The Burnt House

2

THE POLICE TOOK eighteen-hour shifts. Somewhere Decker got down enough food to calm his stomach, although he had no memory of eating. The crash information that filtered through to the emergency crews was incomplete and contradictory. With the passing of the first twenty-four hours, no radical terrorist group came forward to take responsibility and that seemed to soothe frazzled nerves. Decker thought it was quite a world when everyone was rooting for mechanical failure. From the eyewitness accounts, it appeared that the plane had been in trouble from takeoff. Ascent was never fully realized, and a few moments later, it nose-dived. No one remembered seeing a midair explosion, and so far, no videos of the crash had surfaced.

Thirty-seven hours after WestAir flight 1324 plummeted into 7624 Seacrest Drive, the fire department declared that the inferno had been contained, although it was far from out. Jet fuel was still stoking the flames, and even in the areas where active fire had died out, there were still flare-ups. It would take days before residents could come home. The Gov had come down, declaring the site a disaster area, making it easier for the surviving residents to get federal aid and loans.

From the snippets of data that went in and out of Decker’s ears, he surmised that the casualties numbered around sixty to seventy, of which forty-seven came from the hapless travelers on the plane. Ground casualties were still being assessed.

Decker was dismissed from duty after forty-two straight hours of work. If he drove home, he didn’t openly remember operating a vehicle. Nor did he recall seeing his wife and his teenage daughter, or taking a shower. Exhaustion had robbed any recollection of his falling asleep. His first conscious memory was Rina waking him up at nine in the morning. He was confused but not ungrateful. His dreams had been disturbing. He wiped his sweat-soaked face with the sleeve of his pajamas, leaving behind a gray streak of soot.

Rina handed him the phone. “It’s Captain Strapp.”

Decker took the phone and depressed the hold button. Electricity and phone service had been restored sometime between when he had left and when he had come home.

“We’re getting calls, Pete. Family of loved ones that lived in the burnt house or in the area: relatives wanting to know if their kin is alive or dead. I want you to set up a task force and collect as many names as possible. Also, get the dental X-rays so that when the coroner’s investigators go in for recovery, we can provide them a list of names and the X-rays for identification. We’ll be one step ahead.”

Decker understood the words as English, but it took him a few moments to grab the meaning. “Uh … do we have a list of the ground deaths?”

Strapp’s voice was strained. “Did you just wake up?”

“My wife just woke me up. I’ve only been home for”—he looked at the clock— “a little under eight hours.”

“How long did you work?”

“About forty-two hours.”

“Good grief! That’s a lot of overtime.”

“I suppose it is.” Decker hoped he had kept the sarcasm out of his voice.

“In answer to your question, we don’t have a list of ground deaths. That’s what I want you to work on. I want your task force to contact the families of the suspected ground deaths and gather names. You can act as a liaison between the bereaved families and the NTSB and the coroner’s office. I’m calling for a town-hall meeting to assess what the community needs. The first thing we need to do is to set up a system so that worried families can access information.”

Decker’s brain was beginning to work. Strapp was spot on target. The charred bodies of the crash belonged to the coroner’s office, the wreckage of the plane belonged to the National Transportation and Safety Board, but the community belonged to the police. Working with bereaved families was bound to be a gut-wrenching assignment, meaning it would be a job that he’d do personally.

Another long day.

Strapp was talking. “… less immediate note, there have been reports of graffiti and looting in the affected areas. I want those investigated as well.”

Decker sat up. “Who’s reporting the looting? The residents haven’t been allowed back in.”

“That’s what I want you to find out.”

Decker exhaled. “All right. I’ll try to make it down in about thirty to forty minutes.”

“See you then.”

The receiver clicked off. Decker gave his wife the phone. “I’ve got to take a shower and go to work.”

She didn’t even bother to protest. “I’ll make you breakfast.”

“Food … that sounds real good.” Decker swung his legs over the bed, stood up, and stretched his six-foot-four frame. Over the years he had gained a few pounds, topping out around 225, but for a guy in his fifties, he carried his weight well. “Is Hannah in school?”

“School is in the hot zone. It’s been temporarily canceled until the board can find facilities where the kids can inhale without clogging their bronchioles with ash. We’re going to my parents for Shabbat, by the way. The air isn’t pristine over there, but it’s a lot better in Beverly Hills than it is here.”

