In Too Deep (Looking Glass Trilogy #1)(32)
Author: Jayne Ann Krentz

"I understand."

"But what I do know," he said, "is that you believe every word of what you’re telling me. And as long as you believe it, I’ll do whatever it takes to get your answers for you. If your grandmother was murdered, I’ll find the killer."

"Fallon," she whispered. Her eyes glistened again. She reached up to touch his jaw. "I don’t know what to say, except thank you." She stood on tiptoe and kissed him lightly.

It was a damn gratitude kiss, he thought. The last thing he wanted from Isabella was gratitude.

16

They gathered in the Scar that evening. Everyone who had lived in the Cove during the heyday of the Seekers’ community showed up. Isabella made a mental note of the handful of longtime residents who had a long history in the town. Henry and Vera were there. So were her landlord, Ralph Toomey, and Marge from the Sunshine. The proprietors of the inn, Violet and Patty, were also present. The two women sat at a table with Bud Yeager, the owner of the gas station and garage. Harriet and Ben Stokes from the grocery store lounged at another table. Even Walker showed up. He hovered, jittering a little, near the door.

Oliver and Fran Hitchcock, owners of the Scar, took up positions behind the bar, solemnly pouring beers. Everyone except Walker had one.

Isabella perched on a red vinyl bar stool. Fallon occupied the stool beside her, one booted foot propped on the brass rung, his laptop in its leather case on the counter beside him.

Isabella watched the faces of the small crowd as Henry gave a brief summary of the day’s events. By now the news had spread throughout the Cove. When Henry told those present that Gordon Lasher’s skeleton had been discovered in the old bomb shelter, no one showed any signs of shock.

Bud Yeager snorted in disgust. "Figures he came back to steal whatever is down there. Lasher was nothing but a low-rent con man. After all this time, I still can’t believe we fell for his scam."

"He was good." Marge sighed. "Real good. And we were a lot younger back in those days. We wanted to think that we were special and that there was a magic path to enlightenment that only we could experience. Lasher made it easy for us to believe."

"Only for a short period of time," Vera said grimly. "The guru magic wore off very quickly, if you will recall."

"As soon as it became obvious that the son of a bitch was going to go after every young girl who wandered into town," Patty said bitterly.

Bud Yeager drank some beer and lowered the bottle. "Wonder who killed him?"

"Who cares?" Harriet Stokes said. "He got what he deserved. I will never forget how he used me. I let him take every dime of the money my parents left me."

Ben Stokes reached across the table to touch her arm. "He used all of us. It was never about founding a community. It was about the money right from the start."

"Good riddance." Violet shuddered. "Wanted to kill him myself, there at the end."

"Who didn’t?" Ralph Toomey asked.

Henry cleared his throat and took charge again. "We always knew there was something dangerous down there in that old shelter. Turns out we were right. Fallon and Isabella say that the objects look like genuine antiques from the late Victorian era but they’re actually very dangerous experimental weapons. They need to be deactivated by experts."

Bud Yeager slapped the tabletop with his palm. "Fat chance of that happening if we turn those weapons over to the Feds. We all know that."

"He’s right," Marge said. "The CIA will want to find out how they work, and the military will want to figure out how to make a thousand more just like ’em."

Fallon stirred slightly. Instantly the crowd fell silent. Everyone looked at him.

"Given the unique nature of the weapons, it is highly unlikely that they could be duplicated," he said. "That’s the good news. The bad news is that the clockwork gadgets that we found are not only dangerous, but they also are highly unpredictable because the technology involved is based on the principles of paranormal physics."

Isabella noticed that no one appeared shocked by that announcement, either.

"Everyone knows that the CIA and the FBI have been fooling around with the woo-woo stuff for years," Oliver Hitchcock growled from behind the bar.

A lovely warmth blossomed inside Isabella. These were her people, she thought. That was why she felt at home here in the Cove. The locals spoke her language, the language that she had been taught from the cradle, conspiracy-ese.

"That’s right," she said eagerly. "Years ago, the press exposed those so-called far seeing experiments that the CIA conducted."

"And don’t forget the paranormal research programs funded at Duke and Stanford decades ago," Marge offered.

"Those projects were just the ones they let the public know about," Henry said. "No telling what they were doing in secret."

"Let’s not get carried away here," Fallon said neutrally. "To date, the black-ops folks don’t seem to have accomplished too much in the field of paranormal weaponry."

Vera sniffed. "Not for lack of trying. If those gadgets down there in the shelter are the real deal, we sure as hell can’t turn them over to the government."

"If we do, they’ll wind up in the hands of some black arts agency, sure as we’re sitting here," Henry warned.

"I happen to agree with you," Fallon said patiently. "Trust me when I tell you that I don’t want those artifacts falling into the wrong hands. I propose that we give them to the one organization that is capable of deactivating and storing them."

Bud frowned. "What organization is that?"

"A group called the Arcane Society," Fallon said. "Full disclosure here, the Society is my biggest client. It has been engaged in serious paranormal research for generations. What’s more, it has had some experience with other gadgets just like those we found in the shelter."

Another wave of murmurs rippled through the crowd. Isabella noticed a few skeptical faces.

"The Society is for real," she assured them. "Just like Fallon is for real. You can trust him to do what’s right with the weapons."

Heads nodded around the room.

"Jones, here, knows more about those weapons than any of the rest of us," Henry said. "I think we should take his advice."

"I agree," Vera declared. "Given the way the clock showed up at the old Zander place and the fact that there’s a second entrance to the shelter that most of us never knew about, it’s clear we can’t protect those gadgets any longer."