One Kill Away

by Alex MacLean

  Melissa cleared her throat and stepped aside. “You can just go in to see Brian. Don’t worry about your shoes.”

  Allan brushed past her, gave Tom a nod. “G’mornin.”

  “G’mornin,” Tom said.

  Allan found Brian in his bedroom, sitting on a rug, playing with his Lego set. He was dressed in a blue t-shirt and plaid pajama bottoms.

  “Dad.” Brian’s face lit up. “I’m building the police station I got for my birthday.”

  “How’s it coming along?”

  “Good. I just started. Want to help me?”

  Allan’s stomach felt hollow. He sat down on the edge of the bed and looked at his watch: 8:47. He had just over an hour to drop off his rental car and make his flight. Not enough time to enjoy his son or for his son to enjoy him.

  Brian pointed to two Lego policemen on his dresser. Black uniforms, gold badges, and for some reason, white hats.

  “That’s me and you.”

  Allan tried to smile. “Partners.”

  “Yeah.” Brian giggled. “We’d make a great team. Right?”

  “We would. For sure.”

  Allan’s gaze drifted past the two figures and settled on a picture leaning against the mirror. Brian had his arms draped around Allan and Melissa, an ear-to-ear grin on his face. A football-shaped cake marking his seventh birthday sat on the table in front of them. The smiles of both parents belied the tension and awkwardness of the moment.

  “Dad?”

  Allan raised his eyebrows. “Mhm.”

  “Are you sad?”

  Allan lowered his head, swallowed over a painful lump in his throat. “Do I look sad?”

  “Yeah.”

  “I am,” he admitted.

  “Why?”

  Allan looked at him now. “Come here, son.”

  Brian got off the floor and walked over. Allan clasped him gently by the wrists and gazed into his face, taking in the light dash of freckles on his nose, the tiny smile playing at the right corner of his mouth, the innocent look in his eyes only a child could have.

  What to say, he wondered, when no words were adequate.

  “I…” He swallowed again. “I have to go back home.”

  Brian’s face dropped. “What?”

  “It’s just for a little while.”

  “Why, Dad?”

  “I have to—”

  Brian pulled his arms away. “You said we would see each other more.”

  “I know.”

  “You promised.”

  Brian’s eyes misted and his chin quivered. He turned sideways, crossing his arms. Sobs began racking his body. It was the worst feeling in the world, Allan realized, to hurt a child. He mentally cursed Melissa for bringing Brian up here, cursed himself for letting her.

  He slid in front of Brian, saw the tears rolling down his cheeks. Heartsick, Allan opened his mouth to speak, but found himself too choked up to get the words out. He pulled his son close, hugging him, and Brian’s arms came tight around Allan’s neck. He cried against his chest, softly and raggedly, pausing brief seconds to breathe.

  “I don’t want you to go, Dad.”

  “I don’t want to go either. But—”

  “Then stay here.”

  Allan pulled himself back, holding Brian to see his face.

  “I have to catch another bad guy,” he said. “He’s hurt people.”

  Brian sniffled. “Are you coming back?”

  “If you want me to.”

  “Yes.”

  “We can play with the monster truck again. Even go back to the zoo. See your little friend, the baboon.”

  Brian wiped his eyes with his knuckles and gave a broken chuckle.

  “Would you like that?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Maybe you can even come down to Halifax on your summer vacation and stay with me for a couple of weeks.”

  “I can see Buddy again,” Brian said with renewed hope.

  “Buddy would love to see you.”

  Brian looked at him, eyes red and puffy. “Okay, Dad.”

  Allan gave him another hug, kissed the top of his head, and promised to see him soon. As he walked through the house, he found he couldn’t look at Melissa.

  When he reached his car and opened the door, he heard Brian call out to him. Allan looked over the roof and saw him running across the front lawn toward him.

  “You can have this, Dad,” he said, handing him a photo.

  It was the birthday picture that had been on Brian’s dresser.

  “Thanks, son. But what about you?”

  “Mommy can give me another one. I want you to have it. So you don’t get lonely.”

