Gabriella couldn’t decide if she loved or hated Bradley’s new case scheduling system. On one hand, it was organized. And efficient. There had been a few simple cases that required minimal investigation that they’d managed to wrap up within two hours apiece, freeing up time that would have otherwise been spent trying to prioritize on the spot.

But on the other hand, he had them scheduled down to the minute and if she heard him tell them to hurry up one more time, she was going to take five minutes out of her day to strangle him.

“Brad, it’s fine,” James said, cutting in with cool collectedness before she could blurt out exactly what she was thinking. “We’re leaving the Central Street case now and we’ve got time. If we start the Muldoon Street house tonight instead of this afternoon, we’ll be fine.”

“Don’t call me that,” Bradley said. “And you’re the one who wanted a schedule for the week. I spent three hours setting that software up.”

“And I appreciate it,” James continued, winking at Gabriella. “Me and Gabriella are going to be passing one of the cemeteries on our list on the way back to headquarters. So we’re going to stop in and take a look around for Father McEnerney before we come back. It’ll be an extra half hour, tops.”

There was a pause, then Bradley sighed, his breath crackling over James’s cell phone. “Fine,” he said. “Listen, just call me when you’re in there. I know why you don’t want us using our official comms for the case, but I don’t like this.”

“Got it,” James said. “Relax, bud. Go get a cup of coffee or something, we’re fine. Alright, bye.”

He hung up as Bradley started to say something and Gabriella could tell from his tone that it wasn’t going to be anything nice. James rolled his eyes and slid his phone into his pocket. “We’re ahead of schedule for the first time in five years, but at what cost?”

Gabriella laughed as she followed James into the van. It was nice to be out here on a simple case, just the two of them. Amelia was off today and Madelyn and Graham had been working on another case at headquarters while Bradley was on comms with James and Gabriella. They’d wrapped up the simple cleansing within an hour of arriving today and beyond a quick follow-up, they could check it off their list.

“So how’s your mom’s place working out?” James asked as he pulled out of the parking lot of the office building they’d been working at and onto the road.

“Good,” Gabriella said. “I was up there helping her with some painting the other day. I think she wants to do a Christmas party, but don’t say anything to your mom yet because she hasn’t decided anything official.”

“I’ll keep my mouth shut,” James said.

She briefly considered telling him about Elliot and the fact that she was going back up to New Hampshire on her next day off and hoped maybe she’d run into him. But if the way he teased Bradley was any indicator, she’d never hear the end of it. And she kind of enjoyed having something to keep to herself. It had been a long time since she’d had a simple crush on anyone, and it was kind of fun to keep it a harmless secret.

They drove past Woodlawn Cemetery a few minutes later, and James pulled over to the side of the road. “You’ve got protection, right?” he asked.

Gabriella reached into her pocket for the medallion she had started keeping on her during work hours. Between that and the vial of holy water in her bag, she was good. So she followed James out of the car and through the small cemetery gates.

Woodlawn was the main city cemetery, a huge, sprawling oasis of green in the center of the city. In the middle of the day it was buzzing with activity, grounds crews mowing the grass and raking leaves, cars slowly ambling through, and people laying flowers and festive autumn decorations at graves. Everything seemed perfectly normal in the daylight, though she knew that didn’t mean anything.

“Are we looking for anything in particular?” Gabriella asked as James pulled out his EMF detector and turned it on.

“No idea,” he admitted, looking at the detector’s display as the glowing results began to show up. “And I don’t think this will be of any use, considering we’re surrounded by dead people. But if we can rule out Woodlawn, all the other cemeteries are much more manageable.”

Gabriella nodded and started walking down the paved street with him. This part of the cemetery was pretty modern, with a few fresh graves still mounded with soft dirt as they passed. She stayed off the grass near those ones out of respect for the dead and the people here visiting them.

Was Robin buried in one of the town cemeteries? The thought came unbidden, and she wished she could stuff it back where it came from. The bright fall day seemed to darken a little as she suddenly glanced around, feeling a little uneasy and trying to hide it.

