The Last Noel

by Heather Graham

  “Not until I’ve had me chance to say Merry Christmas to me niece,” Paddy announced. He walked over to her and hugged her, taking the chance to whisper, “Sheila knows.”

  She hugged him more tightly, adrenaline racing through her. Was he crazy? Was he just trying to give her hope?

  Or could it be true?

  As Paddy pulled away, she lowered her eyes to hide the light of hope, choosing to believe what he’d said was true—that the cops knew—and realizing that everything had to be played out meticulously.

  Or else someone would die.

  Sheila didn’t want to go far from the O’Boyle house, but it was freezing and the snow was still flying and their snowmobiles didn’t offer any protection against the storm. She also knew they had to carefully weigh every possible course of action and that they wouldn’t think clearly if they were freezing.

  Her small Colonial house was closer to the O’Boyle residence than the office was, so she led the way there to make plans. Since they had no way of communicating to anyone from the office, anyway, it didn’t make much sense to go all that way back.

  “I know that guy’s face,” Tim told Sheila, rubbing his hands in front of the fire she had quickly stoked. “The youngest one.”

  “From where?”

  “I don’t know. But I’ve seen him.”

  Sheila was doubtful. “On a most-wanted list?” she asked skeptically. “I sure don’t know who he is. That’s not the kind of face you forget. But he managed to talk to me. Smooth as silk. He told me there were two armed men, the one we saw and another one in the kitchen with Mrs. O’Boyle and Jamie, and he’d kill them if we acted suspicious in any way. He said we had to find a way to take them both down.”

  Tim glanced at her. “He said all that?”

  “Right in the middle of an Irish lullaby,” she said flatly.

  “Well, we thought our guys might be in there,” he said.

  She produced a piece of paper. “He was definitely telling the truth. Paddy Murphy slipped this into my pocket.”

  Tim took the note from her. It was crumpled, since Paddy had wadded it into a tiny ball before slipping it into her pocket when he hugged her.

  “‘Two men with guns. Must be taken together. Will kill if threatened. Be careful,’” Tim read aloud. He looked at her. “Clever old geezer,” he said.

  “Thank God we went in carefully,” she said. “But what do we do? Try to get hold of the state police somehow? If we go at them with enough guns…”

  “No,” Tim said.

  She looked at him.

  “Sheila, Lionel Hudson is already dead. They killed him. It won’t make any difference to them if they have to kill again. If we go up against them in force, the first thing they’ll do is kill that family just to get them out of the way.”

  They were both silent, thinking.

  “He had it right, that guy Craig,” Sheila said. “Scooter, or whatever his real name is, and the guy in the kitchen have to be taken down together.”

  “The question is, how?” Tim said, turning away from the fire to pace. “We can come up with some excuse and go back over there.”

  “Sure. And then we’re up against the same thing we were before, only this time we know it. One of them will hole up somewhere with a couple of the O’Boyles, and he’ll kill them if we make a move. They’ll do it—even if they’re going to die themselves—because they don’t intend to go down alone.”

  “Oh God,” Tim said suddenly.

  “What?”

  “They’re going to figure out pretty soon that not only have we figured out who they are, but that we’ve seen their faces. If they want to get away clean, they’ll need to kill us, too.”

  “Tim, we have to go at this logically and reasonably,” Sheila said.

  “What about negotiations, then?” he asked.

  “They won’t negotiate, I’m sure of it,” Sheila said. “But we won’t give in, either. And we’ll have help,” Sheila said.

  He looked at her questioningly.

  “The family,” she said. “They’re not armed, and they’re scared as hell, but I promise you, they’ll fight to the death for one another.”

  He nodded. “Good point.”

  “And I don’t know who the hell that Craig kid is, but he’ll help us, too. He’s not one of them.”

  “Maybe he was just trying to sucker you in,” Tim warned.

  “No, he was being honest. I’d swear to it,” Sheila said.

