Branded by the Sheriff

by Delores Fossen

  “What do you want?” she tried to say, but his hand muffled any sound.

  Still, there were sounds. Footsteps, both his and hers, as he started to drag her in the direction of the back door. Beck would likely hear the sounds, even though he might still be on the phone dealing with the call that’d come in. Once that call was finished, he would begin to wonder what was taking her so long to get a drink of water.

  Then Beck would come looking for her.

  And this person might shoot him.

  He jammed the gun even harder against her temple when she started to struggle, and Faith had to try to come to terms with the fact that she might be murdered tonight. She thought of Aubrey, of her precious little girl. And of Beck. He would blame himself for this because he hadn’t been there to protect her. But Faith didn’t want him there. She wanted to live, but not at the expense of Beck being killed.

  The man opened the back door, and cold air rushed inside, cutting what little breath she had. He tried to push her outside, but Faith dug in her heels. If he got her out of the house and away from Beck, he’d just take her to a secondary crime scene where he’d do God knows what to her.

  But why?

  And that brought her back to the question of whom.

  Had Nolan hired someone to do this last deed? A way of reaching out from beyond the grave to settle an old score with her?

  Of course, there was another possibility. One she didn’t want to consider—maybe somehow her brother had gotten free. Maybe he really was a killer after all and had come to eliminate the last member of their family.

  “Faith?” she heard Beck call out.

  Her attacker froze for just a moment and then resumed the struggle to get her out the door. She tried to warn Beck, but her assailant’s hand prevented that.

  “What the hell’s going on?” Beck called.

  Though it was pitch-dark, she spotted him in the hallway opening just off the kitchen. She also saw him lift his gun and take aim.

  The attacker stopped trying to shove her out the door, and he pivoted, placing her in front of him. He even crouched slightly down so that his head was partially behind hers.

  She was now a human shield.

  “Who are you?” Beck demanded. He squinted, obviously trying to adjust to the darkness. He reached out for the light switch on the wall next to him.

  “Don’t,” her attacker growled. He kept his voice throaty and low, but there were no doubts that this was a man. A strong one. He had her in a death grip, and the barrel of the gun cut into her skin.

  Beck didn’t turn on the light, but he kept his gun aimed.

  “I’m leaving with her,” the man said. He was obviously trying to disguise his voice. That meant Beck and she probably knew him.

  Inching sideways and with her still in front of him to block Beck’s shot, the man started dragging her back to the door.

  Faith didn’t know whether to fight or not. If she did resist, he might just shoot Beck. However, the same might happen if she cooperated.

  Beck inched closer as well, and because she was watching him, she saw his eyes widen. He didn’t drop his gun, but he did lower it.

  “Pete?” Beck called out.

  The man’s muscles went stiff, and he stopped. She heard every word of his harshly whispered profanity.

  “What the hell do you think you’re doing?” Beck demanded. He came even closer.

  “Stop,” the man said. Not a muffled whisper this time. She clearly heard his voice.

  It was indeed Pete, Beck’s brother.

  “Well?” Beck prompted. “What the hell are you doing?”

  “What’s necessary.” With that, Pete jammed the gun even harder against her. She could smell the liquor on his breath, but he wasn’t drunk. He was too steady for that.

  “What’s necessary?” Beck spat out. “How did you even get in here?”

  “You gave Dad the codes to disarm the security system and I used the key you gave me for emergencies. I didn’t want you to be part of this,” Pete said to Beck. “I wanted to take care of her before you noticed she was missing. She’s a loose end.”

  Beck shook his head, and his expression said it all. He couldn’t believe this was happening. “Put down your gun.”

  “I can’t. I have to fix this.” Pete groaned and took his hand from her mouth. “I’ve made a mess of my life.”

  “You can fix things the legal way,” Beck insisted. His voice was calm, and he took another step toward them. “Put down the gun.”

  “It’s too late for that. I killed them, Beck. I killed them all.”

  Oh, God. It was true. Pete was a killer, and he had her in his grips.

  “You mean you killed Sherry and Annie?” Beck clarified.

