Wicked Burn

by BETH KERY

  “I read about it in the newspaper a few days ago. Seems that even Niall’s daddy can’t keep the press from reporting the fact that his grandson’s murderer has the dubious honor of being the only man on death row for which the Illinois General Assembly lifted the moratorium on execution. And they’re going to be doing it” —Evan checked his watch drolly—“oh, in about two hours or so.”

  “Grandson’s murderer?” Vic managed with the little air he had left in his lungs. Niall had told him that she was an only child. Surely the son that Niall told him had died hadn’t been murdered —

  “Yeah, Niall’s kid. Matthew Manning opened fire in front of a preschool about four years ago. Killed seven people, a good portion of them children. Seems Manning was sore about the fact that the courts had granted custody of his five-year-old exclusively to his wife. Go figure, right?” Evan muttered before he reached for the fresh martini that the bartender put down in front of him and took a drink.

  Vic resisted an urge to grab the glass from the man’s hand and shake the rest of the story out of him. “The papers said Manning’s kid’s preschool teacher gave testimony about Manning pitching a fit and scaring the kids at school half to death a year before the shooting occurred. She wouldn’t let Manning’s son leave with him while he was so out of control. Manning paid the teacher back a year later by making her one of the victims of the bloodbath.”

  “In Barrington? Is that where this happened?” Vic asked, referring to the affluent western Chicago suburb.

  He vaguely recalled hearing the horrific story on the news. He’d been living in Montana at the time but the national news had covered it not only because of the violence and the number of deaths, but also because so many of those who died had been innocent preschoolers. It had been one of those news stories that left you feeling confused, raw, and bitter about the potential nature of your fellow human beings.

  No. Niall’s little boy had died on that fateful day? It was too much for Vic to wrap his mind around at that moment. He wasn’t sure that he ever would be able to—

  “Yep. It was in Barrington all right. Niall was there.”

  Vic stared at this man who was almost a complete stranger to him. It felt like ice water was being poured down over his head at a trickle but was reaching the inside as well, flowing slowly but steadily both down his skin and straight into his veins at once.

  “Niall was there,” he repeated flatly. “On the day that some madman opened fire and killed her four-year-old son along with six other people?”

  Evan nodded, obviously enjoying being the one to impart such juicy gossip. “Along with another dozen or so who were wounded. Yeah, Niall saw the whole thing. He fired into a crowd of people—the kids, parents dropping them off, teachers. I don’t know what happened to Niall’s husband after the boy’s murder, but he must have split or—”

  “You know, you really shouldn’t talk about things that you haven’t got the vaguest clue about, Evan,” a feminine voice accused abruptly.

  Vic’s head swung around. Kendra Phillips stood behind them, a wrathful look on her round face.

  “Hi, Kendra. Don’t you look nice today,” Evan greeted her smoothly, taking only a microsecond to compose himself after getting caught spreading rumors like a teenage girl.

  “One of Niall’s soldiers,” Evan muttered under his breath to Vic.

  The scowl still lingered on Kendra’s usually amiable face when she turned to Vic. “Hey, Vic. Do you mind coming with me for a minute? There’s something I want to discuss with you . . . in private,” Kendra added with a pointed glance at Evan.

  Evan shrugged insouciantly and took another draw on his martini. Vic stood and threw a twenty on the bar before he followed Kendra out of the restaurant. Once they were walking down the dimly lit corridors of the museum, she turned and smiled at him apologetically.

  “Sorry for dragging you away like that. Evan Forrester is a real pain in the—”

  “Yeah, I know,” Vic interrupted impatiently. “But he was telling me more about Niall than anyone else ever has, including Niall. Do you know where she is, by the way?”

  Niall wouldn’t attend Matthew Manning’s execution by herself, would she?

  Kendra looked startled. “I haven’t talked to her for two weeks, when she called to check in on things. Isn’t she on the farm?”

  “She left yesterday. I’ve been looking for her, but she’s not at her loft and she’s not here.”