“What’s up?” James asked with a slight frown. “Did you spot something?”

Gabriella shook her head. “No, nothing,” she said. “I just thought…”

“What?”

He wasn’t going to let it go, so she let out a long breath. “Do you know where they buried Robin?”

James looked queasy for a second and she felt guilty for bringing it up. But he shook his head. “No,” he said. “I imagine the Foundation and his family took care of it. They didn’t get us involved.”

The urge to apologize again rose in her throat, but Gabriella resisted it. They were all getting past what had happened and constantly apologizing wasn’t going to help things move any faster. “I just thought, like, what if we come across his grave?”

The leaves crunched under their feet as she and James walked silently down the pavement for a moment. Then James shook his head. “I guess we let him rest,” he said. “Honestly, I don’t know. I could spend the rest of my life trying to untangle what the hell he thought he was doing. And I’ll never forgive him for what he did to you.”

“Or you,” Gabriella added quickly.

James shrugged. “Sure,” he said. “I know I mentioned it, but I saw what I thought was him a few times in the weeks afterward. I still don’t know if it was real, but Amelia helped me go through some mental exercises to break any lingering connection with him and it’s helped some.”

“How long was he your boss?” Gabriella asked.

This wasn’t a fun conversation by any means. But it felt like safe ground for the two of them to be on by now. Like enough time had passed to take some of the sting out of everything.

“Six years,” James said, nodding hello to a man passing by with a rake on his shoulder. “He replaced a captain who retired shortly after Amelia and Madelyn joined.”

“And was he always, you know..?”

Gabriella tried to mimic the over-the-top friendly expression Robin always had on his face and James laughed. “Yeah,” he said. “I mean, yeah. He was nerdy, but kind. I don’t know, something got twisted up inside of him. Maybe desperation was part of it, but if you’re desperate enough to set up a murder, that’s a point of no return.”

Gabriella didn’t have anything to say to that. But James didn’t seem to expect an answer from her. Instead, he turned to look at an old woman who was setting flowers on a headstone.

“Gran’s buried here,” James said suddenly. “Want to go stop by her stone?”

“Do you know where it is?”

James thought for a second. “Yeah, I think so. Oh wait, I promised I’d call Bradley, didn’t I? He’s probably losing it right now.”

He took out his phone and pressed a few buttons. A second later, Gabriella heard the line connect and then the tinny sound of Bradley yelling at James.

“Brad-” he tried to cut in. “Brad-Bradley!”

There was a pause. “We’re fine,” James said. “I’m sorry. Really. I said I’d call as soon as we got here and I forgot. That’s on me. We’re walking through the cemetery, it’s full of people, they’re all alive, and there’s no sign of anything weird. Okay? So calm down.”

Gabriella braced herself. If her own resentment at anyone telling her to calm down was an indicator, James was about to get his ass kicked over the phone. But James apparently got lucky. “Alright,” he said. “We’re going to stop by our grandmother’s grave real quick on our way out of here. There’s no indication that this is the cemetery the kid was in. The EMF detector is telling us ghosts galore, but everything else looks normal.”

Another pause as Bradley said something she didn’t catch. “We can discuss that, yeah,” James said. “It might be a good idea, but we’d have to figure out the cameras. No, I don’t want to use any Foundation equipment beyond what I can carry in my pocket and not transfer results from. I know you’re planning to get me an EMF detector for my birthday and that’s really sweet of you. Alright, we’ll be back in about twenty minutes. Bye.”

He hung up and put his phone back in his pocket. “That man,” he said, shaking his head. “He’s gotten so jumpy about staying on the line during cases lately.”

Gabriella thought back to when the phone had died as James was walking through Jarvis Street School. The way they’d found him lying so still on the floor in that classroom. Even if that wasn’t the reason for Bradley’s strictness, she couldn’t feel like she blamed him for it.

“Alright, it’s over this way,” James said, gesturing toward an intersection ahead of them. “We’ll bring flowers next time, but I’ve got an apple in my bag that’ll do for now.”