  “Here’s the thing. I’m armed, you’re armed, and the killers are armed. There’s not going to be a chance for any warning shots. We have to take them both out.”

  “Easier said than done,” Sheila replied.

  “We just have to get back in that house.”

  “Ring the doorbell again?” Sheila said. “I don’t think so.”

  “Of course not. We have to get in without being seen.”

  The house remained comfortably warm, despite the bitter cold outside. Thanks to the generator, the lights on the tree continued to blink their message of Christmas cheer. But the living room was silent.

  Quintin had dragged one of the big upholstered chairs over to block the front door and was on guard, a watchful eye on the living room, his gun resting comfortably in his lap. Scooter was in the other armchair, asleep, his gun tucked in his waistband, where no one could steal it without waking him.

  Uncle Paddy had the love seat, Kat’s parents were on the couch, and everyone else had blankets right on the floor. Kat was all too aware of Craig lying right up against her, even though there was no longer any need to keep up the pretense of being a couple.

  Time ticked by. Kat watched the clock. Nearly one o’clock.

  One-thirty.

  She had to believe in a miracle. Had to believe that what Uncle Paddy had whispered to her under cover of a good-night hug was true—Sheila and Tim would be back, and would have the good sense not to come in with guns blazing. Because if they did?

  Quintin would take out half her family before he died.

  Her mother was curled against her father, and Mom’s eyes were actually closed. If she could ignore the circumstances, they made a nice picture. She so seldom saw them this comfortable with each other anymore.

  She shifted, trying to get more comfortable, and Quintin’s hand tightened on his gun. He eyed her for a long time without saying anything, so she closed her eyes and pretended to rest.

  A moment later, she barely withheld a scream when Craig threw an arm across her in his sleep and pulled her closer. She gritted her teeth, ready to push him away, and then she realized that he wasn’t asleep at all. His eyes were open, and he was staring at her intently, meaningfully. “Keep it together,” he whispered. “They’re coming back. And they know what’s going on.”

  Her eyes widened. “How do you know that?”

  “I told them.”

  She was silent for a very long time. “I wish I believed you.”

  For a second, he wore a pained expression. “I wish you did, too,” he said. And then it was as if something fell over his eyes. A curtain. As if…

  As if he wouldn’t allow himself to care.

  “Quiet down, all of you!” Scooter snapped, waking up suddenly, apparently under the impression that something was going on.

  He must have been dreaming, Kat thought, and looked at the clock.

  Two o’clock.

  She couldn’t believe it, but despite her fear and the disconcerting presence of Craig beside her, her eyelids were starting to droop. She was exhausted.

  Her mother and father appeared to be sleeping. Frazier’s eyes were closed. Jamie hadn’t moved.

  She looked across the room. Uncle Paddy’s eyes were only half closed. His lips twitched, and he gave her a thumbs-up sign.

  She tried to smile in return.

  In the end, after going over and over the possibilities, Sheila and Tim decided that trying to slip into the house in the middle of the night would be a mistake.

&nbs
p; It seemed most likely—though not, they thought with grave concern, certain—that if it came to a massacre, it wouldn’t be until night fell on Christmas Day. Sheila had lived in the area her whole life, and she could second-guess the wind and read the snowfall. This storm wasn’t going to slack off enough to allow the killers to escape for hours, at least.

  With his military training, Tim was the expert in subterfuge, and in his opinion, given that there were only two of them, trying to enter the house in the dead of night, when at least one of the killers would be alert and on guard but the family would most likely be asleep and too disoriented to help in their own rescue, would be a grave mistake.

  They decided to make their move just before daybreak. They would take the snowmobiles as far as they could without risking being heard, then walk the rest of the way. Their plan was to reach the house with darkness as a cover, but not to attempt a break-in until the inhabitants were actually rising.

  “I think we’re crazy,” Sheila said.

  “No, you think I’m crazy,” Tim said with a smile.

  “Whatever,” Sheila said dryly.

  “Are you ready?” he asked.