“That could apply to a lot of things. That sounds fine. I’d love to see your parents.”

“You would?”

Decker smiled. “After witnessing such harrowing events, I look forward to a night with the in-laws and their mundane problems. Besides, your mother is a phenomenal cook.”

“That she is.”

“What about Cindy and Koby? Weren’t they supposed to come over on Saturday?”

“Friday night, actually, and Mama was gracious enough to invite them as well. Hannah, by the way, is thrilled. Not so much because she’s going to see her grandparents, but because she gets to see her friends that live in the city for a change.”

“It’s the age.”

“That’s true. Hannah lives for her friends. She’s either IMing someone or on the phone or doing both at the same time.”

“I hope I can make dinner this weekend.” Decker kissed his wife on the forehead. “This public servant may be doing overtime for a while. At least it’ll mean more cash in the till.”

“I’d rather have you.” Rina stroked his face and Decker realized how lovely she looked. His hormones shot through his lower body, but it was all for naught. He didn’t have the time.

After he showered and dressed, he sat down to pancakes and a cheese omelet. He drank four cups of coffee and two glasses of juice. He could have eaten more but the clock was ticking. When he announced that he had to go, Rina didn’t try to hold him back.

“Are you safe behind a wheel?”

“Safe and completely fueled.”

“I packed you a lunch while you were showering—four sandwiches and various side dishes. What you can’t eat, you can share with your brethren in blue.”

“I’m sure they will be grateful for any morsel I throw to them.” He kissed his wife chastely on the lips, deciding that this wasn’t at all satisfactory. The next kiss was long and deep. “I really do need to retire from my job.”

“You keep threatening, but for me it’s not a threat. First of all, I love you. Second of all, I’ve been collecting a list of projects that we’ve jawed about over the last four years. I’m ready when you’re ready.”

He knew what she was referring to. They’d conversed endlessly about adding more space to their eighteen-hundred-square-foot home, although the house had been losing occupants rather than gaining them. For the last few months, they’d been cutting out articles in design magazines. Rina’s pet project was a sumptuous master bathroom. Decker had been saving articles that dealt with media rooms and home theaters. Everything was still in the dream stage, but it made for interesting reading over the weekend.

Fantasy was the stuff of life.

AT HIS DESK, Decker sorted through the list of names and numbers. “This should keep me busy for a while.”

“Why not call a conference for all of them to come in?” Marge asked him.

“Because I think initial contact should be personal. These people lost loved ones in a horrible way. Besides, it shouldn’t take me all that long to make the phone calls. As the families start dropping off the dental X-rays, we’ll set up a schedule. There needs to be someone manning the desk all the time to deal with the bereaved until we’ve got all the bodies accounted for.”

“I can do that.”

“We should also contact several professionals who can offer support.”

“I’ll call social services and see what they can do for us.”

“Great.” Decker regarded his favorite detective—over forty and young at heart. They had worked together for over twenty years. As bedraggled as he felt, she looked fresh and alert. “How many hours of sleep did you get?”

“About five. Why? Do I look that bad?”

“On the contrary, you look chipper.”

“It’s the coral blouse,” Marge told him. “All women look good in coral.”

“What about men?”

“Men should wear black. It makes them look mysterious. In your case, Pete, black would set off your red hair very nicely.”

“It’s more gray than red,” Decker grumped.

“It’s still has plenty of red in it. So does your mustache. And you’ve got a lot of it … head hair. What you really need to look hip is a soul patch.”

“I’m beyond trying to look hip. All I want is to look appropriate so I don’t embarrass my teenage daughter.”

“I thought that was the purpose of parents of teenagers, to embarrass them.”

She had a definite point. Nothing was as much fun as to see his kids squirm at his misbehaviors. “So what’s going on with the graffiti and the looting?”

“We’ve gotten calls about homes being tagged.”

“How did that happen with units patrolling the area twenty-four/ seven?”

“The taggers are wily guys. They’re also not afraid of heights. We found signatures on the 405 Freeway overpass, and a couple of twenty-foot-high billboards. There’s also one on the top of the Parker/Doddard building, which has to be seven stories high.”

“Criminal Sherpas. Send them out to Everest where they can do some good.”

“I don’t think we’d like to see their signature in the snow, especially if we think what they might use to write with.”

Decker let go with a deep laugh. It felt good. “Not a pretty image. So what’s going on with the looting? Who’s reporting the activity?”

