Indefensible

by Pamela Callow

He grabbed his father’s throat and began to squeeze. His father’s eyelids—one almost swollen shut—fluttered. “You fucking bastard.” He spat the words. Every one of them gave him strength. He was close, so close. He could feel his father losing the fight.

  Lucy threw herself at him. “Nick, stop it, please, Nicky, stop!”

  He closed his eyes, shutting out his sister’s desperate face.

  And squeezed as hard as he could.

  His mother’s body drifted down from the balcony, white, fluttering. Like a snowflake.

  He never saw the bottle coming at his head.

  35

  Monday, 2:29 a.m.

  Kate stared down at the blond, sweaty head of Randall’s son. Her eyes blurred, then focused.

  She’d stunned him, not killed him. He swayed. His fingers still held on to Randall’s throat.

  “Lucy, call the police. Now!” Her voice was shrill, unrecognizable. She raised the bottle again, her fingers trembling. Her sluggish brain was trying to comprehend the scenario: Randall lying beaten and bloodied against the wall; Nick choking his father, his face contorted with rage. “Nick, let go of your father.”

  Nick turned his gaze to her.

  The expression in his eyes made Kate’s heart shrivel: the acknowledgment of his damnation.

  And worse, the resolve.

  She raised the bottle over her head. “Let go, Nick!” She was panting now. Her arm shook with effort.

  Nick’s nostrils flared. She braced herself. He was taller than she, but she had the bottle. She could protect herself. But could she protect his sister, too? She darted a glance at Lucy. The girl pressed against the wall. Her eyes were huge with confusion. Fear. Disbelief at the sight of her brother trying to murder her father.

  Nick’s fingers tightened around his father’s neck.

  Randall was semiconscious now, his breathing ragged.

  “Nick, let go!” Kate smashed the bottle down on Nick’s arm. Then she threw herself on his back.

  He twisted violently, trying to throw her off. She wrapped her arm around his neck and pulled. His head jerked back against her shoulder. She could smell the rank odor of boy-turned-killer.

  Before she could react, he smashed his fist into the side of her head. Her head snapped sideways, her ear exploding with pain. She bit down on her jaw, tears springing to her eyes, clinging to him. She’d managed to get him off Randall. She couldn’t let him go now.

  Randall rolled over onto his hands and knees. He gasped for breath, struggling to stand. Blood gushed down his cheek. Kate’s eyes met his and she saw his fury that his son had attacked her, his fear that Nick would hurt her. He wanted her to get away. He swayed, his head drooping.

  Then Nick swung his fist again.

  Kate acted on instinct. She kneed him from behind, between the legs. He yelped, dropping to his knees and rolled, cupping himself.

  She snatched the bottle off the floor, raising it over Nick’s head. If he moved, she would hit him again, so help her.

  “Freeze! Police!” Two patrol officers stormed into the hallway, weapons drawn. Kate started, whirling around to see one of the cops pointing his gun at her.

  “Facedown. Now!”

  Kate froze. Who, me? I’m not the one you want, her brain protested.

  “Drop the bottle!” one of the cops shouted, lunging toward her. “Facedown on the ground!”

  The bottle slipped from her fingers and hit the ground. It rolled by Randall’s feet.

  She lowered herself to the floor and stretched out, her cheek pressed against the wood. It was cool and hard under her skin. It seemed like the only thing that was real. Everything tilted. Was the sleeping pill screwing with her brain?

  Maybe this was all a dream. A hallucination. That was a side effect of Delteze, she recalled.

  The other cop put his foot in Nick’s back and pushed him over. “Facedown! Hands behind your back!” Nick rolled onto his belly, putting his hands behind him, his face contorted with frustrated rage.

  “You!” The cop turned to Randall. His eyes flickered over Randall’s bloodied features, lingering on the red marks around his throat. “Get down!” Kate watched Randall ease himself onto the floor, a grunt escaping him before he was fully prostrate. Couldn’t the police see that he needed medical attention?