  “Hell, no. So let’s go over it one more time.”

  Tim frowned. “I just wish I could remember where I’ve seen that Craig guy before.” He paused in concentration. “Maybe not actually him…maybe just a picture of him.”

  “And you’re absolutely certain it wasn’t the ten-most-wanted list?”

  Tim shook his head. “I’m certain. Anyway, you said the guy is trying to help us.”

  “Yeah.”

  “But what if…?”

  “What if it’s all a lie? What if he’s trying to trick us?” Sheila asked him.

  Tim didn’t answer.

  Kat couldn’t remember how the hours had passed, or just what time it was when she finally drifted off.

  When she awoke, she was wrapped in Craig’s arms. And he wasn’t sleeping anymore, either.

  His fingers were gently stroking her hair. She turned and caught his eyes, and for a second she froze, just watching him. There was so much pain in his gaze.

  Then a shield slipped over his gaze and he shifted uncomfortably. “Sorry,” he murmured.

  Was that for the sake of Quintin and Scooter? Because she had the impression he wasn’t really sorry at all, that for a moment he had been living in the past, remembering a time when they had so often fallen asleep together, then woken up in each other’s arms.

  She closed her eyes in anguish. For just a moment, she had been living in the past, as well.

  It was coming up on first light, she realized, the darkness not as thick as it had been. Everyone else was waking up, too, she saw.

  “I see people are finally up,” Quintin said. “Good. Because I’d like some coffee.”

  “Coffee, sure,” Skyler said.

  “I’ll make it, Mom,” Kat said, getting to her feet.

  And away from Craig.

  She stretched, one eye on Quintin, who looked wide-awake. She wondered if he’d stayed up all night.

  “Scooter, you awake?” Quintin asked.

  “Yeah.”

  “Good. You keep an eye on the happy family, and I’ll go watch our little escape artist make the coffee.”

  “Wait,” Skyler said.

  Quintin turned to look at her.

  “Bathroom break,” Skyler said, “And don’t tell me you’re coming in with me, because you’ll have to shoot me right now.”

  “That can be arranged,” Quintin said, his eyes narrowed dangerously.

  “Hey,” David snapped. “Just do what you did last night. Let everyone have a minute’s privacy. It’s not like we don’t all need the same thing.”

  Quintin didn’t look happy, Kat thought, but he must have decided that the alternative was worse, because he let everyone line up and take a turn in the downstairs bathroom. As for him, he must have a bladder the size of a football, she thought. He hadn’t gone all night, and it didn’t seem that he had to go now.

  Or maybe…

  Maybe his faith in Scooter was so small that he didn’t dare disappear, even for a moment.

  “You. Make the coffee and get something on for breakfast,” he said to Skyler.

  “Don’t talk to my wife that way,” David said, then added, “Please.”

  “All right. Please, Mrs. O’Boyle, coffee and breakfast.”

  “Since you asked so nicely…” Skyler murmured sarcastically.

  “I’ll help my mother,” Jamie offered.

  “I can set the table,” Brenda said.

  “Sure. Scooter. You watch them. Craig, you get in here, too. You,” he said, pointing a finger at Kat. “Come with me.”

  “Wait a minute,” her father said, frowning.

  “Calm down, Dad,” Quintin said. “I just want to ask the girl a few questions, that’s all.”

  “Where are you going with her?”

  “I just want to open the door and see the weather,” Quintin said.

  Frazier spoke up warily. “I can give you a weather report. The weather sucks.”

  “The snow’s not going to stop until tonight,” Paddy said. Quintin looked at him skeptically. “I can tell, man. I can feel it in me hip. The weather won’t be letting up for hours, till darkness, I say.”

  Quintin gave him a strange look. Kat wondered if he knew they were all aware they would only live as long as the roads were impassable.

  As soon as everyone else had gone into the kitchen, Quintin turned to Kat. “Open the front door,” he told her, gesturing with his gun.

