Angels Fall

by Nora Roberts

  stopped the car, got out and came around for her. "I can hurt you, too. if I have to," he warned her. "It's your choice."

  "I want to see Brody."

  "All right then." Rick took her arm, quick-stepped her to the cabin.

  He gave her a light shove inside before locking the door, turning on the light.

  Brody was tied to a kitchen chair, his chin slumped on his chest. On a muffled cry, Reece stumbled toward him to fall on her knees beside the chair. "Brody. Oh God, Brody."

  "He's not dead. A little drugged is all." Rick checked his watch. "Should be coming out of it soon enough. When he does, we're taking a hike, and we're getting this done."

  "Done?" She shoved herself around, and hated that she was on her knees in front of him. "Do you think because you got away with killing once, you can kill both of us and no one will know? It won't work, not this time."

  "Murder/suicide's what it'll be. That's how it's going to look. You talked him into driving out this way, hiking down to where you said you saw the killing. You drugged him. Got his thermos right over there." He nodded to the end table by the couch. "Coffee in it's spiked with pills from one of your bottles. Bottle's going to be in your pocket when we find you."

  "Why would I hurt Brody? Why would anyone believe I'd hurt Brody?"

  "You snapped, that's what you did. You snapped, drugged him so he wouldn't see it coming. You shot him, then you shot yourself. You took the gun Joanie keeps in her desk drawer to do it. Your prints'll be on the gun, gunshot residue on your hand when it's done. That's the physical evidence, and your behavior gives it plausibility."

  "That's bullshit. It's just bullshit. I've already called the state police and told them about Deena Black."

  "No, you didn't. I'm going to take those cuffs off you. It you try to run, I'll hurt you. And I'll put a bullet in Brody where he sits. You want that?"

  "'No. I won't run. Do you think I'd just leave him?"

  He rose, a patient, cautious man. Taking out his key, he uncuffed her. "You sit right there." He touched the gun in his holster as warning. "I don't want any trouble. And I don't want any bruises or signs on your wrists showing some M.E. you've been restrained. Rub the circulation back into them. Do it now."

  Her arms ached like a fever, and trembled with it as she rubbed her wrists. "I said we called and reported to the state police."

  "You'd've done that, Brody would've said so when he came out here. Told him I found out information on the killing from the state police myself. Asked him to come out here and meet me, and them, to get the details before we made an arrest."

  Going to the table, he picked up the plastic cup of water and the pill he'd set out. "Want you to take this."

  "No."

  "It's one of yours, said it was for anxiety. Might help a little, and I want them to find drugs in your system. You're going to take it, Reece, or I'm going to force it down your throat."

  She took the glass, the pill.

  Satisfied, he sat, rested his hands on his knees. "We'll give that a few minutes to work for you, then we'll get started. I'm sorry it's come to this, that's the truth. Brody's been a friend of mine, and I've got nothing against you. But I've got to protect my family."

  "Were you protecting them when you screwed Deena Black?"

  His face tightened, but he nodded. "I made a mistake. A human mistake. I love my wife, my kids. Nothing's more important. But there are needs, that's all. Two, three times a year I took care of those needs. None of it ever touched my family. I'd say I was a better husband, better daddy, better man for taking care of them."

  He believed it, Reece realized. How many people deluded themselves into believing cheating was somehow honorable?

  "You took care of them with Deena."

  "One night. It was supposed to be just one night. What difference could it make to anyone but me? Just sex, that's all. Things a man needs but doesn't want his wife doing. One night out of so many others. But I couldn't stop. Something about her got into me. Like a sickness. I couldn't leave her alone, and for a while I thought, I guess I thought it was love. And that I could have them both."

  "The dark and the light," Reece said.

  "That's right." He smiled with terrible sadness. "I gave Deena all I could. She kept wanting more. The kind of more I couldn't give. She wanted me to leave Debbie, leave my kids behind. I was never going to do that, never going to lose my wife and kids. We had a fight, terrible fight, and I woke up. You could say I woke up from a long, dark dream. I broke it off then and there."

  "But she wouldn't let it stay broken off." Wake up, Brody, she thought desperately. Wake up and tell me what to do.

  "She kept calling me. She wanted money, ten thousand or she'd tell my wife. I didn't have that kind of money, and I told her. She said I'd better find it if I wanted to keep my happy home. How you feeling? Calmer?"

  "I saw you, by the river. I saw you kill her."

  "I was just going to reason with her. I told her to come here. I used to bring her here, here to the cabin when I was in that long, dark dream. But when she came, I couldn't talk to her here, not here, not again. Maybe you should have two of those pills."

  "You took her down to the river."

