A Chip and a Chair (Seven of Spades, #5)(46)

“I’m going to pretend I didn’t see that bottle on your nightstand and give you this instead,” he said. “Remember that you can’t work in the field or carry your service weapon while you’re taking narcotics.”

I can’t fire my gun anyway, Levi thought, but all he said was, “Thank you, Doctor.”

Dominic showed Feinberg out, then returned to the bedroom. “All good?”

“Yes. You don’t have to worry about me; you should go to work.”

Dominic hesitated just long enough to set off alarm bells in Levi’s head. “I can’t.”

Levi didn’t ask why not. He folded his hands in his lap, resisting the urge to pick at his bandages.

“They’ve been evacuating the Strip since last night,” Dominic said. “The surrounding area’s been declared an exclusion zone.”

Meaning only official response and recovery vehicles could enter-and McBride’s office was a block off the Strip. “They’re actually evacuating?” Levi asked faintly. He wasn’t sure what he’d expected, but evacuating over a hundred thousand people, most of them tourists with no vehicles of their own, was such a complex undertaking that it boggled the mind. The city wouldn’t invest the massive resources necessary unless the situation was desperate.

“Not just the Strip. UNLV, the area around the Fremont Street Experience-basically, anything the governor thinks is an attractive terrorist target. The airport is shut down; schools and most government buildings are closed. It’s . . . kind of a clusterfuck out there.”

“I want to see the news.” When Dominic didn’t respond, Levi hardened his tone. “Dominic. You can’t keep me in the dark forever.”

With an exasperated huff, Dominic picked up the remote and clicked on the TV, tuning it to a local news station. The current shot was a live feed being filmed from a helicopter above the city.

A reporter was talking, but none of the words penetrated Levi’s brain while he stared at the screen. That was I-15, one of the highways that led out of the Valley, except all the northbound lanes had been converted to southbound. And every single lane was choked with cars and trucks to the point where traffic had come to an absolute standstill.

The view changed to a panning shot of US-93, which cut through Henderson. Same thing here: all of the lanes were so congested that it would be faster to walk out of the Valley.

Levi ground his hands into his eyes. “People who aren’t supposed to are spontaneously evacuating.”

“Exodus-style.”

Fuck, that would make things a thousand times worse. The Las Vegas Valley was a genuine valley; there were a limited number of routes in and out. Spontaneous evacuations would overwhelm the county’s infrastructure and law enforcement resources. People would run out of gas and get stranded on the road, intensifying the problem. There would be multiple fender benders from the stop-and-go traffic. The combination of fear and frustration and desert heat would provoke violence. And emergency vehicles wouldn’t be able to get where they needed to go in time.

“Everyone’s panicking,” Dominic said. “The explosion alone would have been bad enough, but a good chunk of the local government is dead or in critical condition, and Utopia’s video went viral long before anyone could stop it. There’s no putting that genie back in the bottle.”

The news station showed an aerial view of the destruction at the Mirage: the decimated volcano at ground zero, surrounded in all directions by ravaged streets, mountains of rubble, and charred landscaping. Wrecked cars had been abandoned half-buried in debris. Behind the volcano, the front of the hotel itself had been burnt out, and its porte-cochere lay in ruins.

“Updated estimates confirm at least thirty-five people dead and over two hundred seriously injured in the explosion at the Mirage, including casualties from multiple car accidents which occurred on Las Vegas Boulevard,” said a reporter. “Fortunately, fires at the scene were quickly contained by first responders before they could spread to neighboring buildings.”

The shot transitioned to footage of a mobbed grocery store, its shelves swept bare like a swarm of locusts had ripped through it.

“Requests by public officials for people to remain in their homes have largely been ignored. Concerns about possible riots have raised the possibility of the governor mobilizing the National Guard. Local and national law enforcement continue the search for the perpetrators of yesterday’s horrifying events, but although many arrests have been made, the FBI has yet to issue a definitive statement.”

Levi clenched his fists, heedless of the pain in his bandaged palms. He might not have grown up in Vegas like Dominic, but this was still his city. His home. He couldn’t watch it tearing itself apart like this.

“We’re waiting now on a press conference with FBI Special Agent in Charge Stephen Tisdale-”

“Turn it off,” Levi said.

Dominic did. The sudden silence was almost worse.

Levi took one deep breath, in and out. First things first. “I have to call my parents.”

“You can use my phone. I called them myself first thing this morning, but I know they’re eager to hear from you.”

“Thank you.” He met Dominic’s eyes. “And then I have to go to work.”

He braced himself for a fight, readying half a dozen counterarguments to Dominic’s most likely objections.