  The first cop turned to Lucy. She stood a half-step behind them, a look of horror on her face at what she had invoked with her 911 call. “Were you the girl who placed the call?”

  Her head bobbed.

  “You said someone was killing your father.”

  She darted a panicked glance at her brother. He returned the look with the bitterness of betrayal in his eyes.

  The cop pointed to Randall. “Is that your father?”

  Lucy nodded again.

  “And that’s your brother?”

  “Yes,” Lucy said in a whisper. Her eyes did not venture to Nick’s face.

  “He was trying to kill your father?”

  Randall stiffened. “He wasn’t try—” He began to cough. He rolled onto his side, doubling up with the spasm. After a few seconds, he cleared his throat. “It was an argument,” he gasped. “That’s all.”

  “Yeah, that’s all.” Nick’s voice mocked Randall’s pacifying tone. “That’s not fucking all!” He twisted, trying to get his feet under him. The cop stepped on his back and shoved him onto the floor.

  Tears ran down Nick’s face. He stared straight at his father. “He killed my mother!” Nick twisted under the cop’s foot. “He fucking killed my mother!”

  Lucy jerked, then swayed. The cop grabbed her elbow. Kate stared at Randall. He had a look of stunned horror on his face.

  “Tell us down at the station,” the first cop said.

  36

  Monday, 6:45 a.m.

  “Nat, I need you to do me a favor.” Kate’s voice was low. Nat glanced at the clock. It was early. It was Natal Day, she remembered. A civic holiday. She should be sleeping in. She stifled a groan.

  “Sure thing.”

  “Can you run over and let Alaska out for me? I called Finn, but he wasn’t home.”

  Two things caught Nat’s attention: Kate wasn’t home; nor was Finn. One made her curious. The other, piqued.

  “What’s up? Did you finally get laid?” Nat asked.

  “No…”

  Kate’s lack of reaction to her crudeness got Nat’s reporter antennae vibrating. “It’s got something to do with Randall Barrett, doesn’t it?”

  “Yes.” Another pause. “Just wait…” Nat heard a door closing. “I’m in the stairwell at the police station. I can only talk for a minute.”

  “Jesus. What happened?”

  “This is off the record, Nat.”

  Nat squeezed her eyes shut. Her gut was screaming scoop. “Look, if it’s a police matter, it’ll be on their phone line, Kate.”

  “Not all of it,” Kate said. “I can’t tell you if I think it’s going to be in tomorrow’s paper, Nat.”

  You’re killing me, Kate. She exhaled. “Fine. Off the record. Spill the beans.”

  “Randall’s son tried to kill him last night.”

  “Je-sus.” Nat squeezed her eyes even tighter. This wasn’t just a scoop. This was the scoop of the century.

  “I was…involved.”

  “You? How?”

  “His son hit Randall’s dog with a baseball bat. I took her to the vet hospital with his daughter. When I brought his daughter home, Nick was strangling Randall—” The words came out in a low torrent of disbelief. Nat heard a door open and close.

  Then Kate spoke again, her voice forced. “So if you could give Alaska a cup of kibble and let him out to pee, I should be home soon.” She hung up before Nat could say another word.

  Nat stared at the phone. Then she threw it on the bed, scrambled out of the tangle of sheets and ran to the bathroom, shedding her T-shirt and pajama bottoms on her way.

  First, she’d look after Kate’s dog.

  Then she’d head to
the newsroom. See what she could unearth without using Kate as a source.

  She turned on the shower. Even though the water always ran freezing cold for the first twenty-seven seconds (she’d counted), she didn’t bother to wait for it to warm up.

  There was a front-page scoop with her byline on it.

  The thick file folder with his name written in bold letters was Nick’s first clue that Detective Drake had taken things to a whole new level.

  He knew, without needing to see what was written inside, what those notes would tell. And he knew, from looking at Tabitha Christos’ worried face, that he was in serious shit.

  They would hammer him. Just like his school principals from the many schools he’d attended, his guidance counselors, tutors and therapists. They all used different methods, but they all had the same goal: for Nick to do what they wanted.