  Allan bit down on his lip and knelt in front of Brian.

  “Do you know what the best day of my life was?” he asked.

  “What?”

  “The day you were born.”

  Allan kissed his forehead, turned away, and hopped into the car before Brian could see his face. Slowly, he drove off, watching his son in the rearview mirror waving to him from the curb, his image blurring from the tears welling up in his eyes.

  28

  Halifax, June 13

  2:25 p.m.

  Allan stepped off the elevator at the 3rd floor of the IWK Health Center. He made his way to the PICU and the main desk buzzed him through. A tiny receptionist with short dark hair took his information and told him Daphne was in bed #12.

  The patient rooms were set up in a semi-circle around a central nursing station. Some rooms had windows, others were wide open. As Allan passed them, checking numbers on the wall, he could hear a cacophony of beeps and alarms, low voices and weak coughing.

  He reached Daphne’s room and stopped at the doorway, looking inside. She lay upon a big bed as if asleep. Tubes connected her head and body to IV bags and monitoring machines with blinking lights and rolling displays. The respirator pumping air and oxygen into her lungs gave off a rhythmic whoosh.

  Audra sat in a visitor’s chair, holding Daphne’s hand and speaking to her in hushed tones. Daniel stood at the foot of the bed, his arms crossed, his head down.

  The day outside was dreary. Sheets of rain swept past the window and at times, gusts tossed the rain against the glass.

  Allan caught Daniel’s eye and he looked at him, made a “psst” to Audra. She glanced over, then laid Daphne’s hand on the sheet.

  “I’ll be back, honey,” she whispered. “Just have to step out for a couple of minutes.”

  She stood up and steadied one hand on the windowsill. To Allan, Audra looked dead on her feet. He wondered if she’d slept at all since the tragedy happened. Her face was drawn and stripped of color. She carried herself to the doorway with the composure of a warrior torn apart by unimaginable sorrow and struggling to hold it together.

  “How is she?” Allan asked.

  Audra flinched. “I don’t know. They can’t give me any answers. Her prognosis depends on how long her brain went without oxygen. She might have permanent brain damage. If she even pulls out of this.”

  “I’m sorry this happened to you.”

  Audra leaned a shoulder against the wall and crossed her arms, dropped her gaze to the floor. A moist film appeared in her eyes.

  “I talk to her,” she said. “I read to her. I hope she can hear me. They tell me she might be able to even if she can’t respond.” She looked up now. “This never should’ve happened. I saw the signs, Al. I saw them. But I got so wrapped up with work.”

  Allan peered into her ravaged face, felt her words stir emotions he found hard to bear. He reached out and touched her arm.

  “Don’t blame yourself for this.”

  Audra tilted her head. “You know I found her?”

  Allan removed his hand, quietly shook his head.

  “Yeah, I did.” Audra nodded and her eyes grew distant, haunted. “Right before I left the house yesterday, Daphne was acting weird. She came into the den and kissed me. Told me she loved me. She never did that before. I went out to the ca
r and I could feel it in my gut as I drove away. This sickening feeling.” She touched a fist to her stomach. “Maybe it was mother’s intuition. I went back home and I could hear this banging, banging, banging upstairs. I called out to Daphne, but she never answered. I went up to her room.” Briefly, she stopped, her voice choked. “And there she was…my baby hanging in her closet. The banging was coming from her limps convulsing against the floor and wall.”

  That drew a mental image Allan winced at and he quickly threw it out his mind.

  “You saved her life,” he said at last. “Where would she be if you hadn’t gone back home? Where would you be?”

  Tears fell on Audra’s cheeks. “I’d be burying her. Then they’d be burying me.”

  She came off the wall, squaring her shoulders. With a heavy heart Allan watched her pull a Kleenex from a pants pocket and dab at her face with it.

  Suddenly, someone let out a piercing wail in one of the rooms on the other side of the nurses’ station. Moments later, a team of doctors rushed in and a young woman came staggering out, hands pressed to her face, sobbing.

  Audra shook her head and turned to Allan.

