoulders jerk up toward my ears, and my feet take a half step back before I can stop them.

Hakon's hand comes up behind me without touching, a warm presence at the small of my back.

Dale freezes with his arms half raised.

Then he lowers them, slowly, and shoves his hands deep into the pockets of his windbreaker.

"Okay." He nods, more to himself than to me. "Okay. I got you."