“That’s right,” Paula said, a congregant calling back to the preacher.
“Do you know how rare it is to make change?” Nick’s eyes were still glowing with purpose. It was infectious. They were all leaning toward him, a physical manifestation of hanging on his every word.
Nick asked, “Do each of you know how truly, genuinely rare it is that simple people like us are able to make a difference in the lives of—well, it’ll be the lives of millions, won’t it? Millions of people who are sick, others who have no idea that their tax dollars are being used to line the coffers of soulless corporations while real people, everyday people who need help, are left behind.”
He looked around the room and made eye contact with every single one of them. This was what Nick fed off, knowing that he was inspiring all of them to reach toward greatness.
He said, “Penny, your work in Chicago is going to shock the world. Schoolchildren will be taught about your integral part in this. They will know that you stood for something. And Quarter, your logistical help—it’s unfathomable that we’d be here without you. Your Stanford plans are the linchpin of this entire operation. And Andrew, our dear Dime. My God, how you handled Laura, how you put together all the pieces. Jane—”
Paula snorted again.
“Jane.” Nick rested his hands on Jane’s shoulders. He pressed his lips to her forehead and she felt awash with love. “You, my darling. You give me strength. You make it possible for me to lead our glorious troops toward greatness.”
Paula said, “We’re gonna get caught.” She no longer seemed furious about the prospect. “You guys know that, right?”
“So what?” Quarter had taken out his knife. He was peeling the apple. “Are you afraid now? All your big-talk bullshit and now—”
“I’m not afraid,” Paula said. “I’m in this. I said I was in this, so I’m in it. You can always count on me, Nick.”
“Good girl.” Nick rubbed Jane’s back. She almost curled into him like a kitten. It was that easy for him. All he had to do was put his hand in the right place, say the right word, and she was firmly back at his side.
Was Jane a yo-yo?
Or was she a true believer, because what Nick was saying was right? They had to wake people up. They could not sit idly by while so many people were suffering. Inaction was unconscionable.
Nick said, “All right, troops. I know the gun in Oslo was a surprise, but can’t you see how fantastic things are for us now? Laura did us a tremendous favor by pulling that trigger and sacrificing her life. Her words resonate far more now than if she’d been shouting them from behind prison bars. She is a martyr—a celebrated martyr. And what we do next, the steps we take, will make people realize that they can’t just run along like sheep anymore. Things will have to change. People will have to change. Governments will have to change. Corporations will have to change. Only we can make that happen. We’re the ones who have to wake up everyone else.”
They were all beaming at him, his willing acolytes. Even Andrew was glowing under Nick’s praise. Maybe their blind devotion was what allowed Jane’s anxiety to keep seeping back in.
Things had changed while she was away in Berlin. The energy in the room was more kinetic.
Almost fatalistic.
Had Paula cleaned out her apartment, too?
Had Quarter gotten rid of all of his most prized possessions?
Andrew had broken things off with Ellis-Ann. He was visibly unwell, yet he kept refusing to go to the doctor.
Was their blind devotion another form of sickness?
All of them but Jane had been in one psychiatric facility or another. Nick had purloined their files at Queller, or in the instances of the other members of the cells, found someone who would give them access. He knew about their hopes and fears and breakdowns and suicide attempts and eating disorders and criminal histories and, most importantly, Nick knew how to exploit this information for effect.
Yo-yos unraveling or rolling back up at Nick’s whim.
“Let’s do this.” Quarter reached into his pocket. He slapped a quarter on the table beside the peeled apple. He said, “The Stanford Team is ready.”
Manic depression. Schizoid tendencies. Violent recidivism.
Paula fell into a chair as she placed a penny on the table. “Chicago’s been ready for a month.”
Anti-social behavior. Kleptomania. Anorexia nervosa. Akiltism.
Nick flipped a nickel into the air. He caught it in his hand and dropped it onto the table. “New York is raring to go.”
Sociopathy. Impulse control disorder. Cocaine addiction.
Andrew looked at Jane again before reaching into his pocket. He placed a dime with the other change and sat down. “Oslo is complete.”
Anxiety disorder. Depression. Suicidal ideation. Drug-induced psychosis.
They all turned to Jane. She reached into her jacket pocket, but Nick stopped her.
“Take this upstairs, would you, darling?” He handed Jane the apple that Quarter had peeled.
“I can do it,” Paula offered.
“Can you be quiet?” Nick was not telling her to shut up. He was asking a question.
Paula sat back down.
Jane took the apple. The fruit made a wet spot on her leather glove. She felt around on the secret panel until she found the button to push. One of Nick’s clever ideas. They wanted to make it as hard as possible for anyone to find the stairs. Jane pulled back the panel, then used the hook to close it firmly behind her.
There was a sharp click as the release mechanism went back in place.
She climbed the stairs slowly, trying to make out what they were saying. The Pink Floyd song blaring from a tinny speaker was doing too good a job. Only Paula’s raised voice could be heard over the soaring instrumental of “Comfortably Numb.”
“Fuckers,” she kept saying, obviously trying to impress Nick with her rabid devotion. “We’ll show those stupid motherfuckers.”
Jane could feel an almost animalistic excitement rising through the floorboards as she reached the top of the stairs. There was incense burning inside the locked room. She could smell lavender. Paula had likely brought one of her voodoo talismans to keep the spirits at peace.
Laura Juneau had kept lavender in her house. This was one of the many stray details that Andrew had managed to relay in his coded letters. Like that Laura enjoyed pottery. That, like Andrew, she was a fairly good painter. That she had just come from the garden outside her house and was on her knees in the living room looking for a vase in the cupboard when Robert Juneau had used his key to unlock the front door.
A single shot to the head of a five-year-old.
Two bullets into a sixteen-year-old’s chest.
Two more bullets into the body of a fourteen-year-old girl.
One of those bullets lodged into Laura Juneau’s spine.
The last bullet, the final bullet, had entered Robert Juneau’s skull from beneath his chin.
Thorazine. Valium. Xanax. Round-the-clock care. Doctors. Nurses. Accountants. Janitors. Mop & Glo.
“Do you know how much it costs to commit a man full-time?” Martin had demanded of Jane. They were sitting at the breakfast table. The newspaper was spread in front of them, garish headlines capturing the horror of a mass murder: MAN MURDERS FAMILY THEN SELF. Jane was asking her father how this had happened—why Robert Juneau had been kicked out of so many Queller Homes.
“Almost one hundred thousand dollars a year.” Martin was stirring his coffee with an antique Liberty & Company silver spoon that had been gifted to a distant Queller. He asked Jane, “Do you know how many trips to Europe that represents? Cars for your brothers? How many road trips and tours and lessons with your precious Pechenikov?”
Why did you give up performing?
Because I could no longer play with blood on my hands.
Jane found the key on a hook and pushed it into the deadbolt lock. On the other side of the door, the record had reached the part where David Gilmour took over the chorus—