---

They got back to headquarters a little while later after picking up an order of apology lunch. Bradley glowered, but took the offered piece of pizza when James handed it to him. Madelyn and Graham were back by now, so they joined everybody in the living room for their lunch break.

“How’s your case going?” James asked them as he took his second piece of pizza.

Madelyn shrugged. “It’s weirdly small,” she said. “The shop owner said things are getting rearranged overnight. We’ve been going through the security footage and so far there’s nothing at all. My eyes are falling out from staring at shelves doing nothing for so long.”

“Maybe head over there this afternoon to get some readings,” James suggested. “We’re going to meet with the Adkins family for Muldoon Street at six, so there’s time for a quick visit.”

“Should we set up some cameras of our own while we’re there?” Graham asked.

Gabriella could see the wheels turning as James considered it. “Nah,” he said finally. “They’ve got regular security cameras. It’s not like we have anything more high-tech than theirs. But speaking of cameras, does anyone have any that don’t belong to the Foundation that they’d be willing to share?”

Madelyn shook her head as he looked at her. Graham laughed. “I live with you,” he said. “Do you think I’ve got secret cameras lying around?”

“No, that seems like Chris’s deal,” James replied.

Gabriella hadn’t met their third roommate. He seemed like a nice enough guy, but very odd based on the stories she’d heard. Graham rolled his eyes, but he was smiling.

“Bradley, do you have any?”

Gabriella expected a snarky reply, but Bradley sighed. “Yeah,” he said. “How many do you need?”

“Do you have three?”

Madelyn gazed off into the corner of the room, pressing her lips together tightly, trying not to laugh. Bradley glared at her, then looked at James. “Yes,” he said. “I have three.”

“Thank you!” James said, ignoring Madelyn. “I’ll hang one at each remaining cemetery entrance and see if we can find anything. I just need them for maybe two nights.”

“And you’re paying me back if anything happens to them,” Bradley said.

“Nothing’s going to happen to them.”

“You’re paying me back if anything happens to them, McManus.”

“Fine.”

Satisfied, Bradley jotted down a quick note, then turned back to James.

“Me and Gabriella checked out Woodlawn Cemetery earlier and didn’t get any weird vibes,” James said. “So Father McEnerney’s kid was probably at one of the others. The Father said he’d try to talk to him again, but it hadn’t gone so well the past few times. So we might just be stuck checking all of them. There are three more in the city limits and we just have to hope that he was telling the truth when he said they were messing around in a Leominster cemetery.”

Gabriella didn’t even want to think about the possibility that it was a neighboring town. These were four-hundred-year-old communities. They all had multiple cemeteries within their borders and checking all of them might take months. But James didn’t seem concerned about that yet, so she wouldn’t be either.

“We’re busy with official Foundation work until probably eight tonight,” James continued. “Then it’s me and Bradley on for the overnight. I don’t think there’s anything on the docket, so I’ll try to get around and get the cameras up if you don’t mind going home to grab them.”

Bradley shrugged. “Yeah.”

Then Madelyn turned. “Wait,” she blurted out. “Are these cameras the ones you threatened to buy to chase the squirrels off of your bird feeder?”

“No,” Bradley said, and it was obvious to Gabriella that he was lying.

Madelyn nodded skeptically, and glanced over at Graham, who seemed to be trying not to get involved in these arguments. He never did. He and Bradley clearly knew each other from somewhere outside of the Foundation. It was obvious through the way they interacted with each other, and there was an air of cautious politeness between them. Gabriella assumed it had to be just through James, the same way that Graham and Amelia had known each other before he’d started.

“Bradley’s out here shooting squirrels with a BB gun after work,” James said.

“Do you want the cameras or not?”

“Of course, thank you,” James said, standing up and picking up his plate. “I’ll only keep them for a couple nights. The squirrels won’t have much time to make any movement while your defenses are down. Does anyone want more pizza while I’m up?”

---

CONTINUE TO CHAPTER 6