The Last Noel

by Heather Graham

  “Let’s move on now,” Scooter ordered. “Kat, open your present.”

  “I’m sorry, but I’m not sure your father and I managed to top Frazier’s present to Brenda,” Skyler warned her daughter. She was trying not to watch Craig, because Craig was still watching Scooter.

  And Scooter was watching the ring.

  Skyler felt a sudden knot in the pit of her stomach. They were probably jewel thieves. Which meant that they would definitely be stealing Brenda’s ring. And the only reason they weren’t stealing it right now was because they intended to wait.

  Until after the turkey.

  “My boots!” Kat cried delightedly, opening the box. She had seen this particular pair of knee-high, fur-lined boots in a boutique window over the post-Thanksgiving weekend, when she’d been out shopping with her mother. They’d been hugely expensive, so she had just sighed and walked away. But she had coveted them, and Skyler had seen that and gone back for them later.

  “Well, they’re bigger than the ring,” Jamie said.

  “Fine. They’re great. Frazier, open your gift now. Do it,” Scooter commanded.

  “Is it all right if he opens his from me?” Brenda shyly asked Skyler.

  “Of course,” Skyler said, wondering if Brenda had bought Frazier a ring, as well.

  But it wasn’t a ring. It was a medallion. A beautiful, simple St. Christopher’s medal in gold.

  Once again, Scooter jumped out of his seat to admire it. And once again, when Skyler looked at Craig, she saw the tension in his features.

  “Brenda…it’s beautiful,” Frazier told her.

  “You two have great taste,” Scooter noted. “Now me!”

  “I think Craig is younger than you are,” Skyler said firmly.

  Scooter frowned. “You have a gift for him, too?”

  “We don’t always know who might stop by around the holidays,” David said. “Skyler likes to be prepared.”

  “It’s okay,” Craig said. “I don’t need anything. Let Scooter open his present.”

  Skyler followed his eyes and registered the way Quintin was just sitting and watching everything, his gun at the ready.

  “No, you have a present, and you are younger than I am, so open it,” Scooter commanded.

  “Scooter…” Craig protested.

  “It’s Christmas, and we have to do Christmas right,” Scooter said.

  Such hopeful words, Skyler thought, and today, knowing what was to come, also so ominous.

  Craig opened the box Skyler quickly handed him.

  “This is perfect,” he murmured, pulling out a deep blue cashmere scarf. “Absolutely beautiful. Thank you.”

  He looked at Skyler, and she smiled at him. She longed to say that she knew he wasn’t with the monsters holding her family hostage. And then she felt a tightening in her stomach again. There were cops in the basement, cops who undoubtedly thought he was one of the criminals. Cops who, if they managed to save her family, might well kill him.

  She looked away to hide her thoughts. She couldn’t afford to care. Her family had to come first. And it was still far from certain that her entire family would survive what was to come.

  What did she know, anyway? He had come here with the other two. He was one of them. Just the one…

  With a conscience.

  But she noticed that her daughter was looking at him, as well. And for a moment Kat looked as if she were going to cry.

  How well had she known him? Skyler wondered.

  “My turn!” Scooter insisted.

  “Yes, Scooter, it’s your turn,” David said patiently.

  “Which box is mine?” he demanded.

  “This one,” Paddy said, pushing a box toward Scooter with his cane.

  Scooter didn’t tear into the paper. He picked up the box and held it, studied it, as if awed by the wrapping alone.

  “Great bow,” he said. “Pretty paper.”

  “I wrapped it,” Kat said.

  He glanced at her with a quick smile. “Wow.”

  “Open the damn thing, Scooter,” Quintin said.

  “I’m getting to it. I’m getting to it.”

  He still didn’t rip into the box. He carefully, painstakingly, removed the bow, the ribbon and then the tape. He folded the ribbon and the paper, and set them carefully aside, as if they were a part of the gift. Then he opened the box.

  He stared at the contents, then looked up at Skyler. “Cranium,” he breathed, almost in awe.

  “You seem to like games,” she said.

  “It’s great. It’s the coolest Christmas present I’ve ever gotten.” He hesitated, frowning, as if trying hard to remember. “It might be the only Christmas present I’ve ever gotten.”

