Cal hesitated, and Sonny lifted Tara off the ground by her throat. She gasped and sputtered, kicking and clawing.
“Daddy,” she whimpered.
Behind her, with Valerie’s arm around her chest and the .22 pressing into the soft place beneath her jaw, Katrina whispered, “Daddy, no.”
“Ten,” Sonny said, tapping the barrel of the Beretta against Tara’s temple. “Nine. Eight. Seven . . .”
Calvin placed the Browning under his chin.
Sonny smiled and set Tara’s feet back on the ground. “Now,” he said. “Pull the trigger.”
“No,” Katrina said. “Daddy, don’t.”
Tara cried harder.
“Do it, Cal,” Valerie said. “Or don’t you believe we’ll really kill them?”
“If I do,” said Cal, “will you let them go?”
“Cal,” she said. “I promise you, we’ll let them go.”
He had to know they wouldn’t, that they couldn’t. Not after the girls had seen their faces.
But his choices were to do it and hope the woman he had loved and betrayed would have mercy on his children—or refuse and watch his daughters die. His third choice, to fire the Beretta at one of his attackers and pray he didn’t hit a hostage, was a death sentence for at least one of his girls.
How could he choose which one?
“Swear,” he said. His eyes filled and overflowed, but his voice was steady. “Swear by all you hold sacred that you’ll keep my daughters safe.”
“I swear,” Valerie said. “I’ll look after them as if they were my own.”
I have replayed this scene over and over in my mind, only I am there instead of Cal, and it is Paulie and Maria with the guns to their heads. In my fantasy, I disarm one opponent with a roundhouse kick and place a bullet squarely in the middle of the other’s forehead. My wife and son are spared, the bad guys brought to justice. I think maybe, on a perfect day, I could possibly have pulled it off.
Calvin didn’t have a prayer.
“Girls, I love you,” said Cal. His eyes squeezed shut. “The Lord is my Light and my Salvation. I will not be afraid.”
He pulled the trigger.
Both girls screamed, but the hands that clamped over their mouths muffled the sound.
“All right,” Valerie said, as Sonny retrieved the Browning from Cal’s lifeless hand. “I promised your daddy you’d be all right, so you just get on up to bed now and tuck yourselves in. Katrina, you first.”
I don’t know what was going through Katrina’s mind as she climbed the long stairs to her bedroom, climbed into her bed, and pulled the white lace and satin bedspread up to cover herself. Maybe she believed she and her sister would live.
Her aunt straightened the covers—no need to worry about fingerprints in a house that surely had her prints all over it—and bent to kiss the top of her niece’s head. Sonny passed her the Browning, and she pressed it to Katrina’s temple.
And fired.
Tara, Sonny’s hand clamped over her mouth, squealed and struggled, kicked and squirmed and bit and clawed. He dragged her into her bedroom and flung her onto the bed, where Valerie fired a quick shot into the side of her head.
She fell back, limp as a rag doll, this child who had stolen Calvin away, this bastard begotten by two Judases.
“Good night, sweetheart,” Valerie said, and emptied the magazine into the child’s chest.
Then they unscrewed the suppressor, wiped their prints from the gun, and pressed it back into Calvin’s hand.
I HADN’T LIKED CAL HARTWELL.
He was a cheater and a hypocrite. His religion made a mockery of Christianity, and his arrogance had made Amy’s life a misery.
A bad husband, Ben had said, and I couldn’t disagree. But a bad man? The jury was still out on that one.
After all, King David had Bathsheba, and Jacob cheated Esau of his birthright. The Bible was full of flawed, yet faithful, men. Who was I to say Calvin Hartwell wasn’t one of them?
People were complicated.
Sitting in my brother’s backyard, sipping Heinekens and watching our kids play a bastardization of touch football, I thought of family, and of Amy Hartwell. If it was true that people were murdered because they got too close to evil, how could Amy have avoided her fate?
She had been born too close to evil.
“So,” Randall said. “That little girl going to be all right?”
I took a swallow of my beer. “Too soon to tell. They think she may be blind in one eye, maybe have some motor damage. They don’t know how much of her intellect might be affected. But at least she’ll live.”
