by Nolon King
“Hang on,” she said. “I’m going to get help for you and Jessi.”
“Jessi? She’s … she’s alive?” He struggled to turn and managed to smile when he saw her. Then gurgled blood through the wound in his abdomen.
Mal called out to Lucia, “See if there’s any first aid kits in the house. And a phone, if there is one.”
Lucia nodded then ran from the room. “I need you both to hang on. We’re going to get you help.”
Mal stood and walked toward Dodd, looking down at him, remembering every horrible thing he’d done to her, to Jessi, to Ashley, and imagining what he’d done to other girls, a number she didn’t know, or ever want to discover.
“Please,” he cried. “You don’t have to arrest me.”
“Oh, I’m not arresting you.” She aimed the pistol at his head.
“No, no, no! You don’t have to kill me, either. I have something, something you’ll want.”
Mal shook her head, “I doubt that.”
“I have a list. A list of the members of Voluptatem. And evidence on them. There are a lot of powerful people on there. Americans. People you may know.”
“Where is it?”
“I gave the flash drive to Madam Pandora.”
“Too bad,” Mal said, focusing her aim.
“Wait! I put a copy online. It’s encrypted, but I can get it for you. You can save so many people, Mallory.”
“Listen to him,” Jasper said.
Mal turned, hardly able to believe that he was asking her to show the monster any mercy. “What?”
“I want that list. We can save others like Lucia, like Jessi.”
Mal turned back to Dodd, eagerly nodding. “You can save so many people.”
His every word reminded her of the vile things he’d said only moments before. How he would rape Jessi with a knife. How he’d made Mal pretend to be Ashley to make her feel what she’d felt.
“Why? Why did you do all this? Why did you hurt my little girl?”
“I don’t know,” Dodd said, tears streaming down his face. “I’m … I’m broken.”
“Broken, but you’re not really sorry.”
Dodd wiped at his tears, “I am. I swear. If I could take it all back, I would.”
“But you can’t.”
Jasper, behind her, said, “Don’t do it, Mallory.”
“You wanted me to feel what my daughter felt, right?” She placed the gun against his head. “I asked you a question.”
“Please …” he cried.
“Don’t do it, Mallory!”
She could hear Jasper moving, trying to crawl toward her.
“Answer the fucking question, Paul. Did you want me to feel what Ashley felt?”
Tears were streaming down her face.
Dodd nodded.
“Then I want the same for you.”
She pulled the trigger, then fell to her knees.
Lucia came back into the room, staring at Mal, holding a first aid kit and a phone.
Tuesday
Epilogue 1
Two days later …
Jasper woke to a woman’s voice. “Is he okay?”
He looked up.
It was Lucia, talking to a doctor.
The man spoke in Spanish, and Jasper could catch only fragments.
He slowly realized that he wasn’t in a hospital or a doctor’s office. He was surrounded by pictures of dogs and cats. Spanish charts instructing people on how to care for their pets, recognize various symptoms.
Lucia came over. “You’re alive.”
“Where are Jessi and Mallory?”
“Mallory left this morning. She took Jessi back to the States.”
“Are they okay?”
“Yes. Dr. Martinez patched you up and made sure Jessi was okay before they left.”
Jasper looked up at the man, confused. “How … how did you find him?”
“He sometimes comes to Paraíso to work on girls when we can’t get a doctor to come, or if we need to keep things quiet.”
Jasper sat up, too quickly. A sharp pain pierced his stomach.
Dr. Martinez said something in Spanish.
Lucia translated. “He said to be careful, your stitches might pop out.”
“We can’t stay here. He’ll tell Madam Pandora.”
“No,” Lucia said. “He’s not a bad guy.”
The man was in his sixties, with wild white hair and the slumped shoulders of a man who had suffered a lifetime of too much shit. Jasper wasn’t sure if he could trust him, but if Lucia did, he’d have to as well.
“Where are Rosita and Maria?”
“Maria’s in the car with Tony.”
“Who’s Tony?” There were too many new people for Jasper to process, too many loose ends which might fray and endanger them all.
“Her cousin. He lives in town.”
“Can you trust him?”
“Yes. He’s letting us stay there.”
“What are you going to do? You can’t stay here, right? Madam will have people looking for you, for us?”
“Paraíso got raided by the police last night. Not sure who got arrested, but there were lots of people talking about it on the news. Madam Pandora wasn’t there.”
“Good. I’m glad they shut the place down.”
“Tony’s got a friend who can get us work in Juarez. He also knows someone who can get you back over the border, once you’re ready.”