  "Wanted to walk, that's all. Never planned it. We just walked, we kept walking until we came to the river. I told her maybe I could scrape together a couple thousand, stake her, if she left Wyoming. Even when I said it I knew it wouldn't work. Once you pay, you never stop. Said she wasn't settling for crumbs. Wanted the whole cake. I could take it out of the money we had for the kids. I don't know why I told her we've put by money for our kids, for their college. She wanted it. Not ten now, she said, but twenty-five. Twenty-five or I'd end up with nothing. No wife, no kids, no reputation.

  "I called her a whore, because that's what she was, what she'd always been. And she came at me. And when I pushed her down and told her it was done, she came at me again, screaming.

  "You saw how it was."

  "Yes, I saw how it was."

  "She was going to ruin me, she swore it. No matter what I paid now, she was taking it all. She was going to tell Debbie every dirty little thing we'd ever done together. I couldn't even hear her anymore. It was like wasps buzzing in my head. But she was on the ground, under me, and my hands were around her throat. I kept squeezing, squeezing, until the buzzing stopped."

  "You didn't have any choice." Reece's voice was absolutely calm. "She pushed you to it. She attacked you, threatened you. You had to protect yourself, your family."

  "I did. Yes, I did. She wasn't even real. She was only a dream."

  "I understand. My God. she was literally holding a gun to your head. You haven't done anything wrong yet, Rick. You haven't hurt anyone who didn't deserve it, done anything that wasn't absolutely necessary. If I'd understood all this before, I'd have let it go."

  "But you didn't let it go. No matter what I did. All I wanted was for you to leave town. Just go away and get on with your life so I could get on with mine."

  "I know that now. I'm on your side now. You can just let me and Brody go, and this all disappears."

  "I wish I could, Reece. That's the God's truth. But you can't change what is. You've just got to work with it, and protect what you have. Guess one of those pills was enough, after all. Now, I want you to move away from him. It's time I woke him up."

  "It you do this, you don't deserve your wife and your children."

  "Once it's done, they'll never have to know." He crossed to her, grabbed her by the back of the shirt and dragged her away from Brody.

  As he turned back, Brody pumped his legs, rising up, chair and all. He swung his body hard into Rick's and sent them both sprawling.

  "Run!" Brody shouted. "Run now."

  She ran, terrified and blind with it, following the order as if a switch had been flicked inside her. Spitting out the pill she'd cheeked, she yanked open the front door. She heard the crash, the curses, the crack of wood as she flew outside.

  An
d she ran with a scream shrieking in her head when she heard the gunshot.

  "DID YOU HEAR THAT?" Linda-gail pushed up on her elbow in bed. "I heard a shot."

  "I heard the angels sing."

  She laughed and poked Lo in the side. "That. too. But I heard somebody shooting."

  "Now who'd think you'd ever hear somebody shooting in the backwoods of Wyoming?" He pulled her back down, digging his hands into her ribs to make her laugh.

  '"No tickling or I'll… Did you hear that? Is that someone shouting?"

  "I don't hear anything but my own heart begging yours for a little more sugar. Now come on, honey, let's—"

  This time it was Lo who broke off at the crash outside the cabin. "Stay right here."

  He leaped up and, buck naked, strode out of the bedroom.

  When Reece burst in, he could only cross his hands over his privates and say, "Well, Jesus Christ!"

  "He's got Brody. He's got Brody. He's going to kill him."

  "What, what? What?"

  "Help. You have to help."

  "Reece?" Linda-gail fought to wrap a sheet around herself as she came out. "What in the world's going on?"

  No time, Reece thought. Brody could already be bleeding, dying. As she'd been once. She spotted the rifle in a display case. "Is that loaded?"

  "That's my granddaddy's Henry rifle. Just a damn minute," Lo began, but Reece rushed to the case. She gave the lid a jerk, found it locked. She spun, grabbed the bear pole lamp and shattered the glass.

  "Chrissake, chrissake, my ma's going to kill us both." Even as Lo made a dash for her, Reece yanked the rifle out, whirled around with it.

  Lo stopped dead in his tracks. "Honey? You want to be careful where you point that thing."

  "Call for help. Call the state police!"

  Leaving them both gaping behind her, Reece streaked for the door.

  Reece prayed Lo's reaction meant the rifle was loaded. That if it was, she could figure out how to work it. She prayed harder still that she wouldn't have to.

  But it wasn't fear, that familiar burn in her throat: it wasn't panic, with its sharp, fluttering wings in her belly. It was rage she felt, the hot, bubbling gush of it pumping through her blood.

  She wouldn't lie helpless this time, not this time, while someone she loved was taken from her. Not this time, not ever again.

  She heard Rick shouting her name, and forced back the tears that wanted to blur her eyes. Brody hadn't stopped him.

