My boss, a heavyset woman named Kate, glowered at the floor of the Frolicking Moose. A little smudge of blood the shape of a ring lingered on the tile. She canted her head to the side as she studied it, then made a raspberry sound with her lips. The woman I’d tackled had gone down hard, but she struggled even harder. In the process, she knocked her bottom lip and split it in half.
“New drug, they’re saying,” Kate said with a harrumph like an old bulldog. She shook her head as she attempted to clear the bloodstain with the toe of her shoe. “Something like a cross between an amphetamine with the addictive properties of an opioid. Inhaled, mostly. Reports are coming in from local cities, too. State authorities think it’s isolated to a small cell here. No one else is reporting something similar yet.”
That information ran through my mind. New drug. That’s all we needed. Drugs had been an increasing problem in our quiet mountain town for the last several months. New stuff would only draw more of them here and create more issues. I rubbed my jaw, still a little sore from an errant elbow.
“She was freakishly strong on it,” I said.
“They all are.”
Her dismissive comment nearly set my teeth on edge, but I shoved that off. The high of adrenalin had subsided in the aftermath. The rush seemed to fade faster with each event. Full night had already fallen outside, and after an early morning with a heavy workout, I felt the extent of my fatigue. Not even the cup of coffee I’d finished almost two hours ago seemed to work anymore.
Maybe I was just getting old.
Kate clapped me on the shoulder. “Solid work, Hernandez. We’ll get more information soon and pass it on. Let go of it for tonight and have a good night’s sleep. You work too much as it is, and you’re scheduled to work on Monday.”
She left without a farewell, but Kate never made space for that kind of thing. Her mind had already skipped ahead to her next task as she stepped over to Maverick and Bethany.
I frowned while I studied the quiet room. Something here was missing. Except for Kate, the response team was gone. Investigation over. Maverick here.
Still, I missed something . . .
The quiet whirr of the heater was the only sound over Kate’s quiet murmur with Maverick. Outside, blue and red lights whirled silently, a quiet, steady beacon like a heartbeat. As macabre as it sounded, the flashing colors comforted me.
That’s when I realized it: Dagny.
I’d completely forgotten about her until just then, despite the fact that she was the only other integral part of this equation. She’d remained calm and cool under pressure, just like one of my best friends, Vikram. Couldn’t fluster him if I tried. She even managed to get help here just in time. That woman had been strong enough on whatever she’d inhaled that I almost hadn’t been able to keep her from harming herself, me, or Dagny.
I rubbed the heel of my hand into my eyes after another fruitless search for Dagny. She lived above the Frolicking Moose now, and had for a few months. Ever since her friend, Serafina, surrendered the lease to marry Benjamin Mercedy. I should go check on her.
But she probably didn’t want me to.
My teeth clacked together with indecision. A hot shower and a hard night’s sleep sounded best, but the right thing to do would be to check on her. Dagny and I didn’t know each other well, but her former work at the Diner, which she'd quit months ago, meant she knew almost as much as I did about Pineville. Which was likely the only thing we had in common, aside from being almost shot tonight.
Certainly wasn’t my first time, but I’d bet it was hers.
After another moment of debate, I stepped outside, circled around the back of the shop, and knocked loudly. The entrance to the loft hid a spiral staircase that led upstairs. Lights glowed overhead, illuminating squares of the pebbled ground. A body moved toward the window, seemed to hesitate, and then disappeared. Just before I rapped again, a light moved inside and Dagny came down the stairs.
When she came face-to-face with me, she blinked. Whoever she’d expected, it clearly hadn’t been me. For that, I couldn’t blame her. Until this moment, I couldn’t recall any time that we’d spoken outside of her taking my order or trivialities over coffee. Acquainances, I’d call us.
But now I couldn’t figure out why I hadn’t made more of an effort to be her friend. Or . . . something.
“Hey,” I said through the glass door. “Just wanted to check on you.” Her lips round into an O and she attempted a weak smile that failed seconds later. When I realized she wasn’t going to speak, I asked, “You good?”
She nodded.
“You did good, Dag.”
“Th-thanks. You s-saved the d-day.”
I chortled. Preventing a druggie from harming others wasn’t, unfortunately, all that unusual for a day in my job. But I remembered again how freakishly strong the woman had been. She could have killed Dagny if I hadn’t shown up. Taken from Dagny’s perspective, it probably felt like I’d saved the day. Still, it was weird praise to receive because praise had nothing to do with my career motivations.
“No heroes here,” I said, “except you. Thanks for your help.”
A glass door separated us, and she didn’t seem inclined to open it. For some reason, I was glad for that. Women were never cautious enough at night, even in a small mountain town and with a man they trusted. Or allegedly trusted, anyway.
“Are you really okay?” I pressed.
She seemed perfectly composed. Her eyes were clear, no signs of crying. Her voice even, but not stiffly so. Slashes of color crossed the backs of her hand—paint, was it?—and a little streak lingered across her cheek bone, beneath her left eye. All in all, I’d guess she had a regular day, not that she was just held at gunpoint. Except for the quick, hesitant swallow that followed, I wouldn’t have known anything was amiss.
She nodded again.
Had I not noticed before how little she spoke? Or was she actually traumatized and just trying to hide it? For some reason, it mattered tonight. My lack of understanding only frustrated me. Dagny was young, beautiful, and clearly had her life together.
Why hadn’t I asked her out yet?
“Okay.” I nodded and took a step back. She needed space. I could give that. “Let me know if you need anything, okay? I’ll bring my card by tomorrow so you have my cell phone, just in case.”
Another nod.
“Bye, Dagny.”
With that, she disappeared back up the stairs.