They were both silent again. Outside the window, people were on the sidewalk striding past. The majority seemed to be either leaving or heading toward the bank. He saw no one going into any of the other businesses. Almost all of them looked worried, concerned or just generally not happy.

It was like living in a horror movie, Nick thought. Except in a horror movie, the hero would fight the monster or solve the mystery and everything would go back to normal. He had a hard time imagining things going back to normal. A bank was not something that could be vanquished. And with three of them now, even if one closed there would be two left. As far as he could tell, his family and everyone else was just stuck here in town until…

Until what?

He had no idea, and that, he realized, was the scariest thing of all.

4

After the service on Sunday, Dennis Whittaker attempted to leave church by the side door rather than the front, hoping to catch Claire Osocampo before she made it out to her car. She was the only reason he attended services at all, and over the past few weeks, he’d made a purposeful effort to sit in a new pew every Sunday. Like kids in a classroom, most parishioners usually sat in the same seats each time. The behavior was territorial as much as habitual, but he was attempting to show that he didn’t consider such things, indeed, didn’t notice them at all, but randomly sat down at whatever spot was most convenient.

His goal was to eventually sit by Claire.

It had to happen naturally. Years before he’d become principal, when he’d just been a teacher, she’d been one of his students. She was twenty-eight now, but pursuing her still seemed, well…wrong, so instead of being seen as making an effort to talk to her, he had to make running into her after the service appear casual and unplanned, just as it would when he finally sat down on the pew next to her.

Pastor Peters caught him before he could exit the church.

If Dennis had had more time, he would have asked the preacher why he was still inside rather than out front schmoozing parishioners the way he should have been, but he needed to get outside quickly, and he merely nodded politely when Peters called his name. “Good sermon,” he said and pushed open the door.

The pastor closed it.

Those few seconds had cost him his chance. Claire was probably halfway to her car by now, and the only way he could run into her was if he actually ran. He slumped in defeat, resigning himself to trying again next Sunday.

“Just the person I was looking for,” the preacher said. “What are the odds?”

Dennis forced himself to smile.