Double Take ft-11

by Catherine Coulter

  Pallack froze at the sound of sirens in the distance.

  Rage pumped through Dix as he stared at the mad old man. “You killed my wife, killed her because she wouldn’t leave me or her boys. Do you know how insane that is?” Dix lurched to the side, and drove his foot toward Pallack’s right arm, but Pallack jumped back and fired. The bullet went wide, and slammed into the dark wood wainscoting.

  Pallack made a strangled noise, and ran out of the study.

  Dix grabbed his Beretta from the desktop and ran after him.

  Pallack fired again. Dix felt a bullet fly past his head and slam into the wall, and he hit the floor. He heard Pallack run all out, pause a moment to jerk open the front door, then he was through it. He jumped to his feet, saw Charlotte, white-faced, hugging herself, and left her standing next to her husband’s desk, Makepeace’s body close to her foot.

  The sirens were close now.

  Dix ran out the Pallack front door to see a metal door slam shut at the end of the short hallway. He jerked open the heavy door and ran up the dozen concrete steps to a small square landing. He shoved open the steel-reinforced roof door, fell back when a bullet caromed off it.

  Dix yelled around the door, “Pallack, the cops will shoot you for sure if you go down those fire stairs. Give it up, it’s over now. You can still come out of this alive.”

  He heard Pallack breathing hard, and wondered if he was going to have a coronary. He eased out from behind the door onto the roof, six stories up. Pallack was standing at the edge, looking down, his knees pressed to the roof guard, his gun dangling loose in his right hand.

  Dix heard voices from the street, recognized Savich and Ruth.

  “Give it up, Pallack,” he said again. He raised his gun and began walking toward Pallack.

  Pallack slowly turned to face him. He didn’t look at all worried. He still held his gun at his side. He smiled. “You had a beautiful wife, Sheriff, but in the end, she wouldn’t have me.” He laughed. “She told me about you, about her sons, on and on trying to convince me to let her go, until—I’ve got to admit it—I lost it.” He shrugged. “She was blind to what I could give her.”

  Dix’s finger was trembling on the Beretta trigger. It would be so easy, he knew, the slightest squeeze, the small buck of recoil, and it would be over.

  “You insane old man—you killed my wife because she looked like your damned mother. She was just a face, nothing more to you.”

  “I told you, it was an accident.”

  Dix knew he didn’t have much time before cops poured out the roof door. If he was going to kill Pallack, he would have to do it now. He leveled his Beretta at Pallack’s chest. “Do you know how long I’ve been trying to find her? Can you even begin to imagine how much I hate you?”

  “So? A sheriff is going to shoot me in cold blood?”

  “If I shoot you, Pallack, it will be an execution.” His finger tightened on the trigger. In that moment Dix felt something warm and soothing touch him. He knew it was something outside himself, but it didn’t matter, it gave him balance and understanding, and it gave him hope. His breath slowed. He lowered his Beretta. “No, I don’t want your blood on my hands. Drop the gun, Pallack, now, or I’ll have to shoot you.”

  Pallack laughed. “I knew you wouldn’t shoot me, Sheriff.”

  “The sheriff won’t need to, Thomas.”

  Dix whirled around to see Charlotte standing just inside the roof door behind him, her nightshirt blowing around her legs. In her hand she held Dix’s two-shot derringer. “There are two bullets in my gun, Thomas.”

  “Shoot him, Charlotte! It’ll be self-defense. He’s insane with grief, came here because he believed I killed his wife—”

  “Shut up, Thomas. But you can put your gun down, Sheriff, won’t you? As I said, my little gun has two bullets. They’re for you, Thomas.”

  “No, Charlotte, don’t—”

  She spoke right over him—”You vile old man, you had David killed. You had my brother killed.”

  “I had no choice, do you hear me? He called me, hysterical, yelling that the FBI had come to see him, asking him all their questions about Christie, and he wanted money or he’d tell them everything. I had no choice, dammit, it wasn’t my fault. I couldn’t let him live.”

  Charlotte pulled the trigger.

  Pallack’s gun went flying as he grabbed his shoulder and staggered back. For several seconds, Dix thought he was going over the roof guard, but Pallack managed to jerk sideways and fall to his knees. Dix saw blood flowing through his fingers from the shoulder wound.