  He was always the loser.

  Nothing had changed.

  He had screwed up.

  And now his father would get away with murder.

  Nothing in life is easy, his father used to lecture him when Nick would put his head down on the kitchen table and cry futile tears over his homework. Except when you’re Randall Barrett. Superstar lawyer, superstar killer.

  “Nick, do you know why we asked you to come here today?” Tabitha Christos asked. She wore another blouse that hugged her breasts. Nick kept his eyes fixed on the table. He searched for the whorls and burn marks he’d spotted the last time he was here. When he found them, his shoulders relaxed. “Yeah.” Of course he knew, he wasn’t stupid. Tabitha’s eyes told him what she had refrained from saying: we are going to pick apart your lies until you tell us the truth.

  He waited for her to begin the interview, but she leaned back in her chair. No sweet talking today, Nick thought. It was the cop’s turn to do the questioning. The detective’s eyes drilled into his. “Nick, you committed a serious assault yesterday. Why did you attack your father?”

  He raised his chin. “Because he killed my mother.”

  “But you told us that your mother killed herself.”

  Nick rubbed his palms lightly over his pants. When he realized what he was doing, he stuffed his hands in his pockets. “Could I have some coffee?” he asked, his voice hoarse. “Please?” He stared at Detective Drake. The detective made no move to get up.

  “Sure.” Tabitha picked up the phone and asked for coffee to be brought in.

  “Nick, why do you think your father killed your mother?”

  “Because I saw him do it.”

  The detective exchanged a look with Tabitha. A cop came in with three mugs of coffee. Nick grabbed his cup with a defiant look and gulped the coffee, the hot brew scalding his tongue, yet comforting him at the same time.

  “So tell us what really happened.”

  Nick stared down at the table. “Everything happened that night just the way I told you. I heard my mother moan so I ran onto the deck. But I fell. Over a flowerpot.”

  That fucking flowerpot. His mother had died because of a fucking flowerpot.

  The detective nodded slightly. “Then what happened?”

  Nick’s heart thudded. The caffeine jolt made it worse. “When I looked up I saw my father. He was holding my mother.”

  “Was she struggling?”

  “No. She just lay in his arms.”

  “Do you think she was asleep?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Then what happened?”

  “He hit her. With a club.”

  “Can you describe it?”

  “It was small, black. The end looked like a leather pouch.”

  “A blackjack?”

  “Yeah.”

  “And then what happened?”

  Nick had scrambled to his feet, his eyes trying to make sense of the black-and-white blur of motion ten feet away from him. Then his father lifted his mother in his arms.

  “He threw her over the balcony.”

  Nick had lunged forward, trying to reach through the wrought-iron railing to grab her hand, her leg, her nightgown. Anything. But his fingers grasped empty air.

  “Then what happened?” The detective’s voice was low, intense. Nick looked at him, then at Tabitha Christos. Both of his interrogators appeared transfixed by his story.

  “My father ran back through my mother’s bedroom. I chased him. But then he ran into the park.” Point Pleasant Park, conveniently located across the street for any fleeing wife murderers. “I couldn’t follow him. I had to see if—” he swallowed “—if…my mother was still alive.”

  “Did your father see you?”

  Nick’s face burned. “When I fell over the flowerpot, he looked over his shoulder and saw me.”

  “So his back was turned to you on the balcony?”

  The detective exchanged another glance with the babe. “Yeah.”

  “What was he wearing?”

  “Black clothes. A dark stocking over his head.”

  The detective leaned forward. “How could you tell it was your father?”

  “I know my dad. And I could see blond hair smushed under the nylon.” For the first time, Nick saw a glimmer of doubt in the detective’s eyes. “It was my father. I swear it.”

  “Did he say anything to you?”

  “No.”

  “Your mother?”

  “No.” Nick gulped his coffee. His father hadn’t needed to say anything. Nick just knew.

  “Tell me exactly why you think it was your father, Nick,” Tabitha said.

