Caden hated getting caught up in Jerome’s delusions, but there was no logical explanation for how Parker had vanished from his room at West Central. He rubbed his temple. “Why would Indrid Cold come back on October thirty-first? If his goal was to reach Parker, and Parker is gone….”
Jerome squirmed. “Yeah, I know. But there’s some kind of obligation Cold has to fulfill. Parker said it had to do with his past and something he left unfinished. Because I believed Parker and wanted to see Cold for myself, Parker gave me the message. I think other people have been watching Parker too.”
“The Deputy Browns of the world?” Ryan challenged. “The shadow organizations?”
Jerome shrugged. “I wasn’t the only one who saw Brown.” He looked at Katie.
“All right.” Caden wanted to wrap things up. His head was pounding, and the nonsense Jerome dumped on them did nothing to mute the ache. “Is there anything else you want to tell us?”
“I want to get out of here. I want to track down Cold on Halloween.”
“Where would you look?” Katie asked.
“I don’t know. The TNT maybe, or on the road to my place. That’s where Parker saw Cold the first time.”
“You’re going to have to talk to your doctors about getting out of here.” It was the perfect chance for Caden to bow out of the conversation.
“Yeah. Here.” Jerome extended the slip of paper on which he’d scribbled the date and time of Cold’s arrival. “Maybe you don’t believe me, but hang on to this, anyway. You’ve still got time to make up your mind.”
Caden hesitated. He took the sheet, folded it in half, and slipped it into his pocket.
“Ryan, I need to talk to you.” He motioned for his brother to follow and walked out the door.
“So you want me to believe some invisible oracle tossed you around in a windstorm?” Ryan took a long pull from his beer. The talk Caden had wanted to have with him didn’t occur until that night when they were both off duty. In the end, Katie and Eve joined them too, all four of them settled in a booth at the River Café.
The place was fairly busy for a Thursday night, over half the seats at the bar taken, several of the tables filled. Eve had reserved a booth for them in the back corner, the perks of owning the place. Away from the crowd, they could talk quietly without worrying about overeager ears that might zone in on their conversation.
“You must have upset the thing somehow.” Seated beside Caden, Eve looked worried, her brows creased in concern. “It wasn’t hostile when Katie and I talked to it.”
“Leave it to my brother to piss off the bogeyman.” Ryan’s lips quirked upward in a good-natured smirk.
“Caden, I’m worried.” Eve gripped his arm, her diamond engagement ring glinting in the glow of the brass wall lanterns. “It might have hurt you.”
“I think I pushed too hard.” Caden placed his hand over hers. “It turned violent when I pressed about Parker. But it answered with something besides ‘yes’ or ‘no.’”
“Oh?” Seated across from him, Ryan leaned forward, resting his forearms on the table. Everything he’d ever heard about the entity indicated it only spoke two words, a negative or a positive affirmation.
“It said ‘Parker is my mistake to fix,’” Caden explained.
“Back to Parker again.” Ryan had to admit the kid’s name was on everyone’s tongue these days. Between his escape from West Central, worry about what he might do, and Floyd damning the whole system anytime someone got near him, it was hard not to have an opinion about Point Pleasant’s tragic murderer. Ryan had even been stopped by a belligerent Shawn Preech when he’d entered the café. Seated at the bar, several empties of Rolling Rock at his elbow, Preech had demanded to know why he and Caden weren’t out looking for “that lunatic kid.”
“Maybe we could talk about something else.” Sounding tired, Katie massaged the back of her neck.
Earlier that day, Ryan had told her about Lach Evening and Lyle, suggesting she stay at the hotel for a while, or with her mom. He’d thought it a reasonable request, but she’d stubbornly refused. At least she’d conceded to having Sam stay with Doreen Sue until they were able to get a track on Lyle.
“I agree with Katie.” No surprise that Eve sided with her friend. “You guys need to give all this stuff a rest. Let’s have a toast before our food gets here.” She smiled broadly. “I’m getting married.”
It was the perfect opening for the girls to start gushing, sharing ideas about wedding gowns, dinner menus, and flowers. Caden rolled his eyes, but there was no disguising his pleasure at being engaged. After a while, Ryan lowered his voice and spoke solely to Caden.
“You remember that star shit stuff I told you about?”
His brother nodded.
“I sent some off for analysis and got the report back today.”
Caden took a swig from his bottle of Michelob. “And?”
“Nothing.”
“They couldn’t determine what it was?”
“There was nothing there to determine. By the time the lab got the container, everything inside had disappeared. Not a trace of residue left. It’s like the stuff evaporated or vanished into thin air.”
“Chester Wilson seems to think it came from a UFO.”
“Yeah, I’ve been thinking about that.” Ryan glanced across the café. Someone opened the front door, allowing a draft of cold air inside. It wasn’t quite seven o’clock, but twilight had already claimed the sky, coating the windows overlooking the street with a chrome-like sheen. At the bar someone laughed loudly, and Shawn Preech added his guffaws to the hilarity. Ryan wondered how he and Suzanne were coping after losing Duke. Apparently, the dog’s death hadn’t stopped Shawn from downing his usual six-pack before staggering home. “If there really was a UFO, maybe it was responsible for moving that cow and dropping it in the other pasture. It could have gotten caught up in a beam or something, and that’s what made its brain explode.”
Caden grinned into his bottle. “It sounds like you’ve been reading spaceman comics.”