  “Yeah, I did. But it was all Sherry’s fault. I swear she tricked me into that affair. When I saw her at the Moonlight Bar, she came onto me, got me drunk and then took pictures of me when I was sleeping. She blackmailed me. And I gave her the money. I gave her exactly what she wanted—ten thousand dollars that I got from Dad’s accounts. Look where it got me.”

  “Start from the beginning. What happened?” Beck asked.

  “The beginning? I’m not sure when it all started. But killing Sherry was an accident. I swear. I used the tranquilizer gun from the stables and drugged her so I could reason with her. But the drug wore off too soon, and when she started struggling, I had to strangle her.”

  “It wasn’t premeditated,” Beck explained. “You could maybe plea down to manslaughter. That’s why you need to put down the gun so we can talk.”

  “Talking’s not going to save me. Sherry’s death might not have been premeditated, but the others were.”

  Until that statement, Beck had managed to maintain some of his cop’s persona, but the grim reality of Pete’s confession etched his face with not just concern but shock. “What do you mean?”

  “After I killed Sherry, I tried to get the money back so Dad and Nicole wouldn’t find out, but Annie wouldn’t give it to me. She said she wanted it and more. A lot more. She wanted fifty thousand dollars. That’s when I had to kill her. I couldn’t keep paying her off, and I knew she’d tell Nicole.”

  It was so hard for Faith to hear all of this. She hadn’t been close to Sherry or her mother, but both of them had been killed for money. For greed. And to cover up an affair that Sherry had probably orchestrated just so she could blackmail Pete. If he hadn’t been thinking from below the belt, Pete might have figured it out before things got this far.

  “I thought after I killed Annie that it’d be over,” Pete continued, his voice weary and dry. “But I got another letter demanding more money. I thought it came from Nolan. That’s why I put a gun to his head and made him write that suicide note. But he insisted right up to the end that he hadn’t sent any blackmail letters.”

  “You killed him anyway,” Beck said. It wasn’t a question.

  “Nolan Wheeler deserved to die.” Pete’s voice was suddenly defiant. “He’d been skirting the law for years. I did the world a favor.”

  “The world might not agree,” Beck countered. “I certainly don’t. You killed three people, and you’re holding a gun on your brother and the assistant district attorney. Where’s the justice in that?”

  Pete stayed quiet a moment. “It’ll be my own form of justice. I can’t let either of you live. Especially Faith. This afternoon there was another blackmail letter in the mailbox. She put it there. I know she did. There couldn’t be anyone else.”

  “You don’t know that. It could be one of Sherry’s friends. Besides, Faith’s been with me all day. She couldn’t have put the letter in the mailbox.”

  “I don’t believe you,” Pete practically shouted. “You’re covering for her because you’re sleeping with her. You chose her over your own family.”

  “Maybe I did,” Beck conceded. Unlike Pete, he kept his voice level and calm though Faith didn’t know how he managed to do that. “But it’s my job to protect her.” He took anot
her step toward them. “Put the gun down, Pete, and let’s talk this out.”

  “No. No more talking. I’d wanted to do this clean and nearly succeeded last night. I got the tranquilizer in her, but then you came to the rescue. Just like tonight. But the difference is, tonight I’ll kill you, too.”

  “I’m your brother,” Beck reminded him. “Think what killing me would do the family.”

  “I can’t think about that. I have to protect Nicole. She’s my first and only concern. I have to make sure she never learns about any of this. The only way for that to happen is for you to die.”

  Pete re-aimed his gun.

  At Beck.

  Faith felt the muscles in Pete’s arm tense. She saw the realization of what was about to happen on Beck’s face. He couldn’t shoot at his brother because he might hit her. Pete, however, had no concern about that since he intended to kill them both anyway.

  She yelled for Beck to get down. With the sound of her voice echoing through the house, Faith turned, ramming her shoulder into Pete. He hardly budged from the impact, but it was enough to shake his aim.

  The bullet that Pete fired slammed into the wall next to the fridge.

  Beck lunged at them, and the hard tackle sent all three of them to the floor. Beck’s own gun went flying, and it skittered across the floor. And the race was on to see which one would come up with Pete’s gun.