“Anonymous phone calls.” Marge laughed. “Since the residents aren’t back in the area to substantiate the claims, I’m thinking that may be thieves reporting on other thieves.”

“Any arrests?”

“A few for burglary, but that hasn’t deterred the felons. You know how it is, Loo. If houses are left unattended, crime is going to happen even with a strong police presence. The bad boys love to take chances. It’s like the tented houses when the owner fumigates for termites. There are always one or two yutzes who think they can beat the system and make it out before poisonous gas renders them unconscious.”

“How many looting complaints have been called in?”

“About a dozen.”

“Okay. Assign someone to call up the owners of the looted houses and have someone meet them there. Do a quick search inside to see if something is missing. That way if something has been stolen, they can contact their insurance agency right away.”

“I’ll get to it right away.”

“Thanks, Marge.”

“Leave the door open?”

“Absolutely.”

After she left, Decker looked around his private space. It was small, with used furniture, but it had walls that reached the ceiling and a door that made it an office as opposed to a cubicle. He was even lucky enough to have an outside window, although it didn’t open. It wasn’t big, but it usually let in enough light to add a pinch of cheer. Today the sash framed a gunmetal-gray sky. Ash had collected on the sill. He ran his hands through his gray-yet-still-red-according-to-Marge hair. He was still tired, but didn’t dare bitch about it, not when he looked down at all the message slips.

His fingers dialed the first number. A young male voice answered the call. Decker introduced himself and asked for Estelle Greenberg. The voice told him to hold on a second and then it called out, “Ma, police are on the phone.”

The woman who came on the line spoke before he uttered a word. “You found her!”

“Mrs. Greenberg, this Lieutenant Peter Decker of the Los Angeles Police—”

“Yes, yes … did you find my daughter?”

“And your daughter is …”

“Oh, for heaven’s sake! Why are you calling me if you don’t even know why I called?”

So much displaced anger. Decker rode with it. “I was just given a message. I’m sorry to upset you. Believe me, that isn’t my intention.”

“Did you find my daughter?” She was yelling over the phone.

“We haven’t recovered any bodies from the affected area,” Decker explained. “It’s just too hot and dangerous to search.”

“Then why are you wasting my time?” The fury in her voice barely overlay her desperation.

“First of all, I want to tell you how sorry I am. Second, I want to explain why I called you. I’m trying to gather information so that when the investigators do go into the area, they’ll know who they’re looking for. From this conversation, am I correct in assuming that your daughter lived in the affected building?”

The answer didn’t come right away. When it did, it was laced with tears. “Yes.”

“All right. May I please have her name?”

“Delia Greenberg. Apartment 3C.”

“I know the next couple of questions are going to sound moronic and insensitive, but I have to ask them anyway. So please forgive me if I upset you. I take it you haven’t heard from Delia since the incident.”

“No.”

“Does she have a cell phone?”

“I tried it a thousand times …” She was weeping. “It goes directly to her voice mail.”

“Okay. Did Delia live with anyone?”

“Alone.”

“So there was no one with her when it happened?”

“I don’t know! There might have been. She had friends stay over sometimes.”

“All right. Do you have any names, perhaps?”

“I don’t know! I can’t think right now!”

“You’re really helping me a lot, Mrs. Greenberg. Thank you for talking to me. One more thing regarding Delia. Do you think that you could obtain a copy of her dental records for identification purposes?”

The request was met with a long, long pause. “Probably,” she whispered.

“They can be sent directly to me or you can bring them in person. You are welcome to come in to the station house at any time or any hour and talk to one of us. There will always be someone here who’ll be familiar with your situation. I’m going to give you my cell number. Feel free to call it at any time.”

“Thank you,” she said without emotion.

Decker rattled off several sets of numbers. Whether the woman was writing any of it down was anyone’s guess. “Is there anything you want to ask me?”

“Who am I talking to again?”

“Lieutenant Peter Decker.”

“You’re a lieutenant?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“Your captain couldn’t have given me a call?”

“He’d be happy to call you, Mrs. Greenberg.”

“But he didn’t. You did.”

“Yes. If you want to set up an appointment with Captain Strapp—”

“Why should I want to set up an appointment if the man doesn’t have the decency to call me?” She was sobbing. “When do you want the X-rays?”

