HABIT: a gripping detective thriller full of suspense

by T. J. Brearton

  He could have been mistaken, but he thought he saw something pass over Olivia’s features. A memory, perhaps, or something she chose to keep internalized.

  Her mouth opened. “He needs a grief counselor, and I’d . . .”

  As she spoke, Brendan heard the approach of a motorcycle on the road along the river. It made the noise of some giant, angry wasp. Olivia must have sensed Brendan’s distractedness, because she abruptly stopped talking. But she heard the bike, too, which now sounded like it was slowing. She opened her mouth again, perhaps to comment on the traffic outside her home, when the window exploded behind Brendan’s head.

  The first thought that flashed through his mind was that the bike had driven right up to the house and launched into it. This dissonant, unrealistic notion was followed less than a second later by the idea that a rock or some other heavy object had been thrown. Neither of these scenarios smacked of the truth, but they passed lightning-fast through Brendan’s mind before more gunshots slapped the air.

  * * *

  The window exploded again, and Brendan launched himself from the table and hit the floor. He started crawling on his hands and knees around to the other side of the table as splinters of glass rained down around him. Olivia was half out of her seat by the time he reached her. Her arms were thrown up over her head and she was bent to one side. Brendan reached up and grabbed her by the elbow and yanked her down to the floor with him.

  He had counted seven shots in all. His ears were ringing. The floor was covered in shining glass shards that glinted in the sunlight. Olivia was taking deep, startled breaths. She was trying to get up; some instinct was telling her to stand upright and look, perhaps to see who was firing, or assess the damage, or run away. Brendan held her fast. “Stay down,” he whispered.

  There was one more shot. A bullet punched into the exterior of the house, missing the window this time. The shooter was just far enough away that the velocity of the bullet and the time for the sound to travel were about the same. The impact and the explosion of gunpowder had created a simultaneous boom. Then, silence. Brendan waited to hear the motorcycle take off again, and roar away down the road. His ears still rang with the resonance of all the shattering glass. He didn’t hear the motorcycle engine rev up to speed again. Instead, he thought he heard someone approaching on foot.

  The shooter had gotten off the bike and was walking up to the house. Even through the ringing in his ears, Brendan thought he could make out the sound of a fresh clip of ammunition being slammed home. The shooter was coming, and he had just reloaded.

  “Jesus Christ,” breathed Brendan. He scrambled to get to his feet, keeping bent at the waist. He bent and reached for Olivia, who was on her side, drawn up into a fetal position, her arms wrapped protectively around her head. He pulled her arm, and she looked up with wide eyes. She seemed to understand what was happening, based on his expression. She rolled over onto her front and with his help got to her feet, as well.

  “Come on.” He took her hand in his. Together, bent in this running-from-the-helicopter fashion, they headed towards the back of the house. As they entered the kitchen, Brendan glanced behind them. There on the front porch, the shooter stepped into view. He was just a shape in the doorway, a dark human form behind the white linen curtain that hung in the front door window. A second later, the door flew open.

  Brendan faced forward again. He pulled on Olivia and they ran through the kitchen and into the mudroom area, and then into the rear of the house, where the back door led to the garden. The shooter opened fire. As Brendan and Olivia exited out the back, the kitchen was exploding. Ceramic dishes and jars of things were smashed to bits by the rounds pumped into the space. At the last second, just before Brendan and Olivia leapt down the three steps onto the ground in back of the house, one bullet penetrated the wood of the door casing, while another slapped a groove in the air just next to Brendan’s ear. The shooter had come into the kitchen and gotten a straight line of sight.

  They almost lost their balance when the two of them hit the grass. Brendan managed to keep his feet underneath him, and still had a good grip on Olivia, though she was mostly making it on her own. He considered letting go of her now that they were outside; they would make smaller targets on their own. Further, he couldn’t get to his weapon, strapped to a holster next to the left side of his torso, unless he had his hands free. But he held on to her, anyway.