  Faith managed to untangle herself from the mix. She got to her feet and slapped on the light. Pete and Beck were practically the same size, and they were in a life-and-death struggle.

  She waited until she spotted Pete’s hand. And the gun. Faith went for it, dropping back to the floor, and she latched on to his wrist. Somehow, she had to keep that gun pointed away from Beck.

  Beck drew back his fist and slammed it into Pete’s face. The man was either tough as nails or the adrenaline had made him immune to the pain because he hardly reacted. In fact, Pete twisted his body and slammed his forearm into her jaw. The impact nearly knocked the breath from her, but somehow Faith managed to hang on to his wrist. She dug in her nails and clawed at any part of his flesh that she could reach.

  Beck threw another punch. And another. The third one was the charm. Pete’s head flopped back onto the tile floor. Dazed and bleeding from his mouth and nose, he groaned and mumbled something indistinguishable.

  “The gun,” Beck said.

  Beck wrenched it from his brother’s hand. He pulled in a hard breath and reached again, this time to roll Pete on his stomach so he could subdue him.

  “Call nine-one-one,” Beck told her.

  “You’re sure?” she asked, though she knew he had no choice. This was attempted murder. But Pete was still his brother. A lesser man would have wanted to try to resolve this without the law and tried to keep it a family secret.

  Beck nodded. “I’m sure. Make the call.”

  She got up to do that, but before Faith even made it to her feet, the back door flew open, hitting her squarely in the back and sending her plummeting into Beck.

  “Oh, my God,” someone said.

  Nicole.

  Pete used the distraction of his wife’s arrival to ram his elbow into Beck, and grab his gun.

  Faith couldn’t scramble away from him in time. Pete latched on to her hair and dragged her in front of him again.

  “January fourteenth,” Pete said as if in triumph. “Faith dies.”

  * * *

  HIS BROTHER’S WORDS WERE like stabs from a switchblade. It was the threat written in the attic. A threat Beck hadn’t announced to anyone other than law enforcement, which meant Pete had been the one to paint that threat on Faith’s attic walls.

  Oh, man. Things had really gone crazy. And worse, it might turn deadly if he didn’t do something now to stop all of this.

  Beck’s gaze connected with Faith’s. She was scared. And shocked. But he could also see determination. She wasn’t just going to stand there and let Pete kill them. She was a fighter, but this fight might cause Pete to pull that trigger even faster.

  “Pete, what’s going on?” Nicole asked.

  Nicole looked at Beck, her eyes searching for a logical answer. But he couldn’t give her one. There was no logic in any of this. Another of Pete’s affairs had gotten him into trouble, and he’d been willing to kill to keep his secret.

  “Pete killed Annie and Sherry Matthews. Nolan Wheeler, too,” Beck explained to Nicole. “Now, he’s going to put his gun down so we can deal with this.”

  Beck hoped.

  “I killed them for you, Nicole,” Pete insisted.

  She gasped and stepped back. Good. So Nicole wasn’t in on this. Maybe, just maybe, she could talk Pete into surrendering.

  “Tell Pete to put his gun down,” Beck instructed Nicole.

  She gave a choppy nod. “Please, Pete. Do as Beck says.”

  “Faith’s blackmailing me. She sent me a letter today. Left it in the mailbox—”

  “No. She didn’t.” Nicole shook her head. “I sent the last two letters.”

  Beck hadn’t thought there could be any more surprises tonight, but he’d obviously been wrong. “You?” he questioned. “Why?”

  Tears filled Nicole’s eyes. “Sherry called me two months ago and told me about her affair with Pete. She faxed me copies of the pictures of them together.”

  “Oh, God.” Pete groaned. “I’m sorry. So sorry.”

  “I know.” Nicole blinked back the tears, and her voice was eerily calm. “But I was upset, and I wanted to leave you—after I punished you. So, after Sherry and Annie were killed, I sent a third letter. This afternoon, I put the fourth one in the mailbox. I wanted you to suffer. I wanted you to think that your indiscretion would be punished for a long, long time.”

