Glistening Haven: A Shape Shifting Dystopian Boxset

by Jill Cooper

  Jenna walked across the street toward a hardware store. Dirk and Jameson were out front. “Shooter was positioned on the roof of this building, best I can tell,” Jameson said. “He took George out before heading down this back alley.”

  “We lost him when he got into the back of a van,” Dirk said grimly.

  “Same van?” Jenna asked.

  Jameson nodded. “Maybe we’re looking in the wrong place, Jen. Maybe this is the work of glistenings.”

  “And they got a sniper gun, explosives where?” Jenna was aware her voice was a bit too high-pitched. She knew why glistenings were locked up, but Jenna’s gut spoke loudly to her that it wasn’t them pulling the trigger. But maybe they were the reason. Maybe they were why Travis was killed and that idea made her hate them even more.

  “Rebecca smuggled them in with the help of George.” Jameson said.

  “Except you’re forgetting they just killed him,” Dirk reminded him. “Why kill someone who’s on your side?”

  “Because they’re damn-ass crazy?” Jameson asked.

  Jenna sighed. “We’re losing track. We go where the evidence leads us. Right now our biggest lead is dead so we have to look into what he told us. Little as it was. The fact that Rebecca Seers was up to something on the same night the chief was killed can’t be a coincidence. It’s connected. We just have to find out how.”

  “We need to talk to her,” Dirk said with resolve. “Too bad we can’t call out while we’re in here.”

  “And we can’t get out until the quarantine is lifted.”

  “So what do we do?” Jameson asked. “Drive around until we spot a van just like our van?”

  “Check town activity reports,” Jenna ordered. “See if anything weird or unusual is going on outside the norm.”

  Jameson nodded, reached for his cell phone, and headed toward their vehicle. Jenna took the moment to cross her arms and study the scene. It should have been loud and disorderly, but it wasn’t. The glistenings were perfectly under control as the police kept them bunched together for questioning and searches. If they were anywhere else but a New Haven colony, the scene would be playing out differently. Much differently.

  Her head turned when she realized Dirk was studying her. A breeze swept across his face, dancing hair across his forehead, and Jenna restrained herself from setting it right. “Staring?”

  “Just wondering if you’re all right.”

  “Because my reaction inside the shop was slow?”

  “Slower than usual. Course it’s not every day someone is executed like that in New Haven. Not a police officer anyway.” A toothpick twirled against his lips that Jenna hadn’t realized he had.

  Was she losing time again?

  “Thanks for defending me to yourself. It’s appreciated.” Jenna walked away, feeling his eyes penetrating through the back of her head. It was one thing to feel vulnerable with Dirk inside the safety of an apartment, but it was another thing while they were on duty. Laurel might have thought she was off the case, but to Jenna, nothing was further from the truth. She wouldn’t stop until she found out what was going on. The brain splatter across her shoulder of a good officer was just added incentive.

  When she approached the van, the look on Jameson’s face as he sat in the driver’s seat put her on alert. “What’d you find?”

  He barely glanced up, his thumbs moving across the transparent surface of his phone. “Glistening killed herself this morning at her job. Few hours ago.”

  Jenna’s eyebrow cocked. She heard Dirk’s footsteps behind her approaching. “That’s unusual. Him?”

  “Her,” Jameson corrected. “Everyone whoknew her said she was healthy and happy.”

  “Anything on her in the Outpost? Was she seeing one of the therapists? Maybe her indoctrination was slipping.”

  “That’s the thing, Jen,” Jameson sighed. Uneasy his face was cast down and his skin was pale. “When I try to bring up her profile to see if there are any vids on her, I’m blocked. It says I don’t have the proper credentials to access her.”

  Dirk and Jenna exchanged a glance. “Can you hack in?”

  “With the equipment I have here? Not in under a few hours.” Jameson sighed. “I placed a few calls to some buds. At least I thought they were. They’re stonewalling me, Jen. I tried to find out if they have a lead on Travis’s kid or what happened with George.” He shook his head. “They acted like I was the plague.”

