by Devon Scott
“In here,” Kennedy announces a beat later.
“Terrell!” he calls to his partner. “Ma’am? Come on out.”
“I’m in the tub. I . . . have a shotgun.”
Tretch backs up. “Ma’am, I need you to put the gun down and come out with your hands where I can see them.”
“He . . . he’s in the bedroom,” she cries. “He tried to rape me.”
Tretch eases his head around the doorframe. Spies her splayed naked inside the tub, hands bound, the shotgun pointing up. He rushes in, Glock trained at her.
“Easy, miss. I’ve got you.” Terrell is behind him an instant later.
“Jesus,” he whispers.
Tretch reaches for the shotgun, ejects the remaining shells. He leans the weapon behind him by the door. Pulls out a folded knife and cuts the duct tape from her wrists. He pulls Kennedy to a standing position, trying to ignore her nude form.
It’s damn near impossible.
“You all right? Here, let me put this towel around you.”
“My son. Is he all right?” Kennedy rubs her wrist as she allows the towel to be wrapped around her shoulders. She begins to push past Tretch, but he holds up a hand.
“Hold on. He’s fine. Wait here until we secure the other rooms.”
Terrell has advanced to the bedroom door. Cautiously he peeks around the door and into the bedroom. He spies splotches of wet blood oozing onto the carpet. The window several feet from the dark spot is blown open. The metal bar holding the curtain is dangling from one end, and half of the curtain is pushed outside. Shards of glass are everywhere.
He checks the bathroom. Empty.
Goes back to the window, glances down where glass, wood, and plaster adorn the deck. He can see a man in dark clothes scaling a wooden fence that surrounds the backyard. He yells out “Police, hold it!” just as Terrell approaches the window. The man clears the top and lumbers over, landing on his feet. He ducks down, out of sight.
“Tretch, he’s escaping out back.”
He gets on his radio.
“Suspect fleeting the scene. Scaled a fence and is heading west on the alley behind Taylor Street. All units be advised.”
“Copy. Suspect heading west, alley behind Taylor Street.”
“Roger that.”
Terrell retreats to the hallway. He walks past the bathroom and into the little boy’s room. By the time he has cut him loose, Kennedy has swooped Zack into her arms.
“Oh, baby, are you all right?”
“Yes, Mommy. I’m scared.” Zack stares at her wrapped in a towel. “What happened to your clothes?”
Kennedy straightens up and adjusts the towel tighter around her frame.
“Mommy’s fine. I need to get my clothes on. Can you stay with him for a second?”
Terrell nods.
Kennedy goes to retrieve her clothes. Tretch is at the window of her bedroom, on the radio. He turns when she enters.
“Can I have some privacy for a moment? Just want to get dressed.”
“Of course.”
Tretch leaves after eyeing her for a moment longer than necessary, closing the door behind him.
Chapter 77
The cab screeches to a halt in front of two squad cars blocking traffic on Taylor. Joe Goodman’s money is already out. A twenty is tossed at the driver. He’s out the door before the cabbie has fully depressed the brake. The driver swears in Punjabi, but the detective is already gone.
Garment bag and shield in hand, he runs past the two black-and-whites, their red and blue lights flashing. Sprinting around a young uniformed officer setting up crime-scene tape, he dashes up the stairs and into the townhouse. There is another uniform right inside the front door. He nods to the detective.
“Where is she?”
The uniform gestures upward.
Joe drops his bag and takes the stairs.
Hits the landing and finds Terrell in the second-floor hallway holding a black shotgun.
Joe looks at him.
“Get him?”
Terrell shakes his head slowly.
“Jumped out the window and onto the deck. Scaled the back fence. He’s wounded, Joe, but he’s running.”
Joe sighs. Terrell nods in agreement.
“Tretch called in air support. We’ll locate him.”
“Where’s Kennedy?”
Terrell thumbs in the direction of Zack’s room.