  “I hate this place,” she said.

  Allan gave a nod. “Me too.”

  Audra shoved the Kleenex in her pocket. “My files are down in the car.”

  “Let’s go.”

  Audra poked her head into the room and held up a hand, splaying her fingers to Daniel. “Back in five.”

  Then she and Allan took the elevator down to the main floor and went outside to the parking lot where she retrieved her briefcase from her car.

  “Everything is in here,” she said, handing the case to Allan.

  “Any leads?” he asked.

  “I have someone on surveillance video. I’m sure it’s our guy. But he never lifts his head or even glances toward the camera. Not for a second.”

  Allan paused. “As if he knew it was there.”

  “Oh, he knew it was there,” Audra said. “Wait until you see the video. There’s a copy in my files. It was pouring rain that night which just makes matters worse.”

  Allan considered that. “Wonder if that was deliberate? Picking such a messy night?”

  Audra shrugged. “Possible.”

  “Where was this camera located?”

  “You know Atlantic News, right beside Dory’s apartment building?”

  Allan nodded.

  “They have an outside camera on the back corner of the building, facing the sidewalk on Morris. It showed the man coming from Birmingham Street. He crossed Morris and came up the sidewalk toward the camera. He had his head down the whole time and as he got closer, he actually reached up and pulled the hood of his raincoat down and kept his hand there in front of his face. That’s when I saw the gloves he had on.”

  “He came prepared,” Allan said.

  “Exactly.”

  “Did he walk past the camera?”

  Audra shook her head. “He cut through a parking lot behind the building. From there, all he had to do was go up a small hill and he would’ve been right at Dory’s back door.”

  “Was he on camera coming back?”

  “Yeah. Roughly forty minutes later.”

  Allan paused, tipped his head back. “He spent time with Dory.”

  “Yup,” Audra said. “The scene struck me as personal. Filled with a lot of rage.”

  “How so?”

  “Dory was murdered with an axe. And it wasn’t pretty.”

  Allan raised his eyebrows. “An axe? Wow.”

  “The suspect also wrote the word ‘corpse’ on the axe handle.”

  “Corpse?” Allan frowned. “Hmm.”

  Audra folded her arms, leaned against the car. “I know. It’s weird.”

  Allan lowered his gaze. He found his mind spinning around the mystery word. Did it serve some psychological purpose of the suspect, a glimpse inside his warped circuitry? Or was it a rhetorical message to the police or the media or even to the other members of the Black Scorpions?

  “Feel like a coffee?” Allan asked. “I know I could use one.”

  Audra hesitated. “Okay. Sure.”

  They went back inside the hospital and headed to the Goldbloom Pavilion where they grabbed a table away from everyone else. Audra sat down, looking beat and detached from her surroundings. Allan laid the briefcase on the table, then bought each of them a coffee at the Tim Hortons kiosk. When he set the coffee in front of Audra, she peeled off the lid and gripped the cup in both hands as if to warm them.

  “The suspect had a shotgun with him,” she said. “Coulter found evidence of it during the autopsy.”

  “What kind of evidence?”

  “A muzzle stamp on Dory’s cheek. The diameter matched that of a twelve gauge. Swabbing confirmed the presence of GSR on the skin.”

  “The shotgun wasn’t fired at all?”

  “No,” Audra said. “I think the suspect used the shotgun to force his way into Dory’s apartment. Then used it further to control Dory while he bound him to a chair and put duct tape over his mouth.”

  “All that before killing him?”

  “Yes.”

  Allan drank some coffee, mulling that over. Why not just shoot Dory once he opened the door? The longer the suspect stayed, the greater his chance of being caught at the scene.

  “Doesn’t make sense,” he said. “You’d think he’d want to make a quick getaway. Why go through all that trouble?”

  “He made it personal.”

  “Revenge.”

  Audra nodded. “That’s my guess. There were no signs of robbery. We found drugs, money, and a Sig in Dory’s bedroom. None of it touched.”

  “Did the Sig turn up in the Registry?”

  Audra shook her head, took a small sip of coffee.

