“What are you going to do?” Mackenzie demanded. She was squatting outside the window now. Her neck was bent, her forehead nearly touching the barricade.
“We’ll open an investigation.” Celine kept her answer to Mackenzie short and to the point. “A murder investigation. Technically, the case won’t be federal, but I have a feeling that the local police department will welcome our involvement.”
Briggs would make sure of it.
As I approached the window—and Mackenzie—I wished Michael was here to tell me exactly what to read into the way Mackenzie finally allowed her forehead to rest against the barricade. Was she tired? Relieved? Now that someone believed her, was the magnitude of what she’d done to get our attention sinking in?
I stopped inches away from her. The room was silent enough that I could hear her breathing. Outside, the sky was still painted in shades of gray, but there was no thunder, no sound at all except for Mackenzie’s breathing and the barest whistling of the wind.
“You’ll find out who pushed her,” Mackenzie said quietly. That wasn’t a question—or a request. I’d expected something like hope in her tone, but I couldn’t hear much emotion in it at all.
“We will.” Lia stepped forward. Of the three of us, she’d interacted with Mackenzie the least, but she was also capable of speaking with a level of conviction with which an unsuspecting listener simply could not argue. “Cassie will start crawling into people’s heads. I’ll interrogate—witnesses, suspects, anyone who gets on my bad side.”
That got a very small smile out of Mackenzie.
“Agent Delacroix will flash her badge around and put the fear of God and the FBI in this whole town,” Lia promised. “It will be a sight to behold.”
If Mackenzie’s only reason for crawling out on that ledge had been to make someone listen, the fact that I’d confirmed her belief, and Lia’s
assurances of action, would have been enough to bring her in. But thinking back on my conversation with her father, I had to wonder if that was all there was to this.
You survived. You danced. And you’ve been dancing ever since.
“Mackenzie, baby…” Mrs. McBride had been remarkably silent the past few minutes. “Please.” Mackenzie’s mother was the talker in the family. “I’m sorry I didn’t believe you about Kelley. We should have listened. I’m so sorry, but can’t you—”
“Don’t apologize,” Mackenzie interrupted tersely. “It’s okay.” Beside me, Lia’s gaze darted almost imperceptibly toward mine.
Mackenzie was lying. It wasn’t okay.
A lot of things in Mackenzie’s life weren’t.
“Before we can leave,” I said carefully, “before we can find the person who killed Kelley…”
I waited for her to fill in the blank. She had to say it herself.
“You need me to come in.” Mackenzie didn’t sound angry or sad, but there was something in her tone that I recognized. Something deep and cavernous, something I’d felt.
“You’re going to be okay,” I reassured our newest Natural, though my voice wavered. “A lot of things in life—things that have happened and things that will—won’t be. But you will.” I paused, letting the words sink in, offering no softening, no sweet lies. “You won’t ever be normal, Mackenzie, but you’ll be okay.”
“Personally,” Lia added with a smirk, “I think normal’s overrated.”
I hoped Mackenzie understood us. We see you. It’s safe to come down now. To come in.
“What if you don’t catch him?” Mackenzie asked, her gaze fixed on Celine, her vulnerability clear. “The one who pushed Kelley. What if he gets away?”
He—or she, or they, my profiler’s mind reminded me. So many possibilities to sift through, as soon as Mackenzie was safe.
“Sometimes we win,” Celine replied evenly, meeting Mackenzie’s question head-on. “Sometimes we lose. But I can promise, we’ll fight like hell for Kelley. And our track record?” She pressed her hand to one of the boards—not the one Mackenzie leaned on, and not too close. “It’s not exactly normal.”
You’re different, Mackenzie, but so are we. We see you. You’re not alone.
“You’re good at this?” Mackenzie’s voice was rough with doubt. “We found you, didn’t we?” Lia’s answer was casual, yet the conviction in her tone was undeniable, as if the truth was obvious.
You may never be normal, but you’ll be okay.
“You can trust them, Mackenzie.” That statement came from behind me. The psychologist. I’d almost forgotten she was there, that there was anyone in this room besides Mackenzie and the three of us. “We’ve talked about trust, haven’t we?”
That was the exact wrong thing to say. I caught Mackenzie’s gaze with my own, willing her to look at me—and at Lia and at Celine.
We’re not humoring you. We’re like you.
Before I could say that, Quentin Nichols stepped forward. “You tell us when you’re ready for us to remove the barricade,” the crisis negotiator said. “You’re the one in control here, Mackenzie. It’s your decision.”
Emphasizing her control of the situation was a good move. It was the right move, one I might have made if he’d given me the chance. But he hadn’t, and my gut said that the words would sound different to Mackenzie coming from him.
He’s male.
“Stay back.” Mackenzie jerked her head off the board, so suddenly that I was afraid it might send her flying backward. It didn’t. “You don’t get to give me control. You don’t get to stand there and say…”
“Breathe, Mackenzie,” the psychologist murmured behind me.
I snapped so Mackenzie didn’t have to. “She’s already breathing. She’s
fine.”
But I knew: You’re not fine, Mackenzie. You haven’t been fine in a very long time. Something had triggered her, taken her back to a place she didn’t want to go. She was fighting that—would fight it—tooth and nail.
As long as Mackenzie stayed where she was, she was in control. On the ledge, it was her body, her choice, her life.
Her eyes stared past me, past Lia, past Celine, past her own mother. Straight to the psychologist—and then to Quentin Nichols.
You’re small. And he’s not. He has power. And you don’t. Mackenzie took a step backward. It was a small one, but…
“Mackenzie,” Celine said calmly, “I need you to stand very still.”
I slid sideways, blocking Mackenzie’s view of the men in the room as best I could. The fireman, at least, had the presence of mind to keep his mouth shut. I didn’t trust Quentin Nichols to do the same.
Mackenzie probably wasn’t his first jumper. This wasn’t his first rodeo.
But whether he saw it or not—she was different.
A clap of thunder boomed in the distance. Mackenzie raised her head to the sky. Her body didn’t shake. She didn’t waver.
“You need me to stand still,” she repeated back to Celine. “And I need you to find the person who murdered Kelley.”
This is control. This is setting your own terms.
“How are we supposed to find the killer if we have to stay here and babysit you?” Lia didn’t pull her punches. She wasn’t a profiler, but she did have a history of trauma and a deep-seated loathing for being treated like she was traumatized.
“You don’t have to stay,” Mackenzie said fiercely. “I can take care of myself.”
We’d been so close to her coming in. If it had been just us in the room, we could have done it. I sure as hell wasn’t leaving her alone with the people who’d botched this enough to keep her out there.
This is control. I wanted to believe that we could undo the damage, talk her down, but everything inside me said that now that she’d set her terms, she’d stick to them. Your body. Your life.
Your choice.
“I’ll stay.”
I’d been on the verge of saying those words, but Celine beat me to them. “I’ll stay with you,” she repeated, her focus solely on Mackenzie. “And
Lia and Cassie will work the case.”
“Fine.” Mackenzie’s voice was like steel, as a gust of wind whipped her tawny brown hair against her face. She stared at Celine for a moment longer, then turned to Lia and me. “You do your jobs,” she promised, “you find Kelley’s killer—and I’ll come down.”
YOU
There are names for what you do. Mercy is one. But another? Another is art.