  “Did something happen?” Kendra asked cautiously.

  “We had a misunderstanding,” Vic admitted after a few seconds. He sensed Kendra studying him inquisitively. She obviously cared about Niall, and Vic knew that Niall considered her a friend. “Listen, Kendra . . . about what Forrester was saying back there . . .”

  Kendra nodded suddenly, as though she’d just made a decision. “Just a second, Vic. There are some things I want to talk to you about,” she said. She went to her desk and unlocked a drawer, then pulled out a set of keys. She tilted her head for Vic to follow her.

  Vic realized with vague surprise that Kendra led him back to Niall’s office.

  A few seconds later Vic followed her into Niall’s office. The large, comfortable room was warm from lack of airing. Niall’s scent lingered. A pain went through him when he inhaled that singular odor. He suddenly wanted to be gone from there. Niall wasn’t here, and he was wasting his time—

  “Sit down, Vic,” Kendra instructed. She sat down in one of the leather chairs in front of Niall’s desk and glanced significantly at the matching chair. When Vic lowered himself hesitantly, part of him wanting to be gone to search for Niall, Kendra reached for one of the frames on Niall’s desk.

  “Niall never told me in detail how she felt about you. As you probably know by now, that’s not her style. But I’ve worked with her for years. There was something in her face when she used to talk about you, something in her smile . . . I think she’d forgive me for talking to you about her past, even though she is an incredibly private person,” Kendra said soberly.

  Vic didn’t speak, but he’d gone very still when Kendra picked up the picture. He suddenly knew exactly whose photo was in the frame. It struck him as strange that he’d never noticed any mementos of Michael before, but then he recalled how Niall’s residence at Riverview Towers was a temporary one. She’d always said that she’d never unpacked the majority of her personal items.

  When he held out his hand, Kendra passed him the photo without comment. Vic stared for several long seconds and abruptly set the frame back on the desk.

  “Did she tell you about him?” Kendra asked, still studying his reactions closely.

  “She told me that she had a child named Michael who died,” Vic replied hoarsely. The vision remained glued behind his eyelids of that beautiful little boy’s face with Niall’s smile and her big, hazel eyes. “Forrester just told me how he died, though.”

  Kendra sighed and sagged back in her chair. “Well, that’s something that she mentioned Michael, that she even said his name, to be honest with you. I guess from your reaction to Forrester, though, she never said anything about Matthew Manning or how her husband, Stephen, went off the deep end during Manning’s trial?”

  “What do you mean went off the deep end?”

  Kendra grimaced. “I’m not saying it in the figurative sense, Vic. Stephen started drinking heavily after Michael’s murder and eventually vacated the world of reality and moved to an insane one. He’s been there ever since, and as far as I know, he doesn’t appear to have any plans on returning,” Kendra added sarcastically. “Sorry,” she amended after a moment. “I don’t mean to be judgmental against someone who is obviously mentally ill and can’t control his actions, but if you had seen the hell that Niall’s been through . . .” She shook her head.

  “I remember what Niall said to me once when I was mouthing off in a particularly bitter fashion about Stephen’s reaction to Michael’s murder. She said, ‘No one really knows how they’re going to react when somet
hing awful and unexpected happens to them. Stephen has reacted in the only way that was available to him.’ ”

  “She defended him?”

  Kendra nodded. “Always. Even though Stephen became so whacked out that he was violent toward her on several occasions. Niall has never said anything to me—not that she would—but I suspect he tried to kill her, maybe more than once. He’s suicidal in addition to being homicidal, so at least he’s an equal opportunity lunatic,” Kendra said, anger lacing her tone despite what she’d said about Niall’s defense of her ex-husband.

  Vic leaned forward in his chair as the ringing alarm bells in his brain notched up to a clanging clamor. The idea of Niall—his Niall, that warm, honey-voiced, delicate-seeming woman with a backbone made of steel—being subjected to all of this meaningless violence and horror had him feeling cornered and desperate.