  “Look underneath,” Skyler said.

  He did, and his eyes widened in wonder. “Trivial Pursuit,” he said happily. “Quintin, look, two games.”

  “Great.”

  “Mom, it’s over to you now,” Kat said.

  “We need to wait,” she said, as she stood and walked in the direction of the kitchen. “I have to baste the turkey.” She spoke more loudly than necessary, hoping the cops could hear her and would get back downstairs, if they’d come upstairs to listen better. She had no intention of accidentally betraying the blessed deputies who intended to rescue them. “If I don’t baste that turkey, it will dry out, and you don’t want a dry turkey, do you, Quintin?”

  “That will be my present. The turkey,” Quintin said pleasantly.

  “I’d like a soda,” Jamie said.

  “I need water,” Kat added.

  “Should we all go into the kitchen?” Skyler asked Quintin calmly.

  Quintin shook his head. “Scooter, take Mom into the kitchen. And watch her closely. Mrs. O’Boyle, when you come back, bring the kids something to drink.”

  Skyler shrugged. “All right.”

  What was it about Quintin? Did he know? Why did he insist on keeping them all split up?

  Scooter followed her into the kitchen. On her way over to the oven, she noticed that the dishes Brenda had stacked on the counter had been moved slightly, as if someone had leaned against the edge and bumped them.

  She tried to act normal as she opened the oven and tended to the turkey, but her heart was thundering. She wanted—needed—to get back over to the basement door, but she didn’t have another trash bag to get rid of. And if she walked that way for no good reason, Scooter would no doubt follow her to see what she was up to.

  “Mmm-mmm!” Scooter said.

  She jumped. He was right next to her.

  “Can’t wait,” he said, sounding just like a kid.

  She was suddenly certain that she didn’t need to open the basement door. They weren’t down there anymore. So where the hell were they?

  TWELVE

  “Scooter!” Quintin shouted, then stared around the room impatiently. “How long does it take to baste a turkey?”

  “I imagine Skyler’s started the rest of the food,” David said stiffly.

  “We can all go in and see, if you want,” Craig suggested.

  “You can go to the door and find out what’s going on,” Quintin told him.

  “Sure,” Craig said. What the hell kind of radar does Quintin have? he wondered. The cops would need to get Quintin and Scooter together to take them out, which suddenly seemed impossible to manage. But he walked to the swinging door and did exactly as he had been told, just pushing the door inward and calling through, “Mrs. O’Boyle? What’s going on?”

  To his amazement, Scooter turned to him and announced proudly, “We’re cooking.”

  Craig turned back to Quintin and said, “They’re cooking.”

  “They’re cooking? Scooter can’t cook,” Quintin said.

  “Mrs. O’Boyle is teaching me,” Scooter shouted happily.

  Quintin stood. “I don’t like this,” he said, agitated. “Dad, you and the boys stay there. Uncle Paddy, in the kitchen. Blondie and Miss Troublemaker, you two get in the kitchen, too.”
>
  He’d seemed so calm, almost laid-back, when they were opening presents, but now, Craig thought, he was actively disturbed, even anxious.

  Maybe worried that Scooter was beginning to like the family too much, that he wouldn’t be able to do what was necessary when the time came.

  “Where do you want me, Quintin?” Craig asked.

  “Kitchen.” Quintin narrowed his eyes. “I trust you about as much as I trust your redheaded girlfriend.”

  “I’m not his girlfriend,” Kat said, her voice hard.

  “You’re a girl, and you were his friend,” Quintin said impatiently. Craig swallowed, every muscle in his body seeming to clench, as Quintin reached for Kat, the gleaming silver nose of his gun aiming for her temple. “Everyone move,” he barked.

  Craig could see the agony that ripped at David O’Boyle as he watched his daughter being threatened and forced himself to remain in his chair. Meanwhile, Brenda and Paddy rose, ready to obey the order to move into the kitchen.

  “Ye don’t need to be manhandling me niece,” Paddy said with dignity. “We’d know ye meant business without havin’ to terrorize the lass.”

