White Space Season 2

a one-legged guy without much difficulty.
    “I’m a private investigator. My name is Brock Houser. You can call me Houser,” the man said, flashing an ID card and badge, though Milo wasn’t willing to step close enough to check it out, even if he could tell a forgery from the real thing. “I saw you at the funeral, taking pictures, and think you and I might be onto the same thing. I’d like to talk, compare notes, see if maybe we can help each other.”
    “Help each other what?”
    “Find answers to what’s happening here. We have shootings, missing people, plus God knows what else going down on the island. I’m guessing maybe you’re thinking something’s fishy about the Heller shootings, right?”
    Milo nodded. “How do I know I can trust you?”
    “Who are you going to trust? Them?” Houser nodded toward the Paladin officers, then turned back to Milo. “Good luck with that; let me know how it turns out.”
    Houser opened his truck and got inside, as if seconds from driving off.
    “Wait!” Milo called. “We can talk.”
    “OK,” he said, rolling down the passenger window. “But not here. Too many cameras. Get in, and I’ll take you home. We can talk on the way.”
    “How do I know you won’t try something?”
    “Try something?” Houser laughed. “Dude, I’m not going to try anything. I just want to talk. Here, take my gun; will that make you feel better?”
    Houser pulled a pistol from inside his black duster, and laid it on the front passenger seat. “Go ahead and take it. All yours, bro.”
    Milo opened the door and grabbed the gun. The reality of the weapon felt much lighter in his hands than he would have expected. He held it up and looked down the sight at the woods in the distance, smiling without meaning to.
    “Don’t go waving it around, kid!”
    Milo looked up to see if the Paladin officers had noticed him. They were only just getting the car fire under control and had yet to look in his direction. But they would be soon, searching for the person who started the blaze.
    Milo got inside the truck. “OK, let’s talk.” He closed the door, and Houser pulled his SUV from the curb.
    As the PI drove, Milo surprised himself by opening up and spilling everything, starting with Roger Heller opening fire on the classroom, and ending with Don asking him to retrieve Heller’s flash drive. He left out Don’s name, calling him, “Mr. X,” since he wasn’t yet sure he could trust Houser, and didn’t want to surrender anything that might draw Don into trouble. Milo was almost shocked by his candid eruption, and realized he’d been waiting for someone — someone other than Don, who did seem sorta batshit crazy — to confide in. Houser seemed trustworthy, even if he was working with a Conway.
    After Milo finished speaking, he looked at Houser, waiting to see how he’d react.
    Houser looked him up and down, then turned back to the road. “Wow, that’s some crazy shit.”
    “Tell me about it.” Milo started scratching at his right arm, then forced himself to stop, afraid he would invite unwanted attention to the scratches and scars blooming in angry red beneath his sleeves. He had left his incessant and impossible-to-relieve itch out of his story. The feeling that there was something inside him; the near constant, obsessive scratching and picking at his arms. If Milo told Houser about that part of the story, the man might think him as batshit as Don. Right now, Milo wanted, maybe even needed, someone to talk to — someone to help him make sense of the chaos.
    Houser asked, “You said you were looking for a flash drive, right? Did you find it?”
    “No, Paladin came inside the house before I could find it, but I did find something else.”
    “Yeah?” Houser turned to Milo. “What’s that?”
    “Can you keep driving?” Milo asked as they swung onto his street, approaching his house.
    “Sure thing,” Houser said, lowering his foot on the pedal.
    “A list of names,” Milo continued, feeling slightly odd for discussing the list with Houser before Don. “The list had all the students Roger Heller shot.”
    “Oh?”
    Milo couldn’t quite tell what was inside Houser’s oh? , though there was definitely something.
    “Yeah,” Milo said through his swallow, “but there was a name on the list that Roger didn’t shoot — Katie, who was also Alex’s girlfriend.”
    “So you’re saying Roger Heller planned to kill those kids, that it wasn’t random, and that he