35. Whose Eyes?
Sally sat the three Rooks down in a row on the mud-splattered grass. They swore and spat, but she barely heard any of it.
Everything hurt. Her neck. Her spine. Her jaw. A deep, surging headache was coming on, and she didn't know what to do next.
Arthur Bledd was in the water still, trawling up and down like some swamp farmer, plowing furrows in mud. Liam stood on the bank, dripping and staring at the Mustang. Its front half was wedged solidly into the bank, the rear wheels still spinning just above the brackish sewer water.
Pieces of the Rooks' boat drifted by. An empty bag of crisps. A wooden oar. The sirens grew louder. Now Sally saw lights.
"You just hit the boat," Liam murmured. He didn't turn. "You just hit it."
Sally walked over. Every step hurt. She looked at his face, and was surprised to see tears trickling down his cheeks. That hit her in the chest. A sickening sense of shame swelled inside her, twisting her stomach.
"Liam, it's OK," she protested. "We're OK."
He looked at her, then rubbed his eyes and turned away.
There was a glint from the water to the left, a sucking sound and a splash as Bledd pulled something from the water.
The shotgun. He lifted it with both hands, side-on. A double-barreled model, weeds and water streaming from the broken-open hinge, mud sliding off the stock. It looked old, ugly and all-too real.
For a long few seconds nobody spoke.
Then Liam's voice broke the stillness, flat and professional, "Shotgun recovered from the water. Yes. It was fired at our vehicle prior to collision. Three suspects have been detained. We need firearms, CSI, several ambulances and a supervisor now."
Sally turned back to him. He was on his phone, facing away.
Across the field, the sirens bleeped and cut out on the road. Figures exited and somebody shouted, looked like Sergeant Simms.
"Are you all right?"
"Get DCI Mayhew," Sally called back.
Arthur Bledd walked over and rested the shotgun at her feet. He seemed untouched by any of this. Muddy, wet, disheveled, but then he'd been all those things before too.
"They'll try and nail you for that," he said softly. "Stand your ground, Rogers. You did the only thing you could. A brave thing." He rested one hand on her shoulder, then pointed at the sewer. "I'm just going to collect some of this rubbish, before your lot tape it all off."
He slid easily back into the water and began fishing for crisp packets, leaving Sally just staring.
Figures were already jogging over the grass toward them. More vehicles pulled up nearby, an ambulance, and the paramedics extracted a stretcher from the back and sprinted across the grass. Sally recognized John Logan. He glanced at her as he came closer.
"Damaged wrist," she said, pointing at Roarke Rook. "Might be broken. But he's dangerous."
"We know what we're doing," Logan said, dropping in behind Rook.
The first wave of officers arrived like a tide. She set them to watching over the Rooks and establishing a perimeter. In moments DCI Mayhew came running from a patrol car, greatcoat flapping. CSM Akilota hurried alongside her.
Sally's body went weak, now she could hand over responsibility. It took everything she had to stay on her feet.
Things moved quickly after that; a series of moments where Sally felt like the skipping needle of a broken record player, jumping tracks.
Mayhew barking orders; Akilota telling Bledd to get out of the water; the rogue halves of the Rooks' boat being secured.
At one point a firearms officer edged up and collected the shotgun.
"That's fine," Sally found herself saying numbly.
Then DCI Mayhew was in front of her, barely two feet away but somehow distant, as if there was a great gulf between them.
"Talk me through this, Officer Rogers," she said, her tone cold and bright.
Sally explained as best she could. A preliminary statement. The race across the field. Roarke Rook firing on them. The decision to ram the boat. Mayhew nodded then probed.
"You're telling me you did not leave the road and enter the field with the intention to assault the boat directly?"
Sally's lips moved. By the banks, DI Gemmell was running the same debrief with Liam. One more officer stood by the sewer, PC Hawlin, trying to get Arthur Bledd out of the water. He eventually came, arms brimming with trash.
"What?" Sally asked.
Mayhew repeated the question. Now Roarke Rook was shouting for his lawyer.
"No, of course not," Sally murmured. She knew this feeling, could recognize it even from within. Dissociation. An effect of shock and trauma. Knowing that didn't clear any of the fog from her head. "I wanted to, uh, head them off."
"And then Roarke Rook fired?"
She nodded numbly.
"Why didn't you just stop? Wait for the ARV?"
That was the question. Sally knew what she'd felt in the moment. A fear they'd be sitting ducks, that was part of it. But also, a need to catch the Rooks now. To not let this drag out any longer. To not risk any more deaths.