  “I want to know it all, Kendra. I want to know everything about Niall that you have to tell me. But before you go into it, just tell me this. Do you think there’s a chance that Niall is at Joliet to attend Matthew Manning’s execution today? Because there’s no way in hell I’m gonna let her go through something like that on her own.”

  Almost an hour and a half later Vic finally turned onto I-80 West, toward Joliet. He checked the digital clock anxiously before he pressed the accelerator to the floor. He’d stayed around long enough to pluck the relevant highlights of Niall’s history out of Kendra before he’d grabbed a newspaper, gotten in his truck, and left town in a hell of a hurry. Traffic had been bad only around the city, thank God, or else he’d never have had the slim chance that he wobbled on precariously at the moment.

  Kendra had been shocked by his question about whether or not Niall would attend Matthew Manning’s execution. She apparently didn’t read the paper as meticulously as Forrester, because she hadn’t even realized that it was scheduled for today. Vic had found out by reading the paper at stoplights while he was still in the city that Manning’s execution by lethal injection was scheduled for three o’clock that afternoon.

  Vic only had about forty-five minutes to make it to Joliet Prison. He didn’t know what the hell he was going to do when he got there. He doubted they’d allow him to enter the maximum security prison, but he had to do something. The idea of Niall being there all by herself on such a god-awful errand was just untenable. For what felt like the thousandth time that day, he tried to call her cell phone, but for the thousandth time was thwarted by the sound of her recorded voice.

  All of his doubts about how useful he was going to be once he got to Joliet Prison were immediately reinforced once he arrived. If he’d been speaking Swahili to the stony-faced guard at the single entrance gate, he’d have been just as effective in gaining admittance. Vic couldn’t even get the uniformed stiff to say if Niall Chandler had recently entered or if he’d ever heard of Niall Chandler . . . or Matthew Manning, for that matter.

  Vic found himself waiting in the small parking lot outside of the prison, wishing he could see through walls so that he might at least be able to locate Niall’s car and know if she was there or not. Sitting all by himself in his truck certainly gave him time to think about what he wanted to say to Niall when he saw her. But just like a plague of writer’s block, nothing came to him. The only thing that he experienced at that moment was an overwhelming need to hold her . . . to protect her.

  The feeling was a familiar one. It had cropped up often enough last year, all those times when he saw the sadness in Niall’s eyes, every time she awoke from her nightmares, trembling and damp with sweat. He closed his eyes briefly in remorse when he considered what she must have been dreaming about . . . seeing Michael shot down in cold blood as if they were soldiers on a battlefield instead of a young mother sending her four-year-old boy off to preschool with a cheerful good-bye.

  Stuff out of nightmares all right, except that for Niall the dream never ended.

  He cringed inwardly with guilt when he recalled how he’d admonished her just yesterday for being dishonest with him. You said that you wanted to tell me back then, but you didn’t, despite the fact that I wanted to be there for you. I wanted it a hell of a lot, Niall! Now you want to talk, but I’m no longer ready to listen.

  “Sanctimonious asshole,” Vic muttered under his breath.

  He knew all too well that there were times in the beginning of their relationship that he had consciously chosen to ignore Niall’s emotional wounds, preferring to focus on the sexual aspect of their relationship.

  Sure, toward the end he’d changed his mind about that. He wanted to have her trust by that point. But it had been his own distrust . . . his own scars from his relationship with Jenny . . . that had made him initially pull away from her when he witnessed her pain.

  Wasn’t it likely that on some level Niall had sensed his unwillingness to share her history and grief? Kendra had told him today how Niall’s parents had judged her for finally choosing to divorce Stephen. Hell, there were probably loads of people who would do the same thing without understanding the circumstances, without comprehending the fact that in his own way Stephen had abandoned Niall when she needed him most—and long, long before Niall made the decision to end their marriage.

  Vic had been one of those judgmental people.

  The expression on Niall’s face that evening in her apartment when Alexis Chandler had dropped the bomb that Niall had a husband suddenly flashed before Vic’s eyes like a perfectly intact film—the sagging shoulders, the sad, deflated expression on her lovely face, as if he’d just done the inevitable . . . as if he’d just condemned her with a look.

