“Are you serious? Three of your employees are dead, and you’re trying to bribe us?” Amy knocked the business card away. “You can keep your better jobs, Pat. We’d rather pick up cans by the side of the road than work another day for Orsk. Right, Basil?”

“I know you’re upset—” Pat began.

“Upset?” Amy’s voice was loud. The anchorwoman with the news crew heard her, grabbed her cameraman, and tried to jockey around the line of cops to get closer. The Orsk consultants looked alarmed. “People died, I almost died, and the first thing you want to do is control your liability? Do you know how messed up that is?”

“Amy, stop it,” Basil said. “He’s right. What’s done is done. They weren’t supposed to be here.”

Amy felt like she’d been slapped.

“You’re going along with this?” she asked.

“I want to get all outraged too,” Basil said. “But this isn’t our responsibility anymore. Leave it to the professionals. They’ll do the right thing. I’ve got my little sister to take care of. Just be happy they’re giving us something.”

A monstrous bird unfurled its wings inside Amy’s chest and her anger felt bigger than the world. Everything they had done, all the horrors inside the store, it was as if none of it had happened. She felt lonelier than ever before in her life.

“I’m truly sorry about what happened,” Pat said. “We will privately extend our condolences to the families. We will talk to the architects and the contractors and we will hold them accountable for this tragedy. We will work something out so that everyone’s protected. You and Basil cannot blame yourselves for this turn of events. Matt and Trinity and Ruth Anne were not your responsibility.”

Amy swung at his head. She’d never hit another person before, and the result was something between a slap and a punch, surprising Pat more than hurting him.

“You asshole,” she shouted. “That’s exactly what they were!”

Epilög

Orsk did come up with an answer it could live with: a massive water main break, coupled with a complete malfunction of the sprinkler system. When insurance adjusters finally got into the store, they found the false doors sealed, the wardrobes shattered, no penitents, no bodies, and no proof of anything beyond an enormous flood. The entire inventory was written off as a loss.