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"Youcircuit? Like a--?"

"No, for a coe It’s a--" He looked away "I don’t want to say Oh, Jules, I just want to go back to Mechanical I want none of this to have happened"

These words were like a splash of cold water Scottie was htened--he was terrified For his life Juliette got off the desk and crouched beside him, placed her hand on the back of his hand, which rested on his anxiously bouncing knee

"What does the program do?" she asked

He bit his lip and shook his head

"It’s okay We’re safe here Tell me what it does"

"It’s for a display," he finally said "But not for like a readout, or an LED, or a dot nize Anyone would…"

He paused

"Sixty-four bit color," he whispered, staring at her "Sixty-four bit Why would anyone need that much color?"

"Due of going ht? The view up top?"

She dipped her head "You knohere I work"

"Well, I’ve seen it too, back before I started eating every ers to the bone" He rubbed his hands up through his shaggy, sandy-brown hair "This progra like that wallscreen look real"

Juliette digested this Then laughed "But wait, isn’t that what it does? Scottie, there are sensors out there They just take the ies they see, and then the screen has to display the view, right? I ot ibberish "Doesn’t this just do what I think it does? Put that iether "You wouldn’t need anything like this You’re talking about passing an ih I could write a dozen lines of code to do that No, this, this is about rabbed Juliette’s ar canyou like"

He sucked in his breath, and a slice of ti in the air between them, a pause where hearts did not beat and eyes did not blink

Juliette sat back on her haunches, balancing on the toes of her old boots She finally settled her butt to the floor and leaned back against theof his office wall

"So now you see--" Scottie started to say, but Juliette held up her hand, hushing him It never occurred to her that the view could be fabricated But why not? And ould be the point?

She i this She must’ve been at least as smart as Scottie--she was the one who came up with the technique he had used to find this in the first place, right? What would she have done with this discovery? Say so out loud and cause a riot? Tell her husband, the sheriff? What?

Juliette could only knohat she herself would do in that position, if she were almost convinced She was by nature too curious a person to doubt what sheinnards of a sealed s of an unopened device She would have to grab a screwdriver and a wrench and have a peek--

"Jules--"

She waved him off Details from Holston’s folder flooded back Notes about Allison, how she suddenly went crazy, almost out of nowhere Her curiosity must have driven her there Unless--unless Holston didn’t know Unless it was all an act Unless Allison had been shielding her husband from some horror with a mock veil of insanity

But would it have taken Holston three years to piece together what she had figured out in a week? Or did he already know and it just took three years to suo after her? Or did Juliette have an advantage he didn’t? She had Scottie And she was, after all, following the breadcru more breadcrumbs, a much easier andfriend, as peering worriedly down at her

"You have to get those out of here," he said, glancing at the printouts

Juliette nodded She pushed up from the floor and tucked the scroll into the breast of her coveralls It would have to be destroyed, she just wasn’t sure how

"I deleted ot for you," he said "I’ at them And you should do the sae of the flash drive there

"And Jules, can you do "

"See if there’s any way I can transfer back to Mechanical, will you? I don’t want to be up here anymore"

She nodded and squeezed his shoulder "I’ll see what I can do," she pro the poor kid involved at all

8

Juliette arrived late at her desk the next s and back sore fro an ounce of sleep She had spent the entire night tossing and turning, wondering if she’d discovered a box that was better left unopened, worried shebut bad answers If she went out into the cafeteria and looked in a direction she normally avoided, she would be able to see the last two cleaners lying in the crook of a hill, almost as if in one another’s ar wind over the very thing Juliette was now chasing? The fear she’d seen in Scottie’s eyes h She looked across her desk at her new deputy, greener even at this job than she, as he transcribed data from one of the folders

"Hey Peter?"

He looked up from his keyboard "Yeah?"

"You were in Justice before this, right? Shadoith a judge?"

He tilted his head to the side "No, I was a court assistant I actually shadowed in the o I wanted that job, but none carow up there? Or the up-top?"

"The mids" His hands fell away from his keyboard to his lap He smiled "My dad was a pluo My mom, she works in the nursery"

"Really? What’s her name?"

"Rebecca She’s one of the--"

"I know her She was shadohen I was a kid My father--"

"He works in the upper nursery, I know I didn’t want to say anything--"

"Why not? Hey, if you’re worried about uilty You’re my deputy now, and I’ll have your back--"