  Nick sighed. Heavily. “The guy was built just like my dad. Same big shoulders. Same height. And he had blond hair.” He stared into the detective’s eyes. “Besides, who else would want to kill my mother?”

  He knew he got them with that question. Tabitha Christos nodded, a thoughtful look on her face.

  The detective’s eyes narrowed.

  And realization hit Nick. How could he have been so stupid? Because you are stupid, stupid.

  Shit. They think I killed my mother. He sat on his hands.

  “Why did you lie to us about seeing your mother kill herself?” the detective asked.

  Nick looked to Tabitha Christos, but there was no empathy oozing from her warm brown eyes.

  “Because I didn’t want you to think my father killed her.”

  “Why not, Nick?”

  “Because then you’d arrest him.”

  “Isn’t that what you’d want if your father killed your mother?” Tabitha asked.

  “Not when it’s my father.” The detective nodded his head slightly. Detective Drake got what he meant. “My father knows everyone. He’s loaded. He’d get himself off in no time.”

  “This isn’t a banana republic, Nick. Your father can’t buy his way out of prison,” Tabitha Christos said.

  Nick shrugged. “He’ll hire some top gun who will screw around with you guys until the case is kicked out of court. I know how this works.”

  Detective Drake’s mouth tightened. Nick had scored a bull’s-eye. They all knew it was true.

  “So you lied to keep us from figuring out your father killed your mother,” the detective said. “And then what was your big plan?”

  Nick’s eyes met his. “I was going to kill him. An eye for an eye.”

  “So that’s what you were doing on Sunday night?”

  “Yeah.”

  “But you didn’t kill him.”

  Nick looked away, his fists curling under his thighs. He hadn’t killed him. And he’d regret it for as long as he lived.

  “No. The fucker.”

  “Nick, if we find evidence that your father killed your mother, we would need you to testify in court.” Detective Drake’s face was somber, but Nick saw a glimmer in his eyes. The detective was excited, he realized. “Would you be willing to do that?”

  “I want my father to pay for what he’s done.”

  The detective stood. “You realize that if you’re lying again, there will be serious consequences. You’ve committed a serious crime, N
ick. A very serious crime.”

  Nick didn’t answer.

  His grandmother met him in the waiting room. “Ready to go, Nick?” she asked, her eyes scanning his face.

  “Yeah.” They walked out to the parking lot. The morning fog had burned off to reveal a glorious afternoon. Several blocks over, Nick could see Citadel Hill, the massive hill in the middle of the city with the fort on top. It looked kind of cool. Couples draped themselves over towels, clad in bikinis and shorts, facing the sun. If he lived here, he’d take Steph to sunbathe with him. He thought of her smooth limbs, the freckles on her arms, the curve of her thighs. The way her skin soaked up the sun until it was so hot to the touch.

  His grandmother unlocked the car. Nick threw himself into the passenger seat and rolled down the window. In Toronto, he took the subway everywhere or his bike. He hated being chauffeured around, like a kid. He’d been counting down the months until he could get his beginner’s license.

  His grandmother pulled the car into traffic. “When we get back to my house, why don’t you take Scrubby for a walk,” she said. Scrubby was her dog, a mix of border collie, beagle and German shepherd. “It’s such a beautiful day.”

  “Is my father coming over?”

  His grandmother threw him a startled look. She could not quite mask her fear at his question.

  She was a smart woman, he thought.

  “I’m not sure when he’s coming,” she said, her voice even.

  He shrugged, his mind already on the next stage of his plan. He hoped his father would come before the police arrested him.

  One niggling thought broke through: Would they let him get his driver’s license in prison?

  37

  Monday, 7:59 a.m.

  The row of crisp, black stitches ended abruptly by the far corner of Randall Barrett’s right eye, a broken railroad track permanently marking his train-wrecked face.

  Mottled and swollen, Randall Barrett had had the crap beaten out of him. By his own son.

  Ethan wondered how that would feel. He’d seen it many times before, father pitted against son, the upstart rebelling against the old man.

  But this attack was different in nature. It wasn’t fueled by rebellion, but vengeance.