On the playing field, Caitlin swept her arms around her brother. “Get Josh, Paulie!” she squealed, and my son plunged into the fray. They called their version of the game Tickle football, because instead of tackling, the ball carrier was tickled to the ground. Paulie loves it.
It’s hard with only three, I thought, remembering Cal and his daughters playing softball.
Caitlin wore blue jeans and a Marvin the Martian T-shirt, while Josh wore black jeans and a black shirt with a tie-dyed circle on the front. I took the splash of color for a good sign. His hair was still dyed black, but he was sans makeup, which I thought was an improvement. He was seeing a counselor every Tuesday. On Fridays, the whole family went together.
There were no quick fixes.
Jay stood at the picnic table, helping Wendy and Maria with the lemonade, while D.W. picked at the deviled eggs. It was a sort of welcome home party, a freedom party, so to speak, celebrating my exoneration.
“What happens to the little girl now?” Randall asked, drawing my attention back to the matter at hand. “Where does she go?”
“I don’t know. Frank reached the mother. I saw her at the hospital. So sorry, she says. She’s not good with handicapped kids, her new husband doesn’t want the responsibility, they can’t afford the medical expenses. Katrina will probably end up in foster care. There’s no one left to take her.”
He ran a callused hand through his hair. “Sad story.”
“Yeah.”
“Josh thinks we should take her. We’re thinking about it.”
I considered it. “Big responsibility.”
“Yeah. But he’s good with kids like that. Look at Paulie.”
“He is good with Paul. But it would be you and Wendy with all the headaches.”
“I know. We’ve talked about it, and neither of us likes the thought of that poor kid being stuck in some institution, or bounced from foster home to foster home.”
“Things are okay, then? With you and Wendy?”
His shoulders hunched. “We went through a patch. We’ll get past it.”
A lump formed in my throat, and I took a swig of beer to wash it down. “I think it would be great,” I said. “If that’s what you want.”
We sipped in silence. Then I asked, “How’s the knee?”
“I’ll live.” I knew the subject was closed.
A maroon Monte Carlo pulled into the drive, and Josh broke free of the game and sauntered over to greet it.
“Hey, Uncle Jared,” he called. “Somebody wants to see you.”
Randall handed me my crutches, and I hopped over to greet her.
“Miss Casale.”
“Back to that, Mr. McKean? I thought we were on a first-name basis.”
Josh laughed. It was a beautiful sound. “Jared and Elisha, sittin’ in a tree.” He darted away, dodging as I swatted at him with a crutch, and went to talk with Jay.
“I don’t usually invite myself to other people’s parties,” she said, “but Josh said you were shy.”
“Gun-shy might be a better word. Join us for a beer? Tea? Watermelon?”
We walked back to the picnic table, where the football players, hot and drenched with sweat, clamored for lemonade.
Paulie trotted over to us and flung his arms around me. I winced as he pressed against my calf. “Hey, Daddy,” he said. “I win.”
“Everybody wins
.” I propped my crutches against the table and scooped him into my arms.
“Is that your son?” Elisha asked. “He’s beautiful.”
Behind her, Randall winked, and I suddenly had the feeling that my streak of bad luck with women might be coming to an end. At least, I’d be more careful this time. Take it slow. Maybe ask for references.
“This is Paul,” I told her. “Paulie, this is Miss Casale.”
“Oh, no.” She laughed. “Not Miss Casale. At least let’s make it Miss Elisha.” She held out her hand and Paulie, still in my arms, solemnly shook it.
I looked at the jostling mob around the picnic table. My family. Paulie and Randall. Wendy, Josh, and Caitlin. Maria, with the new life inside her. Jay. And even, in an odd way, D.W. The family I had been given and the one I had chosen.
Across the table, Maria’s eyes met mine, and I saw the loss and insecurity in them.
Then she smiled. Goodbye. I love you. Goodbye.
I tilted my head back and let the sun warm my face, as the laughter and cries from the ball game filled my ears and threatened to burst my heart.
Racing the Devil Page 25