  So she stopped, closed her eyes and ordered herself to think. She couldn't go running back to the cabin. He'd hear her, see her. And he would end it. He might very well end up killing Lo and Linda-gail as well.

  Circle around, she decided. She could do that. He'd think she was still running, or just hiding. He wouldn't expect her to come back to fight.

  "No place for you to go, Reece," Rick shouted. "No place I can't find you. This is my land here, my world. I can track you as easy as I can walk down the street in the Fist. You want me to finish Brody here and now? Is that what you want? Want me to put a bullet in his head while you're hiding like you did back in Boston? Think you can live through that one again?"

  In front of the cabin, Rick dragged a bleeding Brody to his knees. And pressed the gun to his temple. "Call her back here."

  "No." Brody's heart squeezed as the barrel pressed hard against his temple. "Think about it, Rick. Is that what you'd do if it was your woman's life on the line? You killed to protect someone you love. Wouldn't you die for her?"

  "You've known her a couple of months, and you want to tell me you'd die here for her?"

  "It only takes a minute. When you know, you know. She's it for me. So pull the trigger if that's what you have to do. But it's ruined for you now. That's your service revolver you're holding, not Joanie's gun. How-are you going to explain Reece shooting me with your service weapon?"

  "Adjust. I'll adjust. I'll make it work. You call her back. Now."

  "You hear me, Reece?" Brody shouted. "If you hear me you keep running."

  When Rick kicked him down, he landed on the arm where a bullet was lodged. It screamed.

  "I've got no choice," he said to Brody, but now his face was pale and ran with sweat. "I'm sorry."

  He lifted the gun.

  Struggling not to shake, Reece brought the rifle to her shoulder. She sucked in a breath, held it. And pulled the trigger.

  It sounded like a bomb. It felt like one had exploded in her hands as the recoil slammed into her. She fell back, fell down. And because she landed flat on her back, the shot from Mardson's revolver flew over her head.

  Still she scrambled up. When she did, she saw Brody and Rick struggling on the ground, the gun gripped in each of their hands.

  "Stop it." She rushed forward. "'Stop it. Stop it." Pressed the barrel of the rifle to Rick's head. '"Stop it."

  "Hold on, Slim," Brody panted out. He shifted to get a better grip on the gun. Rick rolled into Reece, knocking her down as he yanked it clear. As he turned it toward his own temple, Brody plowed his fist into Rick's face.

  "It won't be that easy," he told him, and crawled over to retrieve the gun that had fallen out of Rick's hands. "Point that thing somewhere else," Brody told her.

  She sat where she was a moment, the rifle still clutched in her hands. "I ran."

  "Yeah, you did. Smart."

  "But I didn't run away."

  Because he was tired, hurt and queasy, Brody simply sat beside her. "No, you didn't run away."

  Lo and Linda-gail, the first in only jeans, the other in a trailing sheet, rushed over. "What in the name of Christ is going on?" Lo demanded. "Jesus, Brody. Jesus! You shot?"

  "Yeah." Brody pressed a hand to his arm, studied the palm that came away wet and red betore he looked up at Reece. "Something else we've got in common now."

  Between them, Rick lay as he was, and he covered his face with his hands and wept.

  AT DAWN, Reece helped Brody out of the car. "You could've stayed in the hospital for the day. A couple of days."

  "I could've spent a couple hours banging a bedpan over my head. I didn't relish either experience. Plus, did you see that nurse they sicced on me? She had a face like a bulldog. Scary."

  "Then you're going to do what you're told. You can have the bed or the sofa."

  "Where will you be?"

  "In the kitchen. You're not having coffee."

  "Slim, I may just be off coffee for life."

  Her lips trembled, but she firmed them against a sob. "I'm making you some tea, and some soft scrambled eggs. Bed or couch?"

  "I want to sit in the kitchen and watch you cook for me. It'll take my mind off my pain."

  "You wouldn't have pain if you'd take the drugs."

  "I think I'm off drugs for life, too. Felt like swimming through glue back there at Rick's cabin. I could hear the two of you talking, but couldn't compute the words, not at first. All I could do was play possum and hope for a chance to take him down."

  "While you were tied to a chair and dopey with pills, he might've killed you."

  "He might've killed both of us. Would have," Brody corrected, "but you didn't run like a rabbit when you had the chance." He let out a long breath when she eased him into a chair at the kitchen table. "Hell of a night, Reece?" he said when she kept her back turned and said nothing.

  "At first," she began, "when I first ran out, that's all it was. Fight or flight, and boy, it was flight all the way. Run and hide. But… it changed. I don't even know when. And it became run and find something so you can fight. I guess I scared a couple of decades off Lo and Linda-gail."

  "Something to tell their grandchildren about."

  "Yeah." She put on water for tea, got out a skillet.