  He looked around. Beyond the half dozen garden beds was a small shed. It had a sharp angled roof and a single door in front. At the peak of the roof it was probably only six feet, and the steep pitch would make it very cramped in there. Not a good place to get stuck in. Surrounding it were higher grasses, some giant sunflowers, and cattails. He threw a glance to his right: Olivia’s single car garage was there. To the left, more high grass and then trees. There were no visible neighbors. He opted to get them around to the other side of the garage. If they could keep the shooter following them, Brendan thought maybe they could buy a few precious seconds, then make like hell for his car and get away.

  He turned in that direction, pushing Olivia gently but firmly. She glanced up at him and then to where he was looking and again seemed to understand his intention. Just as they started in that direction, the shooter materialized in the doorway overlooking the garden. It might have taken him a second to see them through the boscages of high grasses and flowers, or he may have just been watching which way they were going before opening fire again.

  There were three shots. As they ran, Olivia jerked to the side, as if hit. The two of them stumbled again and for a second Brendan was sure they were about to tangle up and fall to the ground in a heap, making themselves fatally vulnerable to the gunman. But she kept her balance, and the two of them made it to the garage and ran behind it.

  * * *

  As soon as they had cover, Brendan let go of Olivia and pressed her against the wall to stop her from moving and to look her over.

  “Are you okay?”

  He saw no blood. She nodded, wide-eyed, her mouth open, and she then looked down at her feet. Ankle, the gesture seemed to say. She might have twisted it. As they were having this exchange, Brendan had pulled his pistol – a .38 special – from its holster and had opened the wheel and checked it. Back in Westchester, old Argon had sworn by the .38, claimed it was the most reliable handgun, and had taught Brendan how to handle it adroitly, even under great pressure. He slapped the wheel in place and cocked the hammer.

  He had just enough time to say to Olivia, “I’m going to fire on him, then we’re going to make it to my . . .” when a fresh round bored into the corner of the garage, dislodging a small chunk of cement.

  Brendan gauged the height of the shot and calibrated his next move. He dropped down and stepped out from the cover of the garage and took aim. The shooter was right in the middle of the garden, standing near the barrel of potatoes and almost in the bed of recently harvested carrots. His gun was aimed in Brendan’s direction.

  It was Kevin Heilshorn.

  Brendan fired. Kevin fired back a split second later, but his shot went wide. Brendan had hit him. The round from the .38 seemed to tag the young man along one side of his neck or jaw. Brendan had shot from a low angle, and had compensated by aiming upwards, but his angle had been a little steeper than he would have liked; he’d intended in hitting Kevin in the ribs or stomach. A man-stopper wound, but less chance of fatality. The bullet contacted higher than Brendan would have hoped.

  He couldn’t risk lingering even for an instant, however, and so ducked back behind the cover of the garage. He reached for Olivia to grab her up again, but his hand only found air. He snapped his head around to look and saw that she was already gone. He followed her most likely path around the back of the garage, where he had wanted to go anyway. As he rounded the next corner he saw her, pressing along through the tall grass that abutted the building, running her hand along the concrete wall. He quickly caught up to her. By the time they were at the front of the garage they
were together, and Brendan was able to reach out and clutch a handful of her tank top to keep her from going any further. He had no choice but to yank on her to stop her momentum and get in front, so he could clear the way.

  The garage door was open. To the right was the house. There was a small space – just a few feet – between the buildings. For the moment, they remained concealed from the shooter’s view. But as soon as they left the shelter of the garage, they would be instantly visible through that gap.

  Brendan was calm. His heart beat good tympani in his chest and his nerves hummed. He didn’t know where this steeliness came from and didn’t question it. He simply pitched himself forward, leaving Olivia behind for the moment, his .38 thrust out in front of him, gripped with both hands. As he moved forward, he swiveled right at his waist. The space between the garage and the back corner of the house grew in size, and the view of the garden opened up. Kevin was there, having anticipated Brendan’s trajectory. The young man was holding his neck with one hand, and aiming his firearm with the other. He fired. A bullet droned past Brendan’s head, missing him by inches. Brendan returned fire. Two shots, in rapid succession – bang bang. He was in motion, so he knew his accuracy would suffer. But the rounds hit home. It was hard to see where – only that Kevin Heilshorn crumpled to the ground.