  “Black market,” Allan said.

  “Yup.” Audra set her cup down and stared at the wisps of steam lifting off the coffee, her eyes faraway. “The woman who found Dory was having an affair with him. I first suspected the husband. What if he found out? What if he’s the insanely jealous type? His background even turned up a prior for assault two years ago.”

  “Not him?” Allan asked.

  “No. His physicality doesn’t match the man in the video.”

  “After all the shit Dory has done over the years, the list of people who hate him is probably long. Same with Kaufman and Higgins.”

  Audra looked up from her coffee. “I wonder if they’re at risk?”

  “Hard to say.”

  “I don’t think either of them know who did this. Or else they would’ve done something by now.”

  “Have you interviewed them?”

  “Kaufman.” Audra paused and her chin wrinkled. “I was heading out to interview Higgins yesterday when this happened with Daphne.”

  Allan watched as she lowered her gaze to the tabletop and began pulling on her fingers. Around them came the murmur of voices, the scrape of chairs across the tile floor.

  “Kaufman was a waste of time,” Audra said at last. “What an asshole.”

  Allan drained the last of his coffee. “Trust me. Higgins is an even bigger one.”

  Audra nodded. Then she grimaced and pushed her cup away. “I can’t drink this, Al.”

  “Leave it.”

  She needed to be at Daphne’s side, Allan knew. Not down here talking shop. He got up and walked over to the trash bin, dumped his cup inside. He went back to Audra, reaching out his hand to her. She blinked at it and gave him a broken smile.

  “Go be with your daughter,” he said.

  When she took his hand, Allan could feel the tremor in her light grip. She rose to her feet and hugged him.

  “Thanks, Al.” She pulled away from him. “I know what you sacrificed to come back. It was Thorne’s idea to call you. Not mine.”

  “Don’t worry about it.”

  Audra’s eyes grew sad. “Are the rumors true?”

  “What?”

  “That you’re leaving us?”<
br />
  Allan stared at her, stilted, not knowing what to say. This past week with Brian had given him a new lease on life. He’d felt it in his soul. That freedom. That happiness. That love.

  He said, “It might be time to move on. Pass the torch to someone else.”

  Audra searched his face. Then she reached out and touched his arm.

  “You know I’ll miss ya. But I understand.”

  She turned and walked across the lobby to the elevators, pressed a button and waited. In moments, the doors slid open with a chime. Allan watched her step inside, a woman carrying more burden than he wished to think about. She looked out at him as the doors closed on her.

  I’ll miss you too, he thought.

  29

  Halifax, June 13

  3:55 p.m.

  It greeted Audra like an unwelcome guest the moment she opened the kitchen door—the stillness, the emptiness, the sense of something amiss. She stood on the threshold and inhaled a deep breath.

  After Allan had left the hospital, Daniel told Audra to go home for a few hours to clean up and get some rest. Even the nurses were getting worried about her. Last night, each time she had dozed off, she snapped awake in a panic, thinking something bad would happen to Daphne if she fell asleep on her. Audra hadn’t reached the point of delirium, but she could feel herself becoming unfocused and clumsy.

  She told herself Daphne was in good hands. If her condition changed, Daniel would call. Still, it didn’t lessen the guilt or worry.

  Audra tossed her keys on the counter, went to the refrigerator. She ate some fruit and yogurt, steeped a cup of tea. When she headed for upstairs—her footsteps growing slower the closer she got to the top—she found herself unable to face Daphne’s empty bedroom. She just wasn’t ready.

  She went to her own bedroom first, straight for the master bathroom where she stripped off her clothes and jumped into the shower. Closing her eyes, she raised her face to the hot spray, then lowered her head and let the pins of water massage the back of her neck.

  She thought of Daphne rubbing her shoulders in the den, kissing the top of her head.

  “I love you, Mom.”

  Her daughter was really saying goodbye. That realization tore Audra apart. She felt the urge to cry again, to sink to her knees, and empty that physical pain building inside her. Let it all flow down the drain with the wastewater and out to the sewer system to disappear forever.