  Pallack raised pain-glazed eyes to his wife. “You bitch! You’re nothing without me, nothing!”

  She fired again, but she missed.

  Dix heard Charlotte crying as he leaped at Pallack. He slammed his fist into his jaw, felt it break. Dix hit him again, knocking him down on his back, and straddled him, grabbing his shirt collar. He brought his head up and slammed it down on the rough stone roof. “You murdered my wife! What kind of insane monster are you?”

  He hit him again even though Pallack was nearly unconscious, and moaning, and then Dix lowered his own head, and started to cry.

  He felt a hand on his shoulder. “He’s unconscious, Dix. You can stop now.”

  A woman’s voice. He turned to look up into Ruth’s face. “He killed Christie.”

  “Yes, I know.”

  Dix looked over to see Sherlock cuffing Charlotte Pallack’s hands behind her.

  The roof filled with people. He heard Savich’s voice, heard Cheney speaking to Frank Paulette on his cell. And Julia was there, telling a uniformed police officer that Xavier Makepeace was dead, in the study, and that he was the one who’d been trying to kill her.

  Dix said to Savich, “Pallack had David Caldicott killed. Charlotte didn’t know about that.” He hated to say it because he knew she was an accomplice to everything else Pallack had done, but he added, “Fact is, Charlotte shot Pallack.”

  Charlotte said calmly, “By shooting him I saved your life, Dix. If we can make a deal, I’ll tell you all about what Thomas has done. I’ll tell you where Christie Noble is buried.”

  “You don’t know,” Dix said slowly.

  “Oh yes, I do. My brother told me. David said he followed Thomas several times to her grave. David said Thomas spent hours there, sitting on the ground beside her, ranting and raving at her.” She smiled. “I’ll even testify against him.”

  Ruth said, “You’re a regular Mother Teresa, aren’t you, Charlotte?” She held out her hand to Dix and pulled him to his feet. “Come on, Dix, it’s over.”

  EPILOGUE

  SAN FRANCISCO

  Cheney and Julia stood side by side on the Marin Headlands looking down at the Golden Gate Bridge, watching thick gray threads of fog weave through the suspension cables. They both had on their leather jackets and gloves. A sharp wind was whipping Julia’s hair around her face.

  “I’d like for you to stay in San Francisco, Julia,” Cheney said. “With me. I’ll bet we can find a nice house that’ll suit us.”

  She cocked her head to one side, tapped her fingertips to her chin. “Say, is that a proposal?”

  He looked surprised. “You know, I hadn’t started out with that particular objective, but I guess that’s how my brain wanted it to come out of my mouth. Goes to prove I should trust my brain. I’m crazy about you. What do you say, Julia? Will you marry me?”

  He saw a leap of excitement in her eyes, felt his smile ready to split his face, but what she said was, “That’s a huge thing you’re saying, Cheney. You’ve never been married before. I have, two times, and neither had a good result. We haven’t had what you’d call a normal dating relationship, let alone a single date, other than that one wild time in the Sherlocks’ gym—well, I’m thinking maybe we should take our time, let things settle down some more—”

  He laid his hands on her shoulders. “Look at me, Julia. Yes, look at me. You can see what I’m feeling for you right on my face. When somethin
g’s right, it’s right. I know it is. Do you?”

  She chewed on her bottom lip a moment, looking away from him. Just when his anxiety level was nearly in the stratosphere, she looked up at him and gave him a big smile. “Yes, oh boy, yes, I’ll marry you. You can forget what I said, that was just depressing maturity and common sense leaking out of my mouth.”

  “Is that a note of sarcasm?”

  “Maybe. Now, Cheney, are you willing to accept my psychic friends without rolling your eyes? Can you restrain yourself?”

  “Even with Bevlin?”

  “Especially with Bevlin. He’s still becoming who he’s supposed to be, trying to fine-tune his gift.”

  Cheney rolled his eyes, then saw the smile she was trying to hide.

  “I saw that,” he said.

  “I can’t help it.”

  The wind kicked up and Julia hugged him closer. She said between kissing his neck and jaw, “You’ll admit, won’t you, that at least Kathryn acts pretty normal, some of the time.”

