The Meridians(13)

"Hey, Far," whispered Scott. He tried to say more, but single small sentence was all he could manage. He felt like he wanted to cry, but no tears were running from his eyes. In fact, his eyes itched, as though he had worn contacts for too long and they had dried his eyes out.

"Hey, Jase," answered Fariborz. The man patted Scott softly on the hand. "How you feelin'?"

"Like crap," answered Scott after a long moment during which he gathered his strength to answer.

"So you feel like you look, then," said Fariborz. "I guess that's good."

"What happened?" asked Scott.

Fariborz snorted. "We were kind of hoping that you'd be able to answer that, man."

Scott related to him all that had happened, starting with seeing his family, then moving on to the shootout with the gray gunman, and ending with the dead body beside him and the disappearance of the killer.

"That's where I don't get what happened," said Scott. "I mean, he pulled the trigger, Far. I saw him do it. I heard the blast."

"No doubt about that," said Fariborz. "I mean...I take it you haven't looked in a mirror yet?"

"No, why?"

"Because you have powder burns all over your face, and the doctors said you've got some pretty hefty damage to your corneas due to the same thing. Your tear ducts are also whacked all to hell and back, and it's a miracle you didn't lose your eyes."

"So how did I get through it?" asked Scott. "What happened out there?"

Fariborz shrugged. "It gets weirder. We wanted to talk to you about the shootings, because we found something strange."

"What?"

"You say there were six shots fired by the bad guy, right?"

Scott counted them in his head. One each for Amy and Chad -

They're dead, they're dead, they're dead.

No. Don't think that way. Focus on the job.

- one that parted his hair, one that hit his gut, one that hit his chest, and the final shot, the one that should have taken his head off but left him only with a burnt face and scorched corneas instead.

And the dead man beside him.

"Yeah," said Scott. "Five bullets and then that last one...I dunno. Where did the sixth bullet go?"

"That's the ten thousand dollar question, bud. But we know a few things for sure."

"What?"

"One, the guy we found beside you is a complete John Doe. We ran his teeth and his prints through a dozen different databases - state and federal both - and came up with zilch. Unless family comes forward to claim him or something, it's likely we'll never find out who the guy was. And two, we recovered six casings that matched the ballistics of the bullets we found in -" Fariborz halted suddenly, and Scott knew he had been about to say "Amy and Chad," but had stopped himself. "We recovered six casings. Not five. Six."

Fariborz stopped a moment to let what he had just said sink in. Casings were ejected when a bullet was pushed out the front bore of a gun like the one the shooter had been holding.

"So?" said Scott, not understanding. "Why is that weird?"

"Because the John Doe was, to all appearances, shot within a few minutes of when we found you. Brand new kill. So that brings the shot total up to seven, counting the one that got you. But we only found the six casings."

"So the killer took one."

Fariborz shook his head. "Why the hell would he bother taking a single casing? Plus, we've got another mystery."

"What?"

"The John Doe was killed by a single shot to the head, we're guessing about the same caliber as the other shots we found laying around the alley."

"You're guessing?" asked Scott. "Why don't you know?"

"Weird thing number two. John Doe was killed by a bullet to the brain, and it looks like he was killed right there next to you. But we haven't found a bullet. Seven shots, six casings, five bullets."

"And a partridge in a pear tree."

"Don't joke, man. You know this is going to be a high-profile situation. And the higher-ups and the folks at I.A. don't like it when high-profile situations have numbers that don't add up."

Scott groaned internally. I.A. - Internal Affairs - was not brought into most officer-related shootings, only operating in cases that involved or were suspected to have something to do with dirty cops. But since Scott had been working the mob beat with Homicide, and since there were so many apparent imponderables with the shooting - weird numbers in the ballistic evidence, a hitman that apparently evaporated into thin air, and a John Doe that no one could lay claim to - it was likely that I.A. would be sniffing around and making life a living hell for him.

As though the loss of his family weren't enough already.

"Great," he breathed.

"Yeah," said Fariborz. "Much as I hate to say it, I have a feeling that the real shitstorm hasn't even hit you yet."





***





7.

***

Kevin Angel was the boy's name from the first instant that Lynette dreamed it, and Robbie was gentle and loving enough - or just smart enough - to recognize how badly Lynette needed her son to be named that, and stayed out of her way on the issue. Not that Robbie ever really got in her way about things. But he was his own person, and if he disagreed with her, he would be the first one to say so. He would do it nicely, tenderly, but just because he loved her, she knew he hadn't given up his right to challenge her and push her to be better.