“Joe?”
“Yeah?”
“Your ex shot him. Twelve-gauge.” Terrell hefts the shotgun into the air. “Definitely slowed him down. We also found an HK semiautomatic handgun in the back bedroom. Think it’s the perps. Thought you should know.”
Joe nods, putting his hand on Terrell’s shoulder. “Thanks, man. Tretch, too.”
“Wish I had caught the son of a bitch,” Terrell says through gritted teeth.
Joe walks into Zack’s room. Kennedy looks up. She is dressed in the clothes she’d been wearing before the ordeal began, sitting on the bed with Zack and trying to bring some sense of normalcy to this crazed situation. She stands when Joe enters.
“Hey,” she utters.
Joe crosses the floor.
“You okay? I was worried sick.”
“Yeah, I’m fine,” she replies.
Joe eyes Zack on the bed. He moves in, taking Kennedy in his arms before stepping back. He puts his hand on Zack’s head. Rubs his short hair.
“How you doing, fella?”
“Good,” Zack responds, glancing up.
Kennedy stares into Joe’s eyes.
“He’s . . . gone?” she asks gingerly, afraid of what the answer might be.
Joe bobs his head.
“Yeah, but we’ll catch him. He can’t get very far. Not with Metropolitan’s finest on his you know what.” He glances down at Zack and grins.
Joe takes Kennedy by the arm and leads her over to the door.
“You shot him,” Joe says, his voice low.
“Yes.”
Joe stares at her for a moment. Then he smiles for the first time this evening.
“That’s my girl,” he says with a wicked grin.
He crouches on the other side of the wooden fence, a few houses down from hers, blood streaking down his face and shirt.
He’s in shock, and there’s blood in his mouth. He feels a hurt he’s never experienced before.
The pain he feels now has eclipsed the pain of before. That aching wasn’t shit compared to what he’s dealing with now.
His face and shoulder are on fire.
The last few minutes have been a whirlwind.
Did the bitch actually shoot him? How is that even possible? Where did the gun come from?
Nothing makes sense.
He’s gone from being in complete control to . . . this.
Readying to impale her, the sweetness, like nectar, so fucking inviting.
But then the blinding, searing pain came at him. Struck him down in an instant.
And now, nothing makes sense.
The pain is intense. His cheek, his nose, his lips.
He can barely fucking see.
His eye.
Damian reaches gingerly to touch it and practically passes out.
It’s no longer there. How can that be?
He can’t even begin to process that. Nothing makes sense anymore. So he stops trying to connect the dots. Instead, it’s now about survival mode. Get away from this crazed bitch, escape from the police that have suddenly showed up like on Cops. He can hear the sirens wailing, see the red and blue lights strobing.
He gets to his feet, keeps his head low. His entire left side is on fire. The H&K is no longer in his hand or his pocket.
Fuck!
Keep moving. Get away. Survive. Regroup. Leave this place that makes him dizzy. Find somewhere to rest. Close his eye and sleep. For a minute or two.
Regroup and then figure things out.
His head throbs. He can no longer think. Just move.
Move, move,
and keep moving.
That’s the only thing left to do.
Chapter 78
Michael screeches to a rolling stop, pans both directions rapidly before punching the accelerator. He races past the stop sign, up Thirteenth, just a few precious blocks away from home. Passes Ritchie Place, then Shepherd Street. The next road is Michigan Avenue. Thank goodness he has the light. He flies through the intersection and cuts an immediate left onto Taylor, doing close to forty.
Three cop cars assault his view. They are blocking the street a hundred yards away, directly in front of his house.
Michael makes a quick right, jumping the sidewalk as he steers the Range Rover into an alley. Flooring the accelerator, his mind is on one thing. Getting to his family.
As soon as possible.
All negative thoughts have erased themselves from his mind. Over the past few minutes, from the moment he dialed Joe until now, all he’s thought about is finding his wife and child safe from harm. His heart is beating in his chest. He’s unsure of what he’ll find. He prays it isn’t too late.