  “Just get in the kitchen,” Quintin said.

  “Scooter,” Quintin snapped, holding the door open so he could see what was happening in both rooms.

  “What?”

  “Get the hell out here.”

  “But—”

  “Get out here. And be on guard. Keep your safety off and your gun on Dad. Now.”

  Scowling, Scooter appeared. “Quintin, I was learning how to make candied yams.”

  “Eating them will have to be enough for you,” Quintin said.

  “Quintin, you don’t have to make a misery out of dinner,” Scooter said.

  “Just get out here. I’m not going to make a misery out of anything. I just can’t figure out how you can keep an eye on Mom if you’re making candied yams.”

  Pouting, Scooter went out to the living room.

  Craig walked past Quintin into the kitchen, Paddy and Brenda ahead of him. With an impatient sigh, Paddy took a seat at the table, setting his cane on top of it. Brenda paused by the sink, and Kat, shoved forward by Quintin, walked over to her mother’s side.

  “You’re starting the rest of the food?” Kat asked.

  Skyler nodded, looking as if she had just lost a negotiation she thought she should have won. “Yes. I was just putting the brown sugar on the yams. Brenda, would you start the green-bean casserole? It’s easy, just the beans, mushroom soup and then the fried onion rings. Everyone loves it. Unless they hate green beans. Or mushrooms. Or onions.”

  Skyler realized she was chattering on about nothing, just hoping to break the tension. But Brenda nodded and started on the casserole, while Kat took over the yams. Sighing, Skyler opened the oven to baste the turkey again.

  Quintin took a seat next to Paddy, and Craig noted unhappily that someone sneaking up from the basement couldn’t possibly get a clean shot at Quintin. Nor was he certain that anyone would have tried. He was sure Quintin was keeping everyone split up to make sure at least one O’Boyle would die, no matter what.

  “So, Quintin,” Craig said.

  “What?”

  “It’s Christmas.”

  “Tell me something I don’t know, college boy.”

  Craig forced himself to smile. “I was just thinking that we should have a drink to celebrate.”

  “It’s early.”

  “Not in Ireland,” Paddy offered.

  “I’d even like a drink,” Brenda admitted.

  “Well?” Craig asked Quintin.

  “What the hell. Go on.”

  As he stood to walk toward the counter where the liquor was kept, Craig felt Quintin’s hostile gaze following him, and he sensed that Quintin was practicing his aim, the 9mm Smith & Wesson pointing right at his back.

  That gun could blow a hole the size of a dinner plate right through him, and he suddenly and inconsequentially imagined himself as a cartoon character looking down at a huge hole in his stomach. He wondered vaguely if cartoons were still as violent as they had been when he was a kid.

  “What’ll it be?” he turned and asked the others.

  “Whiskey, neat,” Paddy said.

  Quintin shrugged. “Same as the old Mick.”

  Craig poured the drinks, brushing by Kat. He couldn’t believe that three years had passed. Three years and a staggering change in his life.

  Craig set drinks in front of Paddy and Quintin. He wondered if it would be possible to somehow block Quintin’s view of the others, forcing him to move and allow someone a good shot at him. But as he hovered, Quintin looked up at him suspiciously. Besides, he thought, if the two officers were in the house, which he had to believe was true, they weren’t going to take a shot until the exact right moment. They wouldn’t go for Quintin unless they had a clean shot at Scooter, as well. He moved back to the counter. “Brenda, did you want your whiskey neat, too?”

  “Good God, no, you’ll have to put something else in it for me,” she said.

  “Soda?” Craig asked.

  “Sure. Cola, lemon-lime, whatever,” Brenda said, intent on getting the last of the mushroom soup out of the can.

  “You should never mix good whiskey with crap like that,” Quintin said. “It’ll give you a hell of a hangover. Not that it will matter.”

  A stunned silence followed his words.

  Craig quickly handed Brenda her glass. She took it with shaking fingers, her blue eyes wide with fear.

  He couldn’t reassure her. Not at the moment. “Skyler, Kat…would you like something?”

  Skyler shook her head, staring in at the turkey again.