  Which he had, of course.

  Vic realized with a feeling of creeping dread that that was precisely the reason why Niall hadn’t told him about her history. Because she was scared, afraid that he would judge her harshly.

  Then she had gambled everything and come to the farm to try to explain. He was too busy feeling sorry for himself, too involved in licking his own flesh wounds to bother to notice Niall’s gaping hole.

  The thought caused such a profound pain to stab through him that he jerked reflexively in the driver’s seat.

  He’d make it right. He had to. The alternative just wasn’t viable.

  Meg sounded glad that Vic answered his cell phone on the first ring but her joy quickly altered to anxious irritation.

  “Thank God I caught you. Where’ve you been all day?” she demanded testily. She plowed ahead without waiting for an answer. “You’ve got to get over to Mercy Hospital in Bloomington right away.”

  “What the hell kind of ‘hello’ is that, Meg?” he asked sourly. He already felt helpless enough as he sat there in the outer parking lot of the enormous, depressing fortress of the prison without having Meg pull her big sister act on him, making him feel like a twelve-year-old kid caught out of bed past his bedtime. “I can’t go to the hospital right now. I’m outside of Joliet Prison. Damn guards won’t let me in but—”

  “Yeah, right. You’re trying to get into Joliet Prison. This ought to be good,” Meg scoffed as if he’d started to tell an obviously moronic joke.

  “Niall is in there.”

  Meg snorted. “Quit kidding around, Vic! This is serious. Damn that Errol Farrell. I knew he was going to stir up a hornet’s next over there.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “Sheriff Madigan just called. Donny was caught in the cross fire of a shoot-out at the Farrell farm earlier today.”

  Vic sat up ramrod straight. “Is he okay?”

  “Madigan didn’t know for sure,” Meg replied worriedly. “He only said that he was one of the ones they took away in an ambulance.”

  Vic shook his head in rising disbelief. The events of today might have been following a schedule from Hell’s Daily Planner. He glanced anxiously from the one road from the prison to his fuel gauge and back to the road.

  “I can’t leave right now. Can you go check on Donny and call me as soon as you know anything? I’ve got to wait for Niall.”r />
  Several seconds of silence followed. “Were you serious about that Joliet Prison thing?”

  “Why would I joke about something like that?” Vic thundered.

  “Calm down, Vic,” Meg exclaimed, half in concern and half in exasperation. “Niall isn’t in Joliet Prison, for God’s sake. Why would she be? She’s on her way to Mercy as we speak. She just pulled into the driveway a minute before I called you, and she went ahead to the hospital when I told her what happened. I’m waiting for Tim to get back from the fields—”

  Vic had already turned the ignition and was in the process of backing out.

  “We really need to have a conversation about the way we communicate, Meg.”

  He peeled out of the parking lot, completely oblivious to the high concentration of police in the vicinity of the prison. The last thing he was thinking about at that moment was getting a ticket.

  Surely this day couldn’t get any worse.

  TWENTY-ONE

  Donny Farrell determinedly attempted to switch channels on the television set in his hospital room with a remote control, but his right hand clearly wasn’t cooperating the way he wanted. His lack of coordination and the pain that shadowed his youthful features related to his heavily bandaged right arm.

  “Use your left hand,” Tim instructed calmly. “You’re going to have to get used to using it for a while anyway, while your arm heals.”

  Donny grimaced in irritation more than in pain. “The doc said the bullet didn’t even hit the bone. It’s not serious,” Donny insisted when he met the gaze of the brooding man who sat on the window-sill, the brilliant late afternoon sunlight casting his body and face in shadow. “Seriously, Vic. Clean shot—that’s what she called it—right through the muscle,” Donny explained matter-of-factly as he waved the remote control. “Doc said that they were just keeping me overnight to check on the results from some tests. I feel fine . . . maybe a little weak from losing so much blood.”