  Pete cursed. He glanced at Faith and then cursed some more.

  “Faith didn’t do anything wrong,” Beck said. “You need to let her go.”

  “Yes,” Nicole agreed. “Let her go. Let Beck handle this.”

  “I can’t. Don’t you see what has to happen here? I’ve already put the plan in place. I waited at the hospital until I could get Darin alone, and I forced him to leave with me. There are no security cameras in the entire place so it was easy. Then I left him on the side of the road about a mile from here.”

  “No,” Faith mumbled.

  Beck silently mumbled the same. With Darin hurt and possibility medicated, he shouldn’t be out on his own on a cold winter night. It was a cliché, but he could literally die in a ditch somewhere.

  “Darin will try to go home, but he won’t have an alibi,” Pete continued. “He’ll be blamed for Beck’s and Faith’s murders. Then we can start over, Nicole. I swear, no more affairs.”

  That just pissed Beck off. His brother was willing to kill Faith and him rather than take responsibility for what he’d done. Somehow, he had to get Faith out of harm’s way and subdue Pete.

  “Do you hear yourself?” Beck snapped. “I knew you were self-centered and egotistical, but I had no idea you’d stoop to this. Think it through. You plan to kill me and Faith in front of Nicole? What kind of future can you have with that hanging over your heads?”

  “Beck’s right,” Nicole added. “I could never stay with you after what you’ve done.”

  “You tricked me with those letters!” Pete shouted.

  “Letters?” Nicole threw right back at him. “I didn’t murder anyone. Nor would I. Did you honestly think I could live with a killer?”

  Pete slowly aimed his attention at Nicole. The change in his brother’s expression wasn’t subtle. Rage sliced through his eyes, and the muscles corded on his face. “I did this all for you, and this is how you treat me?”

  “You didn’t do this for Nicole.” Beck wanted to get Pete’s attention off Nicole and Faith and back onto him. Because it looked as if his brother was about to start shooting at any minute. “You did this to cover up what you’d done. Well, the covering up has to stop.”

  “Who says?” He pushed Faith onto her knees
and put the gun to the back of her head.

  She looked up. Her eyes met Beck’s. “I love you,” she said, silently mouthing the words.

  Oh, man. Oh. Man. That hit him, hard, but he knew he couldn’t think about it. Later—and there would be a later—he’d deal with her confession.

  A sound shot through the room.

  Beck was certain he lost ten years of his life. It took him a moment to realize that Pete hadn’t fired. The phone was ringing.

  “Don’t answer that,” Pete ordered. “You,” he said to Nicole. “Get down on the floor next to her.”

  Nicole frantically shook her head. “You’re going to shoot me?”

  “Yeah.” This was no longer the voice of his brother. It was the voice of a cold, calculated killer. “I love you, Nicole. I always will. But I won’t give up my life for you. I’m not going to jail for you.”

  The answering machine kicked in on the fifth ring. “Faith, it’s Marita. Pick up.”

  “No,” Faith whispered. She repeated it as Marita’s cheerful voice poured through the room.

  “I guess you’re celebrating, but I wanted you to know we’ll be there in about ten minutes. Aubrey’s sacked out, but I’ll wake her when we arrive so you can get some hugs and kisses.”

  Hell. Ten minutes. He couldn’t have Marita, Tracy and especially Aubrey walking into this.

  “I gave Marita an emergency key,” Beck let Faith know. And that meant if they didn’t answer the door, which they wouldn’t be able to do at this point, then Marita might let herself in.

  “You couldn’t hurt a child,” Beck told Pete, trying one last time to reason with him.

  Pete met him eye-to-eye. “I’m fighting for my life. I can and will hurt anyone who gets in my way.”

  Beck believed him. This wouldn’t end with a successful surrender. It would end only when he managed to stop Pete. He might even have to kill his own brother. But he would if it came down to that.

  He wouldn’t allow Pete to hurt anyone else.

  “Go ahead,” Beck instructed Nicole. “Get on the floor.”

  The tears were spilling down her cheeks now, and her eyes were wide with terror.