Please, please don’t let it be too late.
The alley ends at a narrow intersection. Forks left and right. Michael jams the steering wheel left, hearing the screech of tires as he practically careens into a Dumpster. He overcorrects, sending the SUV lurching to the right and into a bunch of garbage cans. He hits them head on, sending trash flying over his hood.
Michael curses loudly but doesn’t slow. Accelerates down the narrow tree-lined alleyway as if his life depends on it.
Fifty yards away is the back of their house. He can see lights on in every room. He spies his deck, just above the wooden fence that adjoins the alleyway. Someone, it appears to be a uniform cop, is at their bedroom window.
Please God, don’t let him be too late.
Please let Zack and Kennedy be okay.
His adrenaline is spiking. He can barely breathe. His chest is about to burst.
Damian finally realizes what it is he truly wants.
To rest from this madness.
He’s been running for so long.
Running away from her . . . and from himself.
He’s grown so incredibly tired.
And for what?
Nothing is ever going to be the way it was.
The way it was back then, when things were sweet and simple.
He can barely remember the details of life before. The images are fleeting. Soon they’ll be gone forever from his grasp.
But he knows this: It was a time without pain. Without aching.
Life was sweet back then.
Everything throbs now. Inside and out.
And it will never stop. The pain will never dissipate. Not until he rests.
He thinks of her once again.
Dawn.
He’s shuffling, stumbling alone in some dark, narrow alleyway, cold, bleeding, unseeing, and afraid.
Trying to remember her as she was.
Before she became polluted.
Before she turned foul.
Butterscotch complexion.
A smile so dazzling and bright.
A smile to die for.
He focuses on her smile now.
And follows it into the blinding light.
A disturbance off to the left captures his attention. It’s a blur that Michael barely picks up in his peripheral vision. Before he has time to react, before he can even consciously consider what the disturbance actually is, the left bumper connects with a sickening thud, and instantly the blur becomes a solid object, smashing headlong into his windshield.
Michael screams and jams on the brake, instinctively cutting the wheel hard to the right. A hundred-year-old oak tree appears in front of him. It is almost surreal in the whiteness of his xenon headlights. He watches it all in a kind of slow motion, the ghostly face staring back at him through the cracked and splintered windshield, one eye cold and unblinking, the other just a mass of blackened, bloody gore, before the Range Rover crashes violently into the tree that has stood for three generations, sending the body flying brutally forward. Whiteness assaults Michael. It is instantaneous, shutting out all sight within his vision.
What Michael doesn’t see, thanks to the air bag that obstructs his view, is the body, which hits the unmoving mass of roots and bark, branches and leaves with a revolting thump a split second before the unmistakable sound of cracking bones, twisting metal, and breaking glass pierces the nighttime air. The old tree shudders as if exorcising a moan. Then it grows still once again.
Then everything around him fades to black.
Chapter 79
It’s after three in the morning when he hobbles inside. Drops his keys on the countertop and makes his way slowly upstairs.
She is waiting for him.
On the bed, wearing a bathrobe. She mutes the television as he drops his garment bag on the floor.
Removes his shield, cell, and Glock. Places them on the nightstand.
Tara goes to him.
Kisses him gingerly on his lips.
“You okay?” she asks softly.
“Exhausted,” Joe responds.
She nods.
“We got him.”
Tara nods again, leading him to the bed.
“I know. It’s been all over the news.”
The WRC-TV and Fox 5 choppers had lit up the sky, and it was like daylight bathing the crime scene. Surreal.
Joe slowly undresses. Leaves his clothes in a heap on the floor.
Tara pulls him under covers.
Holds him against her warm body.
Feels him shudder, respite elusive.
Sleep is a game that Joe is losing.
For several minutes they are silent, holding one another, each reveling in the comfort the other brings.
