“He has unbelievable power, Danielle.”

“Who?”

“You tell me.”

Lightfoot stared at the nurse. The nurse stared back at him. Slowly but surely, Danielle set down her cleaning supplies.

“You want to help someone, Andrew, pick a room, any room. The kids need you. I don’t.”

“It’s bad and it’s going to get worse.”

“Then go work a little voodoo. In your own words, life is about choice, and I don’t choose you.”

Lightfoot thinned his lips. His eyes flashed darkly. Slowly but surely, he turned and stalked down the hall. Upon reaching Lucy’s room, he glanced over his shoulder one last time at Danielle. Then he disappeared inside.

D.D. released a breath she hadn’t realized she’d been holding.

“I take it you don’t care for woo-woo,” D.D. said.

“No, I don’t.” The nurse gathered her cleaning supplies. “Unfortunately, Andrew’s not wrong about everything.” She started scrubbing a bloody wall. “Man, this place is fucked up.”

Chapter Thirty-One

CHAPTER
THIRTY-ONE

DANIELLE

“Did you come back just for me?” the sergeant asked a few minutes later. We’d finished cleaning and were now combining smaller tables to form a larger rectangle for the upcoming staff meeting. The other detective, the George Clooney look-alike, had taken over scrubbing the blood out of the carpet. Kept him busy, but also within earshot. D.D. continued, “Because I’d love to speak with you.”

“I’m here for the debriefing,” I said stiffly, fitting in the final table. “Karen said I could attend.”

“Gonna mention the anniversary, Danielle? You remember that twenty-five years ago your father gunned down your family?”

The sergeant was goading me. I understood that, and still had to work not to rise to the bait. I noticed some blood droplets on the far window, picked up the Windex, and got busy again.

For the past twenty-five years, I thought I’d done okay. I’d gotten myself through college. I’d landed a job that I loved, and three hundred and sixty days out of the year, I was pretty solid. I didn’t replay the events of one night over and over again. I didn’t dredge up old photos of my family. I didn’t recall the stink of whiskey on my father’s breath and I didn’t fixate on the weight of a nine-millimeter gun in a child’s hands.

I worked with my kids. And I made it a point not to look back.

Until one goddamn week a year.

I felt inundated with my family these days. Scalded by memories I’d made it a point not to remember. And suddenly flush with new information. My mom had been leaving my dad? She’d found a “good guy”? Maybe my father had slaughtered everyone over her affair, instead of my rebellion?