  Something big was going on. Bigger than they realized. She remained thoughtful, calm, but thought that the goodwill she received from the force might be over now, with Travis dead. Who knew how long it would be before she lost her job? She couldn’t worry about that now, despite how tough things were in the real world. No matter what happened, Jenna had to see this through.

  “All right then. We do it the old-fashioned way. We head to her work and see what we can find out.” She hopped in the van, getting herself situated while Dirk did the same. “Where’d she work?”

  “Haven High School.”

  Chapter Fifteen Jenna

  The halls of Haven High were clean even by glistening standards. The air had a hint of lemon and the tile floors were waxed and buffed to a perfect shine. Perfect place for a murder, Jenna thought to herself as she led her team toward the nurse’s room. Already her mind was convinced that whoever this lady was, she hadn’t committed suicide. Glistening suicide rates were the lowest they had been in over ten years and New Haven 56 never had one. What a coincidence it would be to happen this week of all weeks.

  There was a glistening outside the nurse’s office. He was nervous, appeared to be on guard. Dressed in a nice suit with fair hair swept back, Jenna guessed he was the principal of the school. Putting the glistenings in jobs of authority made her nervous, but at a school she supposed it made sense. As she approached him, her phone chirped a warning. It was her glistening warning device. When in close quarters to plummeting blood pressure, it beeped. She had to be close enough and the glistening needed to be tagged for it to work. This guy was close to a stress rampage.

  “I’m here to relieve you, glistening,” Jenna crossed her wrists in front of her body. Behind her, Jameson and Dirk followed suit. “Why don’t you head to your office, do a little yoga, and have a nice tall glass of cow juice?”

  He blinked his eyes rapidly. “I didn’t think the police was ever coming. They told me when I called it in to stay with the body, that there was trouble downtown, but I didn’t think it would take this long.” The color faded from his cheeks and were dangerously close to shimmering.

  “Just relax and take a deep breath,” Jameson said from behind her. He stepped up and put a hand on the man’s shoulder. “We don’t need an incident and you’re fine. We’re fine. Everything is rosy here. Your life is perfect, right, man?” He grinned, slapping the man on the back.

  When the principal expelled a big breath of air, pink returning to his delicate features, Jenna relaxed and moved her hand from the butt of her gun. Jameson moved the man away down the hall to a bench while Dirk opened the door to the nurse’s office and stepped inside. Jenna wasn’t sure what state they would find the body in, but was surprised to see it looked fine. The nurse looked like she just simply fell asleep at her desk, still in her uniform.

  Her head was rolled back, her mouth set in a small smile. She was heavyset, but her skin appeared perfect, without discoloration or even a patch of blotchiness. Her soft brown curls were pinned back to her head in a way that made her look far too young to be a practicing nurse. Jenna wondered how old she really was. There was no way to tell until the glistening disease ravaged your body to the point it started falling apart after decades of pristine beauty.

  Dirk slipped on a pair of latex gloves and inspected the body. Jenna, already wearing her black gloves, poked around her desk. Nothing appeared out of place. Even her day planner was still there. Flipping it open, it looked like the nurse had a full week of social engagements. Certainly not what you expected from someone so de
pressed she would kill herself.

  Dirk lifted the nurse’s hand slowly and called Jenna’s name. She saw there was a syringe clamped in her meaty hand. “Death by injection.”

  “See if you can find out what it is,” Jenna ordered. “See if it is something she’d stock in here.”

  “Got it,” Dirk said as he worked to lessen her grip. Their van had top-of-the-line equipment; it would be able to identify the compound, if there was enough left in the needle.

  Footsteps behind her told Jameson had returned. “Old coot’s going to be okay.”

  Dirk cast him a look. “Sounds like you like him.”

  Jameson snorted. “He’s a glistening. I have no disillusions about what he is, but he’s still a coot.”

  Jenna suppressed a smile. “See if you can sync up with her phone.” She nodded her head toward the phone on the desk. “See what she was up to. Who she met, what she was doing. E-mails, text messages, phone calls.”

  “Can do,” Jameson took out one of his phones and took a seat in a waiting armchair.

  “Hurry,” Jenna pressed. “We don’t know how long we have before the police show up and escort us out.”