  “Okay, maybe.”

  “That’s because she thinks you’re hot, and doesn’t want to scare you off. Or maybe it’s Savich she thinks is hot, hard to tell. But me, I’d take you any day.”

  He cupped her face in his hands and kissed her. “I’d take you any day too. I could offer her Savich, but I think he’d hurt me.”

  She kissed his ear.

  Cheney said, “I called my folks, you know, told them about you.”

  “Oh dear, I hadn’t thought of your family yet. You got a big one?”

  “Oh yeah, three brothers, two sisters, a dozen nieces and nephews and my parents, of course, and none of them are very good at minding their own business. But my family will adore you, Julia, fold you right into the mix, whether you want that or not, and begin meddling immediately—career decisions, vacations, where we’ll spend Christmas, where our children should go to school—won’t ever stop, even if we move to Alaska. Once you’re married to me, your privacy is over. Can you live with that?”

  “That sounds wonderful. They don’t know much about me, do they?”

  “No, but when they find out, they’ll cheer you for being such a heroine.”

  Julia saw a couple of tourists in jeans and short-sleeved T-shirts, trying to brave the cold wind, shivering violently. She should tell them the sun would come out, maybe, but instead, she threw back her head and broke into “Tomorrow.” Several more shivering tourists standing some twenty feet away turned and listened. When she finished, they applauded. She gave them a small bow and waved.

  She said, “The district attorney called me today. Are you ready for this, Cheney? Fact is, he apologized. He’s got a truckload of proof against Thomas Pallack, and with Charlotte more than eager to testify against him, I know he meant it.”

  No matter how many apologies the D.A. gave Julia, Cheney would still like to smack him in the chops.

  “I’m big with the paparazzi again, for a short while anyway. They photographed me at my house speaking to one of the insurance people.”

  “So long as they don’t trail you to my condo, we’re safe.”

  She sighed and snuggled in close. The wind died down as the fog thickened, the tops of the bridge towers nearly covered now. She was sorry, but there was no chance of sun today. They both shivered at the sight of two lone sailboats on a broad reach, heeling sharply.

  “There’s no more beautiful place on earth,” she said, “even if you freeze half the summer.”

  He smiled, felt happy enough to burst with it. Not all that long ago he’d gotten himself a date on a Thursday night for the Crab House on Pier 39. He hadn’t gotten his cioppino, he’d gotten Julia.

  Fate was something he marveled at, but accepted. As for the local woo-woo wizards, he imagined it would always be hard not to roll his eyes. He pictured Bevlin Wagner in his slipping towel and grinned.

  He said, “Let’s go brew some coffee and talk about that new house we’re going to find.”

  MAESTRO, VIRGINIA

  It was easy to dig Christie’s grave. Bobby Ray Parker and Lynn Thomas hadn’t used equipment, no need. In the early morning hours beneath a soft steady rain that had begun the previous evening, they’d shoveled deep and deeper still and the earth was still damp and yielding. They spoke of Christie Noble, her kindness, how she’d yelled her head off at her boys’ games, and how sometimes life was just too bitter to bear, and it wasn’t fair, now was it? But at least she’d finally come home.

  Four hours later, Dix stared at that massive wet black mound of rich earth, at the three red roses laid carefully atop it, and felt pain like a gash to his heart.

  He held his boys’ hands, theirs squeezing his hard during Reverend Lindsay’s brief graveside litany, his deep quiet voice somehow reaching to the last person in that crowd of at least five hundred people, all of whom had come directly from the memorial service at the First Presbyterian Church of Maestro to Penhallow Cemetery, to attend Christie Holcombe Noble’s interment next to her mother.

  Dix looked over at Lone Tree Hill, at the single oak, an ancient sentinel, keeping vigil over the rolling hills and the row upon row of graves. Its leaves were greening up nicely. Suddenly the sun came through the clouds, blurring through the gentle rain, and he saw raindrops sparkle fiercely on the oak leaves. He squeezed his boys’ hands and slowly they raised their heads and looked to where he nodded, toward that old oak, at the sunlight coming through the rain. He heard Rob sigh, felt both boys move closer against him.