  Kat looked daggers at him. He knew she was wondering what the hell he was doing and letting him know she didn’t want anything from him. Ever.

  He poured himself a shot and went to sit next to Paddy. “Cheers,” he said, and lifted his glass.

  Paddy stared at him. “Slainte,” he returned.

  Craig turned to Quintin. “They’ve seen us, you know,” he said thoughtfully.

  “What?”

  Craig shook his head. “Those cops who came by last night. They’ve seen us. So when we leave here, after…whatever, they’ll know we were here.”

  To his amazement, Quintin stared at him and blinked, and Craig realized that the other man hadn’t realized the mistake he had made. He’d been obsessed with having this safe haven. He’d thought he had everything under control. And he hadn’t realized what he had done.

  Quintin sat perfectly still for a very long time, until finally Craig dared to speak out again. “It doesn’t make sense to kill anyone here,” he said.

  Quintin smiled slowly, and he aimed the Smith & Wesson right at Craig’s face. “But they didn’t see me,” he said, and smiled malignantly. “And it won’t make any difference to anyone if I kill you.”

  Would he have done it? Craig didn’t know, because Skyler was suddenly right there, and she had clearly reached the end of her rope. “Stop it! I mean it. I have had it with the bickering and the backbiting, and I don’t give a damn if it’s you two or my own kids. Read my lips. This is Christmas! I’m cooking a turkey. And I am sick of the entire world behaving like a pack of two-year-olds. There will be no more fighting around this table, do you understand?”

  Quintin was stunned. He just stared at Skyler, who stood over him, her hands on her hips, her eyes flashing.

  He didn’t shoot Craig, and he didn’t shoot Skyler.

  And after a moment, he even began to laugh.

  Craig could hear Kat’s gasp of relief, and he looked over and saw her doubled over, shaking.

  He stood. “Kat, are you sure you don’t want a drink?”

  “I can get it myself,” she said, and turned away.

  David O’Boyle sat on his chair, in his living room, with his Christmas tree and his sons, and stared at the man who was holding a gun on him.

  Scooter seemed to feel he’d been duly chastised. He was
n’t joking around, and he wasn’t talking about Christmas. He only glanced toward the kitchen now and then, as if he were willing Quintin to come back.

  They could all hear the rise and fall of conversation coming from the other room. What’s going on in there? David wondered. To take his mind off the things he couldn’t control, he turned to Scooter and asked, “How long have you worked for Quintin?”

  “I don’t work for Quintin,” Scooter said, frowning.

  “Oh?” David said politely. He folded his hands in his lap.

  “I don’t work for Quintin,” Scooter repeated, more vehemently this time.

  “Sure. I believe you.”

  “It’s the truth.”

  “I said I believe you.”

  “You know, if anyone works for anyone…it was my thing first. My gig.”

  “Right,” David said. “That’s one hell of a gun you got there.”

  Scooter sneered. “What would you know about it?”

  “I don’t own a gun,” David said, “but that doesn’t mean I don’t know anything about them. I’ve heard the sales pitches, read about the laws. They always ask what you want a gun for. You know, are you a hunter? Marksman? Do you need it for self-defense? Strange, I never heard anyone claim they had the best gun for holdups and harassing innocent families. And killing, of course, but, hey, that’s just an assumption.”

  A muscle started twitching in Scooter’s jaw. “Shut up. Just…shut up. You know, if you’d had a gun, you could have shot me.”

  “And maybe Quintin would have shot half my family while I was doing that.”

  Scooter looked down, embarrassed, for a moment. “You got a nice family,” he said when he looked up. “All you have to do is…well, don’t try anything, okay?”

  “Quintin plans on killing us, no matter what,” David said.

  “Now that’s just not true,” Scooter said, but he was a bad liar.

  “He who lives by the gun dies by the gun,” Jamie said.

  Scooter only laughed. “No death penalty in this state,” he said. “That’s why I moved up here.”

  “From where?” Frazier asked.

  “Louisiana. I went to Florida first, but then I figured a state without the death penalty would be best for me,” he said. He sounded pleased with himself, as if he thought he’d been very smart to have figured that out.