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The FBI agents were back in the hotel restaurant again. Joseph sighed, shook his head, and went to start another pot of coffee. The one he’d just brewed wouldn’t be enough.
For the past few days, Agent Anderson and Agent Casey had stayed here. And for the past few days, Casey in particular had been trying his best to work his way through the hotel’s entire supply of coffee, a cup in hand at all times. At this point, he’d gone through enough that Joseph needed to put in an early order to restock.
Casey came up to the counter, squinting until Joseph could hardly see his eyes. “Two black coffees to go, please.”
“Whoa, hold up.” Anderson chuckled, shaking her head. “I just finished a coffee, Casey. I don’t need another one yet.”
“Mhm.” Casey didn’t budge. “Two black coffees to go, please.”
“Casey!”
“They’re both for me.”
Joseph went to get two coffees. Behind him at the counter, Anderson dropped her voice to a murmur that wasn’t quite soft enough to stay private. “Casey, are you okay? This is a lot of coffee, even for you. And you’re squinting.”
“I always squint, Anderson.”
“Not this much.” Anderson was quiet for just a moment. Joseph set up the disposable coffee cups by the pot, then poured. “You’ve been gloomier than usual, too. And you’ve been trying to hide in the shade of trees without me noticing, which is pretty unusual since you hate trees.”
“Your point?”
“Do you have a migraine?”
Casey sighed. “I-I’m fine. There’s just too much sky today.”
“And not enough clouds to block the sun?”
“Something like that.” Another sigh. “You don’t need to fuss, Anderson. I’m fine.”
“You’re barely on your feet. Maybe we should sit down for a while.”
There was silence again. Joseph put cups on the coffee lids, trying to resist the urge to tell them where the nearest drugstore was so they could pick up some Excedrin. They probably already know where it was. After the two of them had spent days wandering around the area, asking weird questions about shadows, cults, and people behaving unusually, they must have walked past the drugstore a thousand times.
“Hm. Well, I got my coffee to go,” Casey said, pressing a hand to his forehead as Joseph brought the two coffees back to the counter. “But you’re probably right. If we run into anything… unusual again, a fucking migraine won’t make it easier to hit the target.”
Anderson chuckled and paid for the coffees. “Yeah, if it’s something we can actually shoot this time.”
They went to one of the tables and sat down while Casey drank one coffee, and started on the other. They were far enough away now that Joseph couldn’t make out most of their conversation, aside from that it was as weird as usual.
Maybe they just liked Night Springs too much, Joseph decided as he wiped down the counter. That sounded better for his own sanity than even entertaining the idea that some of the things they’d talked about—like shadow monsters and evil lakes—actually existed in the world beyond, and were being investigated by the FBI.