CHAPTER 36
Hale Residence
3:37 P.M.
Dana and Ethan went through it all again, every page of the case files, every awful photo, every line of the nearly incomprehensible medical reports.
They wound up at exactly the same place.
“Look,” said Ethan, “if Maisie was killed like Jesus, then maybe the other deaths were meant to look like other famous deaths. Maybe it’s only that we can see the Jesus injuries because they’re more well known. The others might not even be religious at all.”
“Maybe,” Dana said dubiously, “but I kind of think they might be.”
“How? ESP or—?”
“No. I just think it.”
Ethan sighed. “That’s not very scientific, though. We need to build on actual evidence, don’t we?”
“It’s a theory,” she said defensively. “Theories are part of science.”
“Sure, but maybe we should bag it for now,” said Ethan. “I’d kind of like to share all this with the science club.”
“Okay, but what if they can’t help? It’s not like we can bring the case files for them to go through,” said Dana, getting a little heated.
“Then we…,” he began, but trailed off, clearly not knowing where else to go. “We can’t talk to my uncle about it, that’s for sure.”
“No,” she agreed, “but maybe we should go to the library. They’ll have books on how other religious people died. How did Moses die or Daniel or any of them?”
“That’s good,” he said, nodding. “But I just thought of something. The crown of thorns and the spear in his side were all how Jesus died, right? Well, Maisie’s family is Jewish.”
“So was Jesus,” countered Dana. “But I don’t think that matters. It’s probably more important what’s going on in the head of the killer.”
“The angel,” he said, and she heard the skepticism in his voice.
“Look,” she said impatiently, “we both know that he’s not an angel. He’s a psychopath, a mass murderer or whatever.”
“You see him as an angel in your dreams, though,” said Ethan. He flapped his arms and then sat down heavily on the other chair. “This is bizarre. We’re talking about angels, psychopaths, and the possibility of a series of murders made to look like religious deaths. Are we imagining all of this?”
“Unfortunately,” said Dana, “I don’t think so. And that scares the heck out of me.”
He looked at her, and for a moment there was almost a shadow of a smile on his face. Not a happy smile, though. “Dana … we’re fifteen.”
“I know. But we’re not dumb kids. You’re smart, I’m smart, everyone in the science club is way smart.”
“Sure, but Jerry, Tisa, and Sylvia are no more detectives than we are.”
“I know.”
“We shouldn’t even be doing this.”
Dana looked down at the papers in her lap. “I didn’t ask to have those dreams, Ethan,” she said softly. “I didn’t ask to see Maisie. I didn’t ask for any of this.”
“Hey, I—”
She raised her head and fixed him with a hard, inflexible stare. “But for whatever reason, this is happening to me. Me. I don’t know why, but I have to believe there is a point to all this.”
“Why? You didn’t know any of them. What makes you so special?”
He stopped as if he realized how his last question sounded, in both tone and meaning. “Wait—”
“Forget it,” she said as she stood up.
“Hey, I’m sorry.”
“No, it’s okay. I have to go, though.”
“Want me to walk you home?” he asked awkwardly, but Dana shook her head.
“I’m not going home,” she said as she stood. “I’m going to the library.”
Ethan stood, too. “Let me put this stuff away.”
“You don’t have to come with me,” she said.
He grinned. “Yeah, I do.”
CHAPTER 37
Abigail Smith Public Library
4:19 P.M.
The Smith Library—informally known as the Abby to everyone—was one of the few things Dana genuinely liked about the town.