  “You’re always big on the pressure. You ever notice that? One big pressure cooker. Maybe if you joined me on some Xtreme Ironing or a pumpkin flinging competition—” Jameson stopped as she threw darts at him with her eyes. She adored Jameson, but she didn’t need to be told she was a stress maker.

  Dirk delicately held the syringe in his hand. “I’m going to run this out to the van and run some tests.” He paused, waiting for Jenna to say something. Probably give her approval or throw him warm gooey eyes, but she did neither. With a slight sigh, he pushed past her and hurried through the hall.

  “You don’t always have to be so hard on him,” Jameson said without looking up. “It doesn’t matter what a bitch you are, he’ll never get over it.”

  For a moment she forgot to breathe and her heart felt juiced. Jenna crossed her arms. “Did I ask for your commentary?”

  “You never would and I’m not going to hold it in. It’s not healthy for the old artery system. Besides,” Jameson’s blue eyes pierced through her, “you weren’t here. You weren’t the one who saw what happened after you left him at the altar. Not sure why you’re the angry one.” Quietly, he went back to his phone and Jenna couldn’t stop a slight tremor in her hand.

  She focused on searching the desk and tried not to think about that wedding dress, the house they wanted to buy, and all the other conversation they had before everything changed. Before she found out the truth. She couldn’t expect Dirk to understand all that. Her voice was a hushed whisper. “And what happened?”

  Jameson’s fingers didn’t pause as they keyed in entry after entry on his phone. “Not my place to tell. Her phone’s wiped. Someone knew what they were doing. I guess that takes suicide off the table.”

  “The school has a server room. All messages, incoming and outgoing, are stored there. If we’re lucky, they didn’t think to wipe that. Or didn’t have time.”

  On his feet before she finished, Jameson gave her a quick glance before leaving the room. Jenna almost wished he stayed there so she wouldn’t have to be alone with her thoughts. Sure, she knew she hurt Dirk. Those nights in the real world when she was hunting glistenings, going off grid and breaking new constitutional laws, gave her a lot of time to think. Most of them she thought of him. Her mind played out all the what-if scenarios; what happened after she left, how he handled it, but to hear about it from a third party... Jenna thought her crew forgave her for the things she did, but maybe Jameson couldn’t forgive her for what she did to his best friend.

  She wasn’t sure she did either.

  A name caught Jenna’s eye as it swept through yesterday’s appointments. Most people were there for the normal stomachaches, fevers, or sports injuries, but right next to vomiting was the name Wendy Reynolds. The chief’s daughter saw the nurse the day of the chief’s death and her disappearance. Now with the nurse dead … was it possible that everything that was going on wasn’t about the chief, but about Wendy?

  Fearful for the girl, Jenna’s stomach tightened. She closed the book, not wanting anyone else to make the connection before she had a chance to investigate, and turned around as Dirk entered the room. His swagger was back. Whatever he felt for her earlier that day was back in check, like it often was. “Check it out, Jen. I finished the test. Hyped-up medicine designed to raise blood pressure. Potent stuff too. If it was you or me, we’d probably implode.”

  “But glistenings’ hearts would be unable to take it. They’d simply drift to sleep.”

  “And the heart would just shut down.” Dirk said.

  Jenna was quiet as the gears of her mind spun. “Medicine like that? Would a school nurse keep it?”

  Dirk shook his head. “It was experimental. Never released to the public. It was thought it could stop a glistening on a rampage, but it never worked. It only killed the test subjects.”

  Jenna thought back. “The initiative to stop a glistening on a rampage was abandoned almost twenty years ago.”

  “Yup. Want to guess who was put in charge to safeguard its formula?”

  “I’m guessing from that smirk that I’ll never guess. Or at the least, you want to tell me.”

  “New Haven Council. The group we have all of this, and by this I mean all five New Havens, to thank for.”

  Jenna raised her eyebrows. “The implications of that are huge. What the hell is going on here?”

  Dirk gave a slight shake of his head. “If they got their hands on it, these guys are more than just dangerous, they’re professionals.”

  “I think we already figured that out,” Jenna took a breath, “Wendy was here the morning of her disappearance.”

