False Memory

“You understand Skeet better now?”

“Oh, yeah.”

“Where’s Valet?” Dusty asked, because the dog was a link to reality, his own Toto, reminding him of a world where wicked witches were not real.

“Bed,” Fig advised, pointing toward the open door of the master-bedroom suite.

The Sheraton bed stood high enough off the floor for Valet to have squeezed under it. He was betrayed by his tail, which trailed beyond the bedspread.

Dusty went around to the farther side of the bed, got down on the floor, lifted the spread, and said, “Got room in there for me?”

Valet whined as if inviting him under for a cuddle.

“They’d find us anyway,” Dusty assured him. “Come out of there, fella. Come here and let me rub your tummy.”

With coaxing, Valet crawled into the open, although he was too spooked to expose his belly even to those he trusted most.

Martie joined Dusty, sitting on the floor with the dog between them. “I’m reconsidering the whole idea of ever having a family. I think maybe this here is as good as it gets — you, me, and Valet.”

The dog seemed to agree.

Martie said, “Driving here, I didn’t think this mess could get any worse, and now look where we are. Neck deep and sinking. I’m numb, you know? I know what happened to Eric, but I don’t feel it yet.”

“Yeah. I’m beyond numb.”

“What are you going to do?”

Dusty shook his head. “I don’t know. What’s the use, though? I mean, the kid’s going to be a hero, right? No matter what I say. Or you. I can see it clear as I’ve ever seen anything. The truth won’t play well enough to be believed.”

“And what about Ahriman?”

“I’m scared, Martie.”

“Me too.”

“Who’s going to believe us? It would have been hard enough to get anyone to listen to us before… this. But now, with the Lizard and Claudette willing to make up wild stories about us just to muddy the waters… If we start talking about brainwashing and programmed suicide, programmed killers. that’ll only make their lies about us ring more true.”

“And if someone did burn down our house — Ahriman or someone he sent — it’ll be obvious arson. What’s our alibi?”

Dusty blinked in surprise. “We were in New Mexico.”

“Doing what?”

He opened his mouth to speak — but closed it without a word.

“If we mention New Mexico, we’re going to get into the Ahriman stuff. And yeah, there’s some substantiation of it — all the things that happened to people out there a long time ago. But how do we get into all that and not risk… Zachary and Kevin?”

They stroked the dog in silence for a moment, and finally Dusty said, “I could kill him. I mean, last night, you asked me could I do it, and I said I didn’t know. But now I know.”

“I could do it, too,” she said.

“Kill him, and then it stops.”

“Assuming the institute doesn’t come after us.”

“You heard Ahriman in the office this morning. This wasn’t any part of that. This was personal. And now we know just how personal.”

“You kill him,” she said, “and you’ll spend the rest of your life in prison.”

“Maybe.”

“Definitely. Because no judge will allow a cockamamie defense like, ‘I killed him because he was a brainwashing fiend.’”

“Then they’ll put me away for ten years in an asylum. That’s better, anyway.”

“Not unless they put the two of us in the same asylum.”

Valet raised his head and looked at them as if to say three.

Someone was running in the upstairs hall, and it proved to be Fig Newton when he burst into the room, his glasses askew and his face more red than usual. “Skeet.”

“What about him?” Martie asked, thrusting to her feet.

“Gone.”

“Where?”

“Ahriman.”

“What?”

“Gun.”

Dusty was on his feet, too. “Damn it, Fig, enough telegraphy already. Talk!”

Nodding, Fig stretched himself: “Took the gun off the dead man. And one of the full magazines. Took the Lexus. Said none of you was safe until he did it.”

To Dusty, Martie said, “Tell the cops, let them stop him?”

“Tell them he’s on his way to shoot a prominent citizen, armed with a machine pistol? In a stolen car? Skeet’s as good as dead if we do that.”

“Then we have to get there ahead of him,” she said. “Fig, you watch out for Valet. There’re people around here might kill him just for the fun of it.”

“Don’t feel too safe myself,” Fig said.

“Do the others know where Skeet’s gone?”

“No. Don’t yet know he’s gone at all.”

“You tell them he popped pills earlier today and now suddenly got funny. Took the gun and said he was going up to Santa Barbara, settle with some people for selling him bad dope.”

“Doesn’t sound like Skeet. Too macho.”

“Lampton will love it. Helps muddy the waters.”

“What happens when I lie to cops?”

“You don’t say a word to the cops. You’re good at that. You just tell Lampton, and he’ll do the rest. And tell him we went after Skeet. To Santa Barbara.”

By the time Dusty and Martie reached the foyer, clambered around the body and the overturned sideboard, and reached the front porch, with Lampton and Claudette shouting behind them, Dusty could hear sirens in the distance.