Page 23 of Fatal Fame
"You son of a bitch," Danny Walsh snarled, pushing past the chairs that separated him from Pierce. "You come into our town, you stir up trouble, you get people killed, and then you have the balls to accuse us of covering up murder?"
Pierce backed up but didn't retreat, his Hollywood arrogance warring with his survival instincts. "I'm not accusing anyone of anything. I'm just trying to find the truth."
"The truth?" Walsh was close enough now that Pierce could probably smell the beer on his breath. "The truth is that you killed Keith Dwyer as sure as if you'd forced him into that car yourself."
What happened next unfolded with the kind of sudden violence that erupted when community pressure reached a breaking point. Walsh threw a punch that caught Pierce on thejaw, sending him stumbling backward into Camila. The crowd erupted in shouts and movement as some people surged forward and others tried to get away from the confrontation.
Pierce went down hard, Walsh on top of him, throwing punches while shouting about outsiders and troublemakers. Marcus and Theo tried to pull Walsh off their colleague while Camila and Sienna scrambled to protect their equipment from the chaos.
“Let me through,” Sergeant Emerson said. “Move.”
"Enough!" A voice cut through the noise like a gunshot, carrying the kind of authority that made everyone freeze. Mia’s uncle, Officer Ray Sutherland, pushed through the crowd, his High Peaks PD uniform and badge clearing a path through the mob. Two other officers followed close behind, hands resting on their weapons but not drawing them.
Ray cut Mia a glance before he reached the center of the confrontation and hauled Walsh off Pierce with the kind of controlled force that suggested years of breaking up bar fights and domestic disputes. "That's enough, Danny. Back off."
"He killed Keith," Walsh said, but the fight had gone out of him with Ray's arrival. "That bastard killed Keith as sure as anything."
"Keith killed Keith," Ray said loud enough for the immediate crowd to hear. "And if you don't want to spend the night in jail for assault, you'll walk away right now."
Walsh glared at Pierce, who was struggling to his feet with a split lip and what would probably become a spectacular black eye. For a moment, it looked like the mechanic might take another swing, but Ray's presence and the sight of two other officers seemed to drain the violence out of the situation.
"This isn't over," Walsh said, pointing at Pierce. "You brought this on yourself."
He pushed through the crowd toward the exit, and several other men followed him. The tension in the room remained high, but the immediate threat of violence had passed.
“Do you want to press charges?” Ray asked Pierce.
Pierce shook his head and wiped blood from his lip with the back of his hand, his media-trained composure finally cracking. "No. We're just trying to help. We're trying to find justice for a murdered family."
"Bullshit," said Rita Morrison, her library-trained voice cutting through the murmur of conversation. "You're trying to find content for your podcast. There's a difference."
Mayor Henley called for order one more time, but it was clear that any pretense of conducting normal town business had evaporated. People were filing out in small groups, conversations continuing in heated whispers as they headed for the parking lot. Mia remained in her seat, watching Pierce's team gather their equipment with shaking hands and shell-shocked expressions. They'd come to High Peaks expecting to encounter the usual small-town resistance to outsiders asking uncomfortable questions. What they'd found instead was a community that was actively hostile to their presence and potentially dangerous to their health.
Ray closed in on Pierce as the podcaster checked his phone for damage. "Mr. Landry, I think it would be wise if you and your team left and kept a low profile for the next few days. Give people time to cool down."
"Are you ordering us to leave town?" Pierce asked with a defensiveness that suggested he was considering exactly that option.
"I'm suggesting that you think carefully about how you proceed. Keith Dwyer's death has people upset, and they're looking for someone to blame. Right now, that someone is you."
Pierce nodded, seeming to finally understand that he was dealing with something more dangerous than typical small-town secrecy. His team gathered around him, and Mia heard Camila suggesting they return to their hotel and reassess their approach.
As they filed out, Pierce caught sight of Mia sitting alone near the back. Their eyes met for a moment, and she saw something in his expression that looked like appeal, as if he was hoping for at least one friendly face in a room full of hostility.
Mia looked away.
Not because she blamed Pierce for Keith's death, but because she was beginning to understand that her father had been right about the dangers of getting involved with outside investigations. The people in this room weren't just upset about Keith. They were afraid, afraid of what Pierce might uncover, afraid of what secrets might be exposed, afraid of what consequences might follow if the truth about the Hale murders finally came to light.
And fear, Mia was learning, made people do things they would never consider under normal circumstances. Things like turning a routine town meeting into a near riot. Things like blaming a podcaster for a suicide that might not have been suicide at all.
As the community center emptied and the maintenance staff began cleaning up the evidence of the evening's chaos, Mia sat alone in her chair and tried to process what she'd witnessed. The names from Keith's suicide note, Carl Peterson, Rita Morrison, Danny Walsh, Mike Torres, Frank Kellerman, had all been in the room tonight, all vocal in their opposition to Pierce's investigation.
That could be coincidence. Or it could be something more deliberate, a coordinated effort to drive Pierce out of town before he got too close to whatever truth Keith had died to protect.
Either way, Mia was beginning to understand that the Hale murders weren't just an unsolved case from her childhood. They were a live wire that still carried enough current to electrocute anyone who grabbed it without proper protection. And Pierce, for all his media experience and investigative credentials, was about to learn that some truths were more dangerous than others.
8
The Adirondack Medical Center in Saranac Lake rose from the morning mist like a monument, its glass and stone facade reflecting the mountains that surrounded the small city. Noah and McKenzie walked through the main entrance at half past ten, each carrying a cup of coffee that had grown cold during the twenty-minute drive from High Peaks.