“How about if I come to your house and we’ll go to the dentist together?”

The woman didn’t answer. All Decker heard was weeping. Then she said, “All right. Do you know where I live?”

“No, but I can take down an address.”

“I don’t live so close to my daughter. She wanted her privacy. I’m all the way in the city.”

“I have a car, I can drive. What’s the address?”

She gave him the street address. “When can you come?”

“How about tomorrow morning around eleven?”

“Eleven would be all right. What do you look like?”

“I’m very tall and have red hair.” That’s turning gray very quickly. “I’ll show you ID at your door. I’ll see you tomorrow.”

“Thank you, Lieutenant. I know you’re trying to be nice. It’s just …”

She was crying again. Decker could have said, “I know …” Decker could have said, “I understand.” But he didn’t know and he didn’t understand.

Thank God.

3

IT WAS A hard time for the West San Fernando Valley. Even the news that the crash had likely been caused by mechanical failure didn’t stave off the increase in emergency calls, of reported heart attacks, asthma attacks, and fainting spells.

The week of the crash, Decker had worked on casino time, never seeing the light of day, never knowing what time it was. He never made it to Rina’s parents’ for Friday-night dinner, nor did he make it over the hill for Shabbat Saturday lunch. There was just too much to do. He did manage to cram in a phone call to his married daughter. Cindy was a grand-theft-auto detective over the hill in Hollywood, and had been doing double duty because so many of the uniformed officers had been diverted to the crash area.

But all things must pass, and eventually the terrible incident that had grabbed headlines in the local papers for two weeks running became old news. Coverage faded and fell to page three, then to page five, then to the back of the front section. Eventually it was relegated to local news until it became yesterday’s news. With the coroner’s investigators working nonstop on the body recoveries, and the NTSB working nonstop on plane and fuselage recovery, the police were permitted to go back to doing police work.

No one would have definitive answers for many months. Maybe it would even be years before the total puzzle was put back together. The nature of the beast required time and patience. Rina had told him that immediately after the crash, people in the area had seemed to move a bit slower, taking more time to smile and say hello. Traffic had been sparser and much more polite. And despite the initial looting and break-ins that had happened directly after the crash, overall monthly crime had actually taken a drop.

A temporary aberration it seemed, because the statisticians reported that the following month, life and crime in the San Fernando Valley had returned to their precrash status.

FORTY-SOX DAYS AFTER the crash, as Decker was looking over the upcoming court cases of his detectives, his extension rang. It was Marissa Kornblatt, one of the three department secretaries who manned the front desk for the squad room. Over the intercom, her voice sounded tentative.

“Excuse me, Lieutenant. I have someone on the line who is demanding to speak to the head honcho.”

“Head honcho?”

“His words, Lieutenant, not mine. His name is Farley Lodestone, and as far as I could make out, he’s ranting about his missing daughter.”

“How old is his daughter?”

“Twenty-eight.”

“Twenty-eight?”

“I told him our standard policy is thirty-six hours before we file a report, but then he said he’s been waiting over a month and he has had enough.”

The man sounded like a nutcase. Decker said, “Why don’t you patch the call to Matt Thurgood and have him take a missing-persons report—”

“Lieutenant, Mr. Lodestone is screaming that it’s a homicide. I don’t think he’s going to be happy with an MP report … sir.”

“I’ll take it.” Decker punched the blinking light. “Lieutenant Decker.”

“Lieutenant?” The voice was surprised. “Finally! Now we’re getting somewhere! You know how many phone calls I’ve made over the last few days?”

“How can I help you, sir?”

“Farley Lodestone is the name and you certainly can help me, Lieutenant Deckman. My stepdaughter’s missing. Me and her mom haven’t heard from her in forty-six days. We thought about it and thought about it and came to the same conclusion. That sumbitch husband of hers finally went out and did it.”

“Did it?”

“You know what I mean, Deckman. The sumbitch finally killed her!”

Decker looked at the phone monitor and took down the calling number. It appeared to be a cell phone and was from an out-of-the-city area code. “Mr. Lodestone, why don’t you come in to the station house and we can talk about this? Things that are this serious shouldn’t be discussed over the phone.”

There was a long pause. “You think so?”

“Yes, sir, I do. I could see you in about an hour. How does that sound?”

“Too quick! It’ll take time for me and the missus to get over there.”

“Where are you calling from, Mr. Lodestone?”