“Is this thing done?” she asks finally.
It takes Joe a moment to respond.
“Yes.”
He knows what Tara is asking.
Kennedy. Is this thing with Kennedy done?
And it is. He means it.
It’s done.
“You’re a good man, Joe Goodman,” she says, kissing his face. “And I love you.”
In the darkness, Joe smiles.
“I love you, too, Tara. Can’t wait for you to be my wife.”
Then sleep finds him. It wins the game.
Chapter 80
He opens his eyes slowly, adjusting them to the harsh fluorescent light.
His stare is unfocused, but as he pans left he can make out a selection of tubes running in and out of him. Machines, blinking, a steady metronome of soft sound. To the right, the face of an angel comes into view. He stares at her features, mesmerized, holding on to them like he would a child’s hand, lest he let them slip and this goddess disappear from his sight forever. She is beautiful. She is incredible. A voice inside his head sweetly whispers in a voice faintly erotic, “I am Celestial, and I’m your deepest, darkest fantasy come true.”
He attempts a smile, but his jaw aches. He endeavors to sit up, but the pain is sharp and abrupt, so he eases back down with a suffering moan.
“Welcome back to the land of the living,” the angel says, beaming.
Overhead, a television, suspended from the ceiling, is tuned to the Disney Channel. Directly underneath the TV sits Zack, head down, absorbed in his PSP. He glances up, eyes suddenly as big as silver dollars. He rushes around the bed and is hoisted up by the angel.
“DADDY!”
Michael coughs. Stares at the angel before recognition fuses into his brain.
“Kennedy.”
He coughs again.
“Drink some water, baby,” she says softly. She brings a glass up to his lips, holding it for him. Michael takes a sip, savoring the liquid as it meets his parched tongue.
He drinks some more. This time swallows long and hard.
Kennedy takes the glass away as Zack touches his hand.
“Hey, buddy,” Michael says.
“Hi, Daddy. Misse
d you!”
The door opens, and his parents, Betty and Roland, enter. His mother has her hands to her face. There are tears in her eyes.
“Lord, my baby is awake,” Betty says, making her way to the right side of the hospital bed. She kisses his cheek and squeezes his hand.
“Hi, Mama.” His father comes up behind her, nodding in that paternal way of his, looking slightly older and a lot more tired than the last time Michael saw him.
“Very proud of you, Son,” his father says. “Very proud indeed.”
Michael looks over at Kennedy.
“What time is it? How long have I been . . . here?”
Kennedy checks her watch and smiles. “It’s close to dinnertime. You’re at Georgetown University Hospital. You were brought here last night after your accident.”
Michael tries to sit up again. The pain spikes in his gut, and he winces.
Serious pain.
“Easy, baby,” Kennedy says, her hand to his shoulder. “You fractured a rib, and you’ve got lacerations over your face.”
The events of the previous evening start trickling back into his psyche.
“My car?” he says.
“Let’s just say we’ll be shopping for a new vehicle really soon!” Kennedy exclaims.
Michael blinks.
“You don’t remember anything?” his father asks.
Michael stares around at the room at the faces glancing back at him. He blinks again, trying to conjure up the details.
“You got him, Daddy,” Zack says, face animated. “You kilt the bad man!”
Nana hushes her grandson.
“What?” Michael asks, his face showing bewilderment. He turns to Kennedy for answers.
It takes her a moment to respond.
“Damian. The one who’s been terrorizing us. He’s dead, Michael.”
“You kilt him, Daddy. You the man!”
“Zack, hush,” his mother says.
“Well, he did!” Zack returns to the chair and his PSP, instantly taken with the game in front of him.
“It’s over,” Kennedy says.
Michael’s forehead wrinkles. “I . . . killed him?”
“I shot him,” Kennedy says, glancing quickly over to Pop Pop before returning her stare to her husband, “but you finished him off with the Range Rover. It’s done, baby. Over.”