  “Man, all the strings are coming together.”

  “Yeah,” Jenna diverted her eyes away from Dirk, but could still feel his eyes on her body like he was undressing her in his mind. Not like he needed to. He knew exactly where everything was.

  “Something on your mind?” Dirk asked quietly.

  She hated the way he did that. “Last night. I was overly harsh. Just, sorry.” Jenna gave a little pout and kicked her foot at some imaginary dust.

  Dirk was wearing his angelic wide-eyed expression. “You? I’m not sure if I’m more shocked by the apology or the fact you recognize when you’re overly harsh.”

  “Didn’t always used to be like that,” Jenna admitted, even though she didn’t know why. Stop it, Jenna. You do not need this right now.

  But she did. Part of her really did.

  “No. Didn’t. I miss that girl, but this one isn’t so bad either. She defrosts a mean pizza.”

  Jenna grinned, turning her head to cast it away. It didn’t work and she felt Dirk take her hand. Apparently when you gave a man an inch, he really did take a mile. “If I hurt you, it wasn’t my intent. And I am, you know, sorry.” When did that word get so hard to say, anyway? It was a small two-syllable word, so why was she always choking on it?

  “Last night was—you’re not talking about last night, are you?” Dirk sighed, loud and frustrated. “You pick now of all days, at a murder scene, to talk about that?”

  “Well if that’s how you’re going to be, I take it back. I’m not sorry.” Apparently it was easy to un-apologize, Jenna mused. It actually almost felt good, which was part of the problem. Why did it feel so good to always be a jerk?

  “You can’t take it back.”

  “Yes, I can,” Jenna said with defiance, turning her nose up.

  “Nope, you can’t. Sorry.” Dirk’s voice trailed off. “So, since you brought it up. Why’d you do it? Why’d you leave without even,” he struggled and gave a hard blink of his eyes, “talking to me?”

  Jenna, stunned that he asked, didn’t have a lie prepared. Her eyes were moist with stinging tears, but luckily, her ear chirped at that moment. Dirk’s head tilted in a way that told her he heard it too. Jameson’s voice ca
me next. “Jen, ask me if I found anything.”

  She sighed. “Have you found anything, Jameson?”

  “Totally glad you asked me that. Two things. Which thing you want first?”

  “Uh, how about the first thing.” Jenna rolled her eyes and Dirk chuckled.

  “Our dead nurse called Alice at work. Told her something was wrong with Wendy and to come pick her up. This was not long after the beginning of the school day. I guess our missing-in-action girl vomited in her classroom with a Jon Voight type.”

  Jon Voight, Jenna thought fondly. If only he didn’t get turned into a glistening and then killed by snipers. He was trying to eat starlets, for better or worse. Jenna bet they only tasted like crunchy bones, anyway. “What happened second?”

  “Rebecca Seers was here in the morning. Vids and logs show she came in and talked to one student in the guidance office. Per regulation, any glistening speaking to her—well, surveillance was cut.”

  “Right.” Jenna said curtly.

  “She was here to talk to…Jake Monroe. Glistening kid. On the football team. Don’t get why she’d want to talk to him.”

  “Good work, Jameson,” Dirk said.

  Jameson snorted. “All my work is good.”

  “I think we need to do two things. Talk to Wendy’s teacher and see what happened. I gotta believe that this thread has something to do with Wendy. Find this Jake Monroe and see what Rebecca wanted.”

  “If we get caught asking him that, it’s a big violation,” Dirk said. “If Rebecca isn’t up to no good and she finds out we breached her organization’s right to privacy—”

  “There’s no right to privacy inside New Haven. You know that.” Jenna walked out of the office and started down the hall. Now if only she could find this teacher’s classroom. Pulling out her phone, she used her police clearance to pull up a blueprint of the school with an overlay of glistening assignments. She found the one she was looking for by the time Dirk nipped at her heels.

  “I’m just saying we need to be careful. I want answers, same as you do.”

  “I know,” Jenna said and cast him a long look. They turned down the hall and she stopped at the door. She decided to play low-key, and opened it slowly and stuck her head inside. The teacher did look a little bit on the older side.