“Fresno.”

One hundred and eighty-six miles away as the crow flies. “And you’re calling this station house because your stepdaughter lives in this area?”

“Two-three-one-one-six Octavia Avenue. That’s where you’ll find the sumbitch.”

“And who is this sumbitch?”

“Ivan Dresden. He’s a broker for Merrill Lynch in Porter Ranch. My stepdaughter’s name is Roseanne. Roseanne Dresden.”

Decker tucked the receiver under his chin as he wrote it down. As he saw Roseanne’s name in print, he realized he wasn’t reading it for the first time. “Her name is familiar. Would there be any reason that I might know her?”

“Well, you mighta probably read her name in the papers saying she was on that WestAir flight that crashed down on the apartment building.”

That was it! Decker’s mind was racing, trying to understand the purpose of the call. “Mr. Lodestone, are you saying that your stepdaughter wasn’t on that WestAir flight?”

“That’s exactly what I’m saying.”

“But the papers reported her as one of the victims.”

“Young man, I’m sure someone somewhere musta told you that you should never believe what you read in the papers.”

THEY MATERIALIZED AT the station house at ten minutes to five in the afternoon. Farley and Shareen Lodestone were dressed in their Sunday finest, the man in a decently fitting gray suit with a white shirt and a tie, and Shareen in a flowered dress and low heels. She had taken the time to put on rouge and lipstick. Blond and blue-eyed, with good skin, at one time the woman had been attractive, but grief had deepened her eyes and depressed their light, giving her face a beetle brow.

Farley was thin and of average height with a mop of white hair. Yet Decker had seen enough of these guys to know that they were deceptively strong and wiry. He knew that beneath that jacket and shirt were some stringy arms with good grip strength. The man looked more mad than upset, but that was often a man’s way of coping with heartache.

Decker got them both cups of coffee and settled them into two seats opposite his desk. After closing the door, he sat down and took out a notepad, although he suspected that what they were going to tell him was a case of extreme denial. He said, “Before we get started, Mr. and Mrs. Lodestone, I want to express my condolences. I am very sorry for your loss.”

“Yeah, I am, too,” Lodestone grunted out. “So if you want to help, you’ll put that sumbitch behind bars.”

“I always had a queasy feeling about him,” Shareen added.

“Him … meaning your son-in-law?”

“That’s right,” Shareen said. “Ivan Dresden.”

Decker wrote down the name. “And you suspect … what?”

“That Ivan killed her.”

“Didn’t I already tell you that?” Lodestone butted in.

“Yes, you did.” Decker paused. “Before you came in, I called up WestAir. They verified that Roseanne had been on the flight.”

“Yeah, verified in what way?” Lodestone said. “They haven’t found her body.”

“They haven’t finished all the recovery, Mr. Lodestone.”

“They finished most of it,” Shareen added. “They got thirty-eight so far.”

“Then maybe we should wait until they have all forty-seven.”

“They aren’t gonna find forty-seven bodies, Lieutenant,” Farley said. “Besides, it don’t matter if they do find everyone on the passenger list because WestAir didn’t issue her a ticket.”

That threw Decker momentarily off guard. “They didn’t?”

“No, they didn’t!” Farley said triumphantly. “So how the hell did they know she was on the flight?”

Decker didn’t answer. He wrote down no ticket? while stalling for time.

Shareen rescued him. “Let me start from the beginning, Lieutenant. Roseanne was a flight attendant for WestAir. After the crash, when we couldn’t get hold of Roseanne, we called up the airlines. But WestAir told us she wasn’t working on flight 1324. Then the company called us up a couple of days later and backtracked. No, she wasn’t working 1324, but she was on the plane, hopping a ride to San Jose to work the route up there for a couple of nights … which is why they claimed they didn’t issue her a ticket.”

“Wait a minute.” Decker started to take notes in earnest. “I thought every passenger who flew on an airline had to be issued a ticket.”

“That’s what I thought,” Shareen said. “But I was wrong. This was told to me by one of Roseanne’s friends, so I hope I’m getting this right.” She took a deep breath. “Okay. Here we go. I think if you work for the airlines and you’re flying to work at a destination, you don’t have to be issued a ticket even if you’re not working the flight.”

Decker nodded. “So it was possible for her to be on the flight and for the airlines not to have a record of it. But then they’d have a record of the assignment, wouldn’t they?”

