Page 53 of Confessions of the Dead

She minimized the tracking software and opened a Google search, typed inbest food near me. That hung for a second, then filled with results.

Matt didn’t understand. “So the internet is back up? Just slow?”

Sally didn’t answer him. Instead, she opened another search and typedBarton Police Department. This time when she hit Enter, nothing happened, the screen froze. “I can pull up random bullshit—restaurants, movie times, mating patterns of aardvarks, but the second I try to search for law enforcement, government agencies, hospitals, the screen hangs. Same thing seems to be going on with email. I’m receiving just fine, but can’t send outside the Bend, and watch this—”

She composed a quick email to herself withtestin the subject and hit Send. It took about thirty seconds before it appeared in her inbox. She folded both arms across her chest. “See?”

Matt looked at the message sitting in her inbox but had no idea what she was getting at. “No. I don’t see.”

She tapped the screen with her index finger again. “See how the subject lineisn’tbold?”

Matt nodded.

“Normally, when email comes in, the subject stays bold until I read it. As of this morning, none of my subject lines on new messages are bold.Somebodyis reading thesebeforethey come in. Screening them. I think the same is happening with internetsearches. That’s why there is a delay. Someone, or something, is reviewing the search first, then deciding whether or not to show the results. It’s happening fast, but it’s happening, I’m sure of it.”

“I think you’re getting a little paranoid.”

The moment Matt said that, he thought of the coroner, Gerald Furber. He’d been paranoid, too. Was Sally infected by whatever was impacting the rest of the town? Could he trust her? For that matter, could he trust himself? If everyone else was infected, why not him? Why not Gabby? Sally? Riley? He didn’t feel any different. He thought about how he’d just pushed Addie out of his way at the door. Had he simply overreacted, or was that something else?

“Paranoid, my ass.” Sally went back to ticking off her fingers. “No radios. No cell service. Local calls only. Internet partially blocked, like searches are being filtered before they’re allowed to go through. Same with email. That ain’t paranoid. Those are facts.”

She clicked back through her screens and brought the GPS map back up. “Tell you what. You bring Ellie back here safe and sound, show me I’m wrong.”

Matt stared at that blinking red dot for a long moment, then said, “I need a minute.”

He spotted Gabby in the far corner of the office, near the copy machine. She was crouching down, talking to Riley, her hands on either side of her daughter’s head. He started toward them.

“Ellie could be hurt, Matt!” Sally called out behind him.

He held up a finger. He’d go, but he had to talk to Gabby first.

Matt pushed through the people, nodding and attempting to calm those who cornered him with questions, concerns, or angry shouts. When he reached Gabby, she didn’t look up at him. Her gaze was locked with Riley.

“Is she okay?”

They’d both checked Riley for signs of physical injury in the car and hadn’t found any, but the girl hadn’t spoken.

Gabby ran her fingers through her daughter’s hair and stood. She spoke in a low, concerned voice, “She’s not trembling anymore, but she’s still not talking, not really. She muttered something about Evelyn Harper, then went quiet again.” Gabby chewed her lower lip. “About a month ago, that Harper girl took a picture of Riley in her underwear when she was changing for gym, then she sent it to a bunch of boys at school. Riley was devastated. So was I. The school wouldn’t do anything—Harper used some kind of app, so there wasn’t proof it originated with her, but a few other kids told Riley it was her. That wasn’t enough.”

“Why didn’t you tell me? That’s technically a felony. At the very least, me or Ellie could have put the fear of God in her or her parents.”

“Her parents.” Gabby huffed. “They’re worse than their kid. I went over there, and her dad just laughed at me. Said, ‘Might as well get used to it. Girl like her’s bound to end up in porn. All she’ll be good for.’”

“He said that?”

“Oh, that wasn’t the half of it. He came in the diner every day for lunch for the next week and left these flyers on the counter for Marshall’s Farm up in Barton.”

Matt knew where this was going. Marshall’s had gotten hit with a substantial fine about a year ago for hiring undocumented immigrants to pick apples at less than a dollar an hour. They housed them in these old barns that weren’t fit for animals. Made them sleep on the dirt floor.

“Matt,” Gabby said, “my mother worked there when she first got to the US. I don’t know how he knew that, but he did, he must have.”

“He was just trying to get under your skin.”

“Yeah, well, it worked,” she said flatly. Then her voice dropped so low he could barely hear her. “Just now, when she said that girl’s name, you know what popped into my head? I wanted tograb your gun right off your belt, track her down, and drop her like some wild dog, put her down. I wanted to see the look on her asshole father’s face when you told him. Like that would somehow make everything okay.” Her eyes welled up with tears again. “I’m not that person, Matt.”

“You’re a mother. They threatened your daughter.”

“I wanted the girl dead. I wanted her father to suffer. Her mother, too. All of them.” She hesitated, then added, “If I had had the gun, I would have shot her. All of them.” She glanced down at his belt. “Hell, I still want to.”

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