  She shrugged and walked ahead of him across the foyer and did as he’d commanded.

  The snow was still coming down, but the house had gotten so warm that the blast of cold air actually felt good for a moment.

  “Step outside,” Quintin told her.

  Swallowing hard, all too aware that he was standing behind her, a gun to her back, did so.

  “Turn around.”

  Did he mean to shoot her in the face, so she could see death coming?

  Slowly, she turned around, her mind racing.

  “Who is Craig?” he demanded, following her out into the snow and closing the door behind him.

  “What?” she gasped, astonished.

  “You know him,” he said.

  “I know he’s a filthy bastard who’s broken into my house and threatened my family,” she said.

  She was stunned when he lashed out, striking her hard across the cheek. “I want the truth,” he announced.

  “I just said—”

  “The truth. Or I’ll knock your front teeth out next,” he said.

  He couldn’t let it happen, Craig thought. If Quintin had Kat outside, he wanted something, and he would hurt her to get it.

  He tried to act nonchalant in front of the family and Scooter, but he knew her parents and the rest of her family were going just as insane as he was, knowing she was outside with Quintin.

  David broke first and started toward the kitchen door.

  “Get back here!” Scooter shouted. “Don’t make me shoot you.”

  “Everybody calm down,” Craig said. “Stay cool. I’ll go out and see what’s going on, okay?”

  “Craig,” Scooter said with a frown. “Didn’t Quintin say—”

  “Yeah, but you don’t want to have a riot before the turkey, right?” he demanded.

  He didn’t wait for Scooter to answer. He turned around and headed out, praying that Scooter wouldn’t do something stupid.

  The minute he opened the front door, he saw that Kat’s cheek was bright red. That bastard had hit her! It was all he could do not to behave like a suicidal idiot and attack Quintin right then and there.

  “What’s going on?” he asked as casually as he could.

  “I didn’t ask you to come out here,” Quintin said.

  “I thought you’d want to know her dad is getting antsy and I’m worried that he’s going to do something stupid.”

  Qui
ntin stared at him, then sneered and shrugged. “I was just telling Miss O’Boyle here that she needed to tell me where she knows you from. Now. Before I take out her teeth.”

  Craig’s jaw nearly dropped.

  “But now that you’re here, you can tell me. Or I will shove her teeth down her throat. Maybe break her nose in the process.”

  Craig stared at him as incredulously as he could. “What the hell are you talking about?” he asked.

  Quintin had turned to face him, momentarily taking his attention off Kat, and Craig was suddenly glad as hell, because he could see something behind one of the snowbanks.

  Something blue.

  Cop blue. Sheriff’s-department blue.

  “Quit screwing around. I’ll shoot you faster than you can exhale if you cross me,” Quintin said.

  Craig dared to hesitate before responding. The snowbanks didn’t provide much cover, and whoever was out there was trying to get around to the back of the house. He had to keep Quintin’s attention on him until their rescuer was safely out of sight. “We knew each other in school,” he finally said, figuring the truth—or at least a piece of it—was the best defense.

  “Ages ago,” Kat said.

  “We went to the same college, Quintin, and that’s that,” he said.

  Thankfully, Quintin was still staring at him, frowning. “College?”

  “College,” Kat repeated firmly.

  “You’ve got a college degree, pretty boy?” Quintin demanded. “You telling me that’s where Scooter found you? Like I’d believe that.”

  “He doesn’t have a degree. He dropped out,” Kat said.

  “But you knew each other there,” Quintin said, his skepticism clear in his tone.

  “We just told you that,” Craig said. The cops were safely out of sight. Of course, if Quintin went for a walk right now, he would see the prints in the snow, but there was no reason for Quintin to go for a walk.

  He had to play it cool, but he also had to get Quintin back in the house and give the cops time to find the door or window or whatever it was that Kat had used to slip out last night. Then they could hide in the house, listening, until the right time came for them to make their move.

  “Who else do you know in there?” Quintin demanded.