Downwinders: Blood Oath, Blood River Part 6

Who's that? Sagan replied.

Come on, Deem, Winn said, walking to the stairs. This idiot doesn't even know who he's named after, and I gotta get out of here before I choke. Don't f.u.c.k this up, Sagan. You f.u.c.k it up, the deal's cancelled and I take it to Gale.

Chill! Sagan said. I'll do it, you don't gotta worry.

"He's an idiot," Deem said, riding in Winn's Jeep. "Makes me a little nervous to have him working on this."

"Me too," Winn said, "since he's our only option."

"There's no Gale in Littlefield?" Deem asked.

"Nope," Winn said. "Sagan's the only Caller I know that's close. If he doesn't work out, the next closest I know of are in Ely."

"d.a.m.n, let's hope he gets it right," Deem said. "Are you going to tell him the corpses are animated?"

"Nope," Winn said. "He'll have to figure that one out. But he will, he's so hungry for them. He'll clean the place out."

"If he doesn't f.u.c.k it up," Deem repeated.

"Yeah, that," Winn said.

Deem felt her cell phone buzz in her pocket. She pulled it out and checked it it was a reminder to visit Joseph Dayton, a friend of her father's.

"So this stop I need to make," Deem said to Winn, "is right in the middle of town. If you want, you can take me home and I'll drive there."

"How long will it take?" Winn asked.

"I don't know," Deem said. "I want to talk to him about my father. He was good friends with him. I think he's gifted, too, and won't admit it. I'm hoping to ask him if my father kept a journal."

"I'll take you there," Winn said, knowing this was of major importance to Deem. Anything that involved her father was major.

"I can't tell you for sure how long it will take," Deem said.

"I'll wait," Winn replied.

Deem gave Winn the address. She was grateful that he was coming along. She could use the moral support.

Winn watched as Deem left the house he was parked in front of and walked to his Jeep. She opened the pa.s.senger door and hopped inside.

"That was fast," Winn said.

"He wouldn't tell me anything," Deem said, fuming. "Wouldn't admit to having the gift, said he didn't know if my dad kept a journal. I dropped into the River and could tell he was lying. I think he knew I knew."

"Did you call him on it?" Winn asked.

"No," Deem said. "I just thanked him and left. I feel like a p.u.s.s.y."

"Want me to go talk to him?" Winn asked.

"No," Deem said. "It's just that...G.o.dd.a.m.nit, it's just how smug he was. There's all this judgment. I'm not active in the church, so the walls are up. It makes me angry. It's my father we're talking about, church or no."

"Yeah," Winn said, "I know what you mean."

"He and my dad spent a lot of time together," Deem said. "He was Dad's counselor in the stake presidency. They were both gifted, I know it. I'll bet he has gifted kids of his own, too. He should be more compa.s.sionate."

"I thought you said your father didn't leave a journal?" Winn said. "Did you discover something different?"

"It doesn't make sense," Deem said. "He advocated keeping a journal, he advised others to do it, as part of the religion. I can't believe he didn't keep one himself. My mom says there's no journal, but he may have hid it from her, or she might be hiding it from me. I spent most of today digging through boxes in storage at home, seeing if I could find something. I know it's there, somewhere."

"And you were hoping this guy would know something?"

"I thought maybe he could confirm if my dad kept one," Deem said. "But he denied any knowledge of anything. It was like he never knew my dad. And worse, he lied to me."

Deem was tearing up. Winn saw her wipe her eyes. "When I was younger," Deem said, "I thought he was a very nice man. Now he's just an a.s.shole."

"You know, there's always been those rumors about Mormon gifteds," Winn said. "Maybe that's why."

"My dad told me they weren't true," Deem said.

"Yeah, well, he didn't tell you about a journal, either. Maybe it was something he was waiting to tell you, but he pa.s.sed away before he could."

"He died a slow, agonizing death from leukemia," Deem said. "He had plenty of time to tell me anything he wanted to say."

"You could always go talk to Claude Peterson," Winn said.

Deem turned to look at Winn. "Crazy Claude? I'd be shot before I could knock on his door."

"The guy knows a lot about it," Winn said.

"It's all bulls.h.i.+t," Deem said. "He's a lunatic."

"He just knows some things he probably shouldn't have talked about," Winn said, "and it got him branded as crazy. It's the community here that's isolated him. I've always believed him."

"Well, you believe in UFOs, too," Deem said.

"This sudden interest in a journal is because of Steven and Roy, isn't it?" Winn asked. "Seeing Roy's journal?"