But then, what had Roarke Rook said?
Nancy Cagen wasn't even dead.
Those words echoed through her. The way he'd said them, without any prep, already in shock himself, felt real.
True.
"I don't think the Rooks killed Cagen," she murmured.
"What?" Mayhew demanded. "I didn't ask about that. I asked why you didn't just stop your vehicle."
Sally struggled to focus. It seemed very important that she get the message across. "Cagen, DCI. Roarke Rook said he didn't even know she was dead, and I believe him." Seconds ticked past her. "That means the killer's still out here."
"I doubt that very much, but we'll get to it. Now answer the question. Why didn't you stop?"
Sally saw Liam, looking back at her. DI Gemmell had a checklist up and was running down it. Liam's lips were moving but she couldn't hear the words. Were they asking him the same questions? Was he giving the same answers?
Her thoughts whirled. "Uh. Rook had the shotgun up. He would have continued firing. I couldn't, uh. I had to…" she trailed off.
Mayhew looked at the Mustang then back. "The windscreen was already shattered from the first shot, correct? How could you possibly know he was going to fire again?"
How could she know? The question whirled and resonated in her head, devoid of all meaning. How could she know? How could she not have known?
"I saw it," Bledd chimed in, being led past by another officer, his arms still full of rubbish. "I was in the front, and I could see he was about to shoot again. Officer Rogers here saved our lives."
Mayhew sucked her teeth. She gestured to the officer to lead Bledd away. Sally just floated in position.
"Is that true?" Mayhew asked, when he was gone. "You could see?"
"Yes," was all Sally could manage.
Mayhew looked back at the Mustang and shook her head.
"From where I'm standing, Officer Rogers, this looks like outright vehicular assault.
At very best, a serious misuse of force.
At worst, attempted manslaughter." She turned to fix Sally in her glare.
"Were you aiming for the boat? Or were you aiming for the men on the boat? "
Sally murmured something. She barely even knew what. Then someone else was there. A warm hand on her arm.
John Logan.
"DCI Mayhew," he said firmly, "this officer is clearly on the verge of collapse. We need to get her into an ambulance immediately. You can continue your questioning later. I'd caution that anything she says right now could easily be a product of peritraumatic dissociation."
Mayhew's lips curled. "John." She said it like she knew him.
"Gloria," he answered. "You know I'm right. You need to stop."
"Do I? She your latest pet project?"
"Right now she's my patient," Logan countered, starting to lead Sally away. "That's all there is to it."
"I want eyes on her at all times," Mayhew called after them. "The Rook brother, how injured is he?"
"Broken wrist. He'll live."
Mayhew sucked her teeth. "You got lucky, Officer Rogers. This could have easily been much worse."
"I doubt she feels lucky," Logan said over his shoulder. "She was just shot at by a wanted criminal and survived a serious crash. Gloria, please."
Mayhew scowled but said nothing more.
A gurney was waiting, half sunk in the muddy field nearby. Logan gently sat her on it and ran a visual inspection. He shone a penlight in her eyes. Took her pulse. Gently probed her throat.
"Where does it hurt, Officer Rogers?" he asked.
"I'm fine."
"You're bleeding from the scalp. Your pulse is racing and irregular and you're close to hyperventilating. Let's get you to the ambulance. Can you walk?"
"I'm fine," she repeated.
He put one arm around her and led her away.
He was strong and warm. The field passed.
She saw Liam, striding alone across the grass with another paramedic trailing him, gaze fixed fervently ahead.
Arthur Bledd led the pack, head up and shoulders straight.
A sandwich wrapper fell from his grip and he knelt smoothly to scoop it up.
More vehicles were coming in still on the road. The ARV arrived and officers with rifles streamed out.
"Little late," Logan muttered.
More paramedics followed with bags and foil blankets, but Sally could only think of Nancy Cagen's face. It seemed to balloon until it filled her vision. Pinched features, worn by the weather and the world, but still a person. She'd been kind. Helpful. She'd deserved more.
"Her eyes," Sally murmured, as Logan helped her through the wreckage of the fence and up to the road. "Were they gone?"
"Whose eyes, Sally?"
Then she was in the ambulance, and finally laid her swirling head down. Logan spread a silver mylar blanket across her. "We need to take these wet clothes off you. My colleague's here, she's going to help you while I go check on your partner."
A woman appeared over Sally, young, red-faced, terrified.
"Whose eyes?" she repeated, as the woman brought up a pair of scissors and began to cut her uniform away.