  Olivia was just behind Brendan. She stopped and turned to look, and she cried out.

  “Back!” Brendan growled. He shouldered up to her and pushed with the side of his body against her, so that she would get back in front of garage and out of the line of fire. He kept both his hands on his .38. Once she was safely out of Kevin’s view, Brendan started moving in.

  The young man had fallen mostly out of sight, hidden by green thickets of something like squash or cucumber. Brendan could only see Kevin’s feet, and one of his hands. It was the hand that had been holding his neck, and it was streaked with blood.

  Slowly, carefully, Brendan passed through the opening between the house and garage and into the garden area. Kevin was prone just a few yards away. The lowering sun glimmered through the neighboring trees, while the house threw a large rectangular darkness over the greenery. The stalks of grass and copses of vegetables still in the sun painted shadow-webs over the ground. The afternoon held the heat from the earlier day, but a cool breeze moved in from the trees surrounding the place, and some leaves detached and drifted into the garden area, twirling to the ground to rest.

  Kevin Heilshorn was on his back. Brendan spied the gun – a Glock pistol, by the look of it – a few inches from his open hand. The young man was staring up at the sky. He had fallen into one of the raised garden beds, and his hips were out-thrust since he had landed across the wooden gusset of the bed. There was blood everywhere. On the vegetables, on the grass, on Kevin’s clothes and skin. A tear just below his jaw, where the round had nicked his carotid artery, was oozing dark fluid. Brendan could smell the metallic odor of blood amid the flowery scents of the garden.

  Kevin was breathing. Brendan stood over him with the .38 aimed down. Cautiously, with an even, smooth movement, he bent and reached for the Glock pistol. He pinched it by the handle-grip and lifted it up and tossed it to the side, just beyond the bed. Then Brendan stood back up.

  Kevin Heilshorn’s eyes rolled down to look at Brendan Healy. His breaths were shallow and rapid. His artery pumped out the blood into the garden bed where it was sucked into the dark, rich soil.

  Why? Brendan wanted to ask. He suddenly felt nauseous, his calm broken at last. He felt hurt too, as if there were something terribly wrong with this scene, and more than just the obvious gore and violence of it. Looking down at this twenty-five-year-old man, with his surfer blond hair, his good looks, his grief and torment, Brendan felt like he was looking at a victim, not a killer.

  Still, the young man had just driven up to the house of the psychologist, Olivia Jane, and started blasting away. He had attacked a woman and a police detective in broad daylight, with a kind of machine-like determination. He had put Brendan in a situation where the detective had no choice but to protect himself and the woman, and take deadly action.

  Why?

  The question lingered. Brendan sensed Olivia very gingerly approaching from behind him. He took his free hand and reached down to his belt and plucked his cell phone from its holder. He brought it in front of his face and dialed 911. He pressed the phone to his ear.

  During all this, Kevin Heilshorn continued to watch the detective. His eyes were alert, seeming to take everything in. His body, however, remained motionless. Brendan had shot the young man in the neck, in the arm, and in the chest.

  Brendan felt detached, as if operating his muscles now from somewhere remote. He heard himself talking to the 911 operator. He gave her his name and badge number with practiced ease. He described his location, and the nature of his call. There was an officer-involved shooting. A man had been hit three times and was suffering from massive wounds. An ambulance was needed on the double. A woman had been involved and needed medical to check her out, too.

  The sound of his voice was strange, as if the vocal chords belonged to someone else. He hung up and put his phone back in its holder. Brendan felt that calm continuing to slip away. His nerves no longer fired in perfect sync. He began to feel dissonant and out of touch. Warm waves of nausea filled his stomach with sourness, and there was a distant firing of pain in his gut.

  “An ambulance is coming,” he said to Kevin Heilshorn. But Kevin Heilshorn was dead. His eyes now looked at nothing but the picture of the last thing he had ever seen, frozen forever in his idle mind.