"It got me thinking, yes," Deem said. Deem felt her phone buzz once again. She slipped it from her pocket and scrolled through the messages.

"Awan found a picture," she said, turning to Winn and smiling.

Chapter Four.

"I told her I'd see what I could find," Eliza said, "but I didn't tell her anything about Eximere, of course."

"Good," Steven said, pouring himself a cup of coffee with his left hand while holding the cell phone with his right. "I'm going there tomorrow. I'll look for it. You'll email it? The picture?"

"As soon as I get it from Deem," Eliza said.

"This would be a nice way to return one of those objects, if it's there," Steven said. "I think we'll have a hard time returning the others without someone stepping forward like this."

"Is that Eliza?" Roy asked, walking into Steven's kitchen to get some of the freshly brewed coffee.

"Hold on, I'm going to put you on speakerphone," Steven said, removing the phone from his ear and pressing a b.u.t.ton. He moved to the kitchen table and Roy sat next to him.

"h.e.l.lo?" Steven said. "Can you hear me?"

"Yes, I can hear you," Eliza said.

"h.e.l.lo, Eliza!" Roy said. "Nice to hear your voice."

"Yours too!" Eliza said. "How's things? How's Jason?"

"He's fine, doing fine," Roy said. "Well, fits and starts, but he's coming along."

"I had to pull back a little," Steven said into the phone. "I've been dumping a lot on him. I didn't want him to feel I was holding back anymore. I think it was too much too soon."

"Jason told him to slow down," Roy said into the phone. "Things were going too fast."

"Well, he got what he wanted," Eliza said. "At whatever speed. Any lingering issues with St. Thomas?"

"Doesn't seem to be," Steven said. "What do you think, Dad?"

Roy remembered the warning Deem had given him about Jason, the potential for something subliminal to reemerge. He hadn't seen anything along those lines yet, but he'd been watching.

"He seems fine," Roy said. "Nothing out of the ordinary."

"That's good," Eliza said. "So, you think we can give up one of those objects at Eximere, for Deem? If it's there?"

"I'd be happy to," Steven said. "We owe them. This would be a nice way to repay them."

"Alright, I'll just tell her I've got some friends looking for it. If you find it, let me know and I'll give her a call."

"Are they in trouble?" Roy asked.

"Yes, it sounded bad," Eliza said. "One of her relatives is under attack, at her house. A friend of theirs found this object in his grandfather's journal, they're hoping it will help. His grandfather claimed it was stolen from him."

"I wonder if he was one of Unser's victims," Steven said.

"G.o.dd.a.m.nit!" Roy said, suddenly standing up. "Hot coffee in the crotch!"

Steven could hear Eliza laughing. "I'll let you go," she said. "Sounds like you need to clean up."

"He knocked over a full mug," Steven said. "Coffee everywhere. I'll call you if we find anything. Or if we don't, either way."

"Thanks," Eliza said, and hung up.

As Winn poured himself another cup of coffee from his thermos, Deem grabbed the Big Gulp from the cup holder in Winn's Jeep and took a long sip. Their car was parked a half block down from Deem's house, with a perfect view of the front of the house and the roof.

"You still drinking that s.h.i.+t?" Winn said. "The sugar'll kill ya."

"What you're drinking isn't any better," Deem said, replacing the Big Gulp in the cup holder.

"Of course it is," Winn said. "I drink it black, no sugar at all."

"I'm drinking a Diet c.o.ke," Deem said. "No sugar."

"Just a ton of chemicals bubbling in carbonation," Winn said.

"Mmm, mmm," Deem said. "And it tastes so good!"

They'd been in the car for over an hour. It was one a.m.

"So you just don't like coffee?" Winn asked, bored.

"I love the smell of it," Deem said. "But drinking it sucks."

"That's because you want it to be sweet," Winn said. "They put chemical sweeteners in Diet c.o.ke, you know. And coffee is good for you. Lots of studies on the internet."

"That's not what we were told in Sunday School," Deem said. "They had all kinds of stories about how bad it was for you."

"Well, you know that was a load of horses.h.i.+t," Winn said, taking a sip.

"OK, let me try some," Deem said.

Winn pa.s.sed his cup over to her. She smelled it, then took a small sip. She handed it back.

"That's nasty," she said. She reached for her Big Gulp to wash away the taste.

"Maybe you need to ease your way into it," Winn said. "With cream and sugar, like most girls drink it."

Deem knew he was trying to get under her skin with the "most girls" comment. She ignored him.

"Roy says I've just never had good coffee," Deem said. "He said in Seattle they'd make sure I got the good stuff."