  Dix felt Savich and Sherlock behind him, Savich solid as a wall, and Sherlock, her hand resting lightly on his shoulder throughout the entire graveside service. His anger toward Savich was long gone, but he remembered how he’d wanted to smash Savich in the face when he’d refused point-blank to let him see Christie’s remains. Why? he’d asked. You already have the image of her you want to keep in your mind and your heart for the rest of your life, Dix. Let it rest, let her rest now. It’s over, finally over.

  And Sherlock had stood with Savich, united against him. Ruth hadn’t said a word, he remembered, simply listened to him rave and yell. He knew she would never say anything about that remote site in southern Tennessee where the dogs had found—no, it was over, Christie’s life was more than three years over.

  He straightened when Reverend Lindsay called for the final prayer, a prayer of acceptance, of granting oneself a measure of peace and the chance of becoming. What did becoming mean for him? But of course he knew. It meant bringing Ruth in fully, it meant bringing his boys forward now that they’d said a final good-bye to their mother, and it meant becoming what they were meant to be. He wondered what that would be for each of them. But whatever happened, the four of them would be together now.

  It was over. Reverend Lindsay finished speaking. Dix felt hands touching him, heard quiet voices speaking to him and his boys, accepted the endless stream of words he couldn’t take in now, but they would be there in his memory, and perhaps he’d recall them one day.

  Chappy, tears running down his face, didn’t want to let him go. He held the older man, Christie’s father, so many times a pain in his butt, but still Christie’s father, who’d loved her more than anything, and his grandsons, her sons, at his right elbow. Behind him stood Christie’s godfather, Jules Advere, who’d collapsed when he’d seen Charlotte Pallack in San Francisco. The phone call from Chappy seemed a lifetime ago, but it wasn’t.

  The gentle monotone of voices went on and on until he thought he might start to weep, and not stop.

  At the end of it all, Reverend Lindsay came over to shake Dix’s hand. The reverend had a strong hand, dry and firm. “Dix—”

  Reverend Lindsay said nothing more until Dix raised his face and looked at him directly. He said very quietly, his voice as firm and steady as his hand still holding Dix’s, “Christie’s home now. And she knows you and the boys will always hold her in your hearts, in rich memories that will never leave you.” Like Savich’s words, Dix thought. Reverend Lindsay laid his ha
nds on both boys’ shoulders. “Rob, Rafe, I want you to remember your mother as a woman of joy, laughter, and endless goodness. She loved you both with all that was in her.” He drew both boys against him. “She had such great pride in both of you, enjoyed both of you so very much.”

  When he turned to Chappy, he enfolded him in his arms as he had the boys, and held him, not saying a word. The sun went behind the clouds again, and the rain began to fall more heavily.

  Ruth raised her face to the rain and felt how warm it was, and how it seemed to soothe away some of the deadening pain. Dix looked at her over his boys’ heads.

  She smiled, and nodded, and took his hand. The four of them made their way through the lingering crowds of townspeople, some who’d known Christie only by sight, some dear friends, their eyes still red with tears, and they walked slowly through them, trying to make eye contact with them, shake hands, so many hands, all of them wanting to say the right thing. Rob sobbed and Ruth leaned down and kissed his cheek, nothing more. He plowed ahead, doing what his father was doing, speaking and nodding, grateful there were so many people who’d wanted to say good-bye to his mother.

  Savich and Sherlock stood beside Tony and Cynthia Holcombe. Tony’s cheeks were stained with his tears, but he smiled as he shook Savich’s hand.

  “Thank you for helping Dix. Thank you for bringing my sister home.”

  “Dix managed that all by himself,” Sherlock said. “He wouldn’t let it go. It was Dix who brought it to an end.”

  Hours later, when everyone had left Dix’s house, and it was quiet, and the four of them were finally alone with themselves and with each other, Dix suddenly stilled. He could swear he felt Christie close, felt her warmth, the memory of the light sweep of her fingers against his cheek. He felt her there, in front of him, smiling and nodding, and then, slowly, she backed away, farther and farther, until there was only the still warm air, and his family.

  WASHINGTON, D.C.

  Savich walked out of Reagan Airport into bright late-morning sunlight that nearly blinded him. He slipped on his sunglasses, hefted his carry-on clothes bag and MAX, and looked toward the line of taxis.