  Brendan dropped to his knees, turned to the side, and retched into a clump of fragrant herbs.

  CHAPTER TEN / THURSDAY, 7:43 PM

  “It doesn’t make sense.”

  “It makes perfect sense. This guy is your killer. And you want to hear why?”

  Brendan sat back and inhaled slowly through his nostrils. He was on the couch in Delaney’s office. Through the glass wall between Delaney’s office, the hallway, and senior Deputy – a woman named Benedetto, he could see Olivia Jane. He watched her lips moving as she gave her statement to the officer.

  Brendan’s head pounded. The Sheriff’s Department offices seemed more cramped and garish than he remembered. He longed to be outside and away somewhere, but he knew he needed to stay. He needed to remain in the right headspace, figure this thing out. Delaney seemed like he already had closed the case. He didn’t wait for Brendan to respond and ask why the senior investigator had it right.

  “Because I got the PERK kit back from the deputy coroner,” he said. Delaney was standing next to his desk. He picked up a large file and tossed it casually into Brendan’s lap. “And there’s some sick shit in there.”

  Brendan looked down at the file. He pulled his hand away from his neck where he had been gently massaging the same spot where Kevin Heilshorn had been gushing blood. For some reason he didn’t want to turn back the cover of that file. He didn’t want to see what was inside. But, he had to.

  Delaney rambled on. If ever there was a movie with a surprise ending, Brendan thought, Delaney would ruin it for everyone if he got half the chance. The large, balding detective said, almost excitedly: “He was balling the sister. We found evidence of, you know, promiscuity in the victim’s PERK kit. Something about the vaginal lining. She’s had many sexual partners. There’s a good chance one will turn out to be the brother.”

  “You’re kidding,” said Brendan. Of course, there was nothing funny about it. He started to feel sick to his stomach again. He stood up, letting the file fall from his lap onto the couch, spilling some of its contents. He reached and leaned and grabbed Delaney’s trash can and then slid it back across the floor to him. Delaney watched all of this like a man watching an injured bird flit around on the ground flapping one wing. He scrunched up his face. Then the kinder Delaney re-emerged.

  “You okay?”

  Brendan leaned over the trash can. “Yeah,” he said. His voice echoed.


  “You’ll have to talk to the IACP right away, you know. I can help you with all of that. That’s the tough part, talking to those guys, filling all that stuff out. But, it’s got to be done. You, uh, you ever . . .?”

  “No.” He had never shot anyone in the line of duty before.

  “You did an amazing job. Seriously. From what I’ve put together, just outstanding. The Sheriff is going to be here in a minute to talk to you.”

  “I don’t think he did it,” said Brendan.

  “Think?” Delaney now reverted back to the bit of a hardcase he could often be. Brendan imagined that he also kept it as tight as possible with Senior Prosecutor Skene, and Brendan had heard a rumor that the ADA, a woman named Selena Joanette, was riding his flagpole.

  “There’s nothing to think,” said Delaney. “The kid was at the scene of the crime. He fought with deputies. And I guarantee you that his fluids will match up with the serology report.” Delaney wagged a finger at Brendan. “You said yourself he described some vague ‘meeting’ with the victim. You know how these weird, superrich families can be. For all we know, he and the sister were regularly involved in sexual congress.”

  “We don’t even have the evidence yet to prove that they’re even blood related,” said Brendan softly. The feeling of nausea passed for the moment, and he leaned back away from the trash can.

  “All the more reason, then, to suspect. He could be an adopted brother, for all we know. But, we’ll clear all that up within a couple of hours. I just don’t understand how you can argue this kid’s culpability when he shows up and opens fire on you. I’ve been an investigator for thirty-one years. In that time I’ve learned two things. One, with a homicide, it’s family or close friends ninety percent of the time. Two, there are no coincidences.”

  “How is she?”

  For a moment, Delaney acted like he didn’t know who Brendan was referring to. Then he turned to look through the glass walls behind him at Olivia, talking somberly with Deputy Benedetto. “She’s fine. A couple of scrapes. Some bruising on her arm.”