A Darkness Absolute (Casey Duncan #2)(92)

“Hell, no,” Dalton says. “We are not—”

“I was making a point, boy. I’d be happy to hold Roger down for this office drone. He’d drop his damned knife and run. The point—” He grabs Sutherland before the other man can escape. “The point is that you don’t ever call someone else a coward for not pulling that trigger. You want it done? You do it. Otherwise, they’re not the fucking coward.”

“Sun’s dropping,” Anders says.

Dalton nods. “I know. I’m going to need to ask you to escort Shawn back…” He trails off and murmurs, “Fuck,” under his breath. He glances at me. I subtly shake my head. We can’t afford to lose Anders, in case this turns out to be a trap. Nor, however, can we bring Sutherland along.

“I’ll hang back,” Sutherland says. “I’ll be fine.” He pulls that sheathed hunting knife from his parka pocket. “Whatever this jerk says, I’m not going to just stand there while someone attacks me. I made the choice to come out here. I’ll live with the consequences.”

“Or die with them,” Cypher mutters. “Which all things considered, might not be the biggest loss in the world.”





FIFTY-TWO

Sutherland is lagging behind, and he’s acting as if he’s being respectful, but there’s a hangdog quality to it, like a kid dragging his feet because he’s been scolded. It’s pissing off the guys. These aren’t men who can muster much sympathy for a guy like Shawn Sutherland. Cypher can obviously be a bully. Dalton isn’t, but he can play the part. Anders can’t even fake it, yet like Dalton, his problem with people like Sutherland is not that they can’t throw a punch—it’s that they seem incapable of looking after themselves and unwilling to learn. They really are, as Cypher said, the average citizen who expects the police or the army to protect them, that being their tax-given right, and any failure in that task leads to armchair-quarterback griping.

It isn’t about physical strength. It’s about being capable. Being able to protect yourself by strength or speed or wits or sheer resourcefulness, and if you can’t do any of the above, then don’t come running into the forest, where others have to take care of you, diverting them from their task.

I do feel sympathy for Sutherland. He’s been through hell, and he’s trying to be helpful. He’s just not cut out for it. But then I wonder whether I’d be as quick to cut a woman the same slack. I have no patience with damsel-in-distress syndrome, and if a woman pulled this crap, that’s what I’d accuse her of—getting attention by putting herself in harm’s way and making others look after her. And maybe, if it was a woman, the guys would cut her that slack while I got pissy, a weird co-gender bias, where we have less patience for weakness among our own.

Even if I do feel bad for Sutherland, I don’t fall back to chat and make him feel better. There’s someone else who needs my support more.

“The militia aren’t trained for this,” I say to Dalton as we walk. He glances over, and I continue, “That’s what you’re thinking. That they have, once again, failed in their duties, this time letting Sutherland escape.”

“Goddamn comedy of errors,” he mutters.

“Because they’ve trained to guard the town, not individuals.”

“Then the fault lies with the fucking idiot in charge—”

“That’d be me,” Anders says.

Dalton glances over. “What?”

“I train the militia, Eric. I’m their direct supervisor. That makes me the idiot. Yes, I know, you meant yourself. You hire them. You help train them. But they report to me. They’re my responsibility. So unless you were going to say I’m the idiot—”

“Course not.”

“Then shut up. This isn’t about blame. Well, not unless we can blame the dumb-ass who escaped protective custody without stopping to think he was going to cause trouble for the guys trying to look after him. Casey’s right. The militia isn’t trained for this. We aren’t trained for this.”

“You know what your problem is, boy?” Cypher says to Dalton.

I wince. “I’m pretty sure he doesn’t want to know.”

“Like I’m pretty sure you’re going to tell him anyway,” Anders mutters.

“Your problem is a lack of options,” Cypher says. “How many people in Rockton have actual law enforcement background? Anyone besides her?” He hooks a thumb at me. “Dollars to donuts, the answer’s no.”

I open my mouth to say Anders does, but he shakes his head, telling me not to bother. Cypher has a point, and, damn it, he’s going to make it.

Cypher continues, “You don’t get a lot of cops in Rockton, and that’s not because they need protection less than the average person. It’s a matter of statistics. For every cop, you’re going to get five office drones, four shop clerks, three factory workers, two schoolteachers, and a fucking partridge in a pear tree. And of the lot of them, you know who’d make the best militia goon? The goddamn partridge. Hell, when I came to Rockton, there wasn’t a cop in the entire town. That’s why they made me sheriff. A fucking hit man was the closest thing they had to someone with law enforcement experience.”

“Hit man?” Anders says. “Tell me that’s a joke. You…” He trails off, as if remembering Cypher saying he knew the value of a human life and had worked for people who didn’t give a damn about it.