“They should have a record,” Shareen said. “But they’re not telling me yes, they have one, or no, they don’t have one.”

“Right now they’re not saying nothing without their lawyer,” Lodestone said.

Shareen said, “Roseanne used to work San Jose. So I figure that maybe WestAir was shorthanded in San Jose. So I called up San Jose, and asked if Roseanne was scheduled to work some routes up there. First they tell me no, then they tell me yes, then they tell me that if I want to talk to them again, they’ll put me in contact with their attorneys.”

“Same old, same old,” Lodestone said.

Shareen patted her husband’s knee. “Their hemming and hawing was making us very suspicious.”

Decker nodded. It did sound funny on the surface, but the airline was probably in disarray.

“I talked to Ivan,” Shareen said. “I just didn’t like what he told me.”

“What did he tell you?”

“That at the last minute, Roseanne changed her plans to work in San Jose. He told me emphatically that she was on the plane and he was upset enough without me making up stories about her not being on the plane. Then he said, in the long run, we were hurting not helping and that he and several other people had lawsuits pending, so we should kindly shut up.”

“He told you to shut up?”

“Not in those exact words, but that’s what he said between the lines. Then he told me I was in denial.” The old woman’s eyes watered. “I’m not in denial, Lieutenant. I know in my heart of hearts that Roseanne is dead. I just don’t think it was the crash that killed her.”

“You said Roseanne had worked San Jose before,” Decker said. “Could she have gone up to San Jose to visit someone?”

“Who, sir?” Lodestone said. “She’s married.”

“I was thinking about a friend.”

Shareen said, “If she was hitching a ride to visit someone, then WestAir would have had to issue her a ticket. The only way she could have boarded the plane without a ticket is if she was working the flight—which WestAir admitted to me that she wasn’t.”

“But then they backtracked,” Decker said.

“They’re lying,” Lodestone insisted. “They haven’t found her body! You know why they haven’t found her body?’ Cause it isn’t there. If that isn’t proof enough of something’s wrong, then I don’t know what is.”

“Mr. Lodestone, I don’t want to sound like a broken record, but neither the coroner’s office nor the NTSB has claimed to recover all the bodies. And even with those that they have recovered, it takes time to do positive identification.”

“Lieutenant, I talked to the sumbitch and asked him point blank why they haven’t dug up her body. You know what the sumbitch told me?”

“No, Mr. Lodestone, what did he tell you?”

“That they just didn’t dig deep enough. Can you believe that?”

Maybe it was true. Piles of debris still hampered much of the recovery operations. Still, it was a strange remark. Decker nodded sympathetically.

“Does that sound like a grieving husband to you?” Lodestone asked him.

It didn’t, but Decker had stopped trying to pigeonhole grief long ago.

Shareen said, “The only reason that Roseanne’s name is on the list is because Ivan Dresden called the newspapers and told them to put her down on the list.”

Decker didn’t like the sound of that. “Are you certain about that?”

Shareen backed down. “Well, that’s what I think.”

Lodestone said, “When he found out about the plane crash, he finally found a way to kill her and hide it. You know, I wouldn’t be surprised if he blew up the plane on purpose.”

Decker had heard people say outlandish things when upset, so his accusations fell on deaf ears. None of the vehemence surprised him, although the intricacy of the fabrication that they had created to explain their daughter’s death was beyond the pale. “Has Ivan Dresden ever threatened your daughter before?”

“He was having an affair.” Shareen had neatly sidestepped the question. “She was going to divorce him.”

“The condo’s in her name,” Lodestone told him. “I helped her buy it. He was gonna lose everything if the divorce went through.”

“And what did he do for a living again?” Decker asked. “Something with finance?”

“Broker for Merrill Lynch. That’s a fancy title for a salesman.”

“And what do you do, Mr. Lodestone?”

“Hardware … three stores and every single one of ’em is profitable.” A smile bisected his face. “Used to bother Mr. High and Mighty that I make more money with my nails and screws than he does with his fancy stocks and bonds.”

Shareen said, “No one has seen or heard from Roseanne since the crash, Lieutenant.”

That’s because she has disintegrated into dust. There was denial and there was this kind of denial, people so horrified and filled with rage that they actively hunted for an object to absorb their venom. Their anger was so encompassing that it blocked out not only the anguish, but also reason.