“Thank you.” Jasper squeezed her hand.
“You asked about Rosita.” Lucia smiled. “She wanted to say something to you.”
Lucia left the room, then returned moments later with Rosita, who approached Jasper’s bedside, smiling and looking at him with her big brown eyes. She looked so different dressed like a kid in red shorts and a blue tee.
“Thank you, Mister.” She hugged him. He flinched as her elbow brushed against his bandage. “Sorry.”
“It’s okay.” Jasper hugged her back. “Thank you.”
Epilogue 2
Mal lay in her hospital bed watching the news conference with Sheriff Bell announcing that Jessi Price and Deputy Mallory Black had both been returned home safely. She’d been admitted for exhaustion and blood work to make sure she hadn’t contracted any diseases from the needle in Mexico, or anything else that might have happened while she was out cold. Mal was more exhausted from all the people she had to talk to and reports to fill out since she came back than she was from her ordeal.
Reports where she omitted important details, such as Jasper’s name, Lucia’s involvement, and how exactly Paul Dodd had come to die. Mal said it was self-defense.
She hoped like hell the Mexican authorities didn’t contradict her account. Judging from the Mexican officers she’d spoken to, things looked good for her. They had their own scandal to worry about, including higher-ups that had looked the other way for so long while Madam Pandora ran her illegal brothel and murder compound.
Someone knocked on her door. “Come in.”
It was Mike and his wife, Gina, with flowers and a giant Get Well mylar balloon.
“How are you?” Gina asked.
“Still alive. Sorry, Mike. You’re not getting rid of me that easily.”
“Damn it.” He reached into his jacket pocket, pulled out a gift-wrapped square, and handed it to her.
“What’s this?”
“Well, detective, maybe you should try opening it.”
“Fuck you, Mike.”
Gina laughed.
Mal peeled the wrapping paper away to reveal a CD. She turned it over, saw it was ABBA’s Greatest Hits, and laughed. “Thanks, Mike.”
“Sorry. I looked for it on 8-track, figuring you probably don’t have a CD player yet.”
She flipped him off. “So, how’s Jessi?”
“Okay. Colleen is glad to have her home.”
“That poor kid,” Gina said. “And her mother. She’s probably never going to let her out of her sight again.”
“Paul Dodd won’t be co
ming back this time,” Mal said.
A silence crossed the room, and Mal wondered what Mike was thinking. Did he suspect she’d killed him? And if so, how long before he asked her what really happened?
She could lie to a lot of people, even herself. But lying to Mike was next to impossible.
After some more small talk, Gina hugged Mal goodbye, saying she had to use the restroom, though all three of them knew it was to give her and Mike some time alone.
As the door closed, he met her gaze.
Just like that, everything she’d been through, from the kidnapping to Dodd’s attempted rape of her and Jessi, to him injecting her with heroin, to her thinking she’d watched Jessi and Jasper die, to her pulling the trigger and ending the monster’s life … all of it toppled down onto her.
And she sobbed.
Mike hugged her tight. “It’s okay, you’re home now. Everything will be okay.”
Mal wasn’t sure if everything would ever be okay again. She had leapt over a line she promised never to cross, ending a man’s life in cold blood as he begged.
She’d pulled the trigger. And that made her no better than the vigilante, Jasper.
Dodd was gone, and so was all the anger and hate she’d felt for him, for what he did to Ashley. All the rage she had carried so long had disappeared, and now she felt nothing.
That absolute emptiness took root in her soul.
Despite Mike’s assurances that everything would be okay, Mal wasn’t sure she could ever find her way back to normal.
This was the end of a chapter, and now she had only pain and regret. Once Mike left to go home, she’d be all alone with nobody to understand or help make things better.
Only the taste of heroin had given her hope.
And even as part of her was preparing for her return to work, another was searching for a way to find that sort of bliss again.
Perhaps the only thing to fill the void.
Epilogue 3
Three days later…
Jessi was lying in bed with HappyCorn reading a book her mom had gotten her, a fantasy about a young girl who wakes up in another world. She was hoping it would provide some escape from the horrible memories running through her head but was finding it hard to concentrate.
All she could think about was Officer Mallory shooting the monster in his head.
She told the police in Mexico and here that she didn’t remember what happened because she was passed out. But the truth was, she could never forget what she saw.
And, for reasons she couldn’t understand, it made her incredibly sad. She should be happy he was gone, and that he suffered for what he’d done to them and to her father. And a part of her was glad. But another part felt bad for Mallory.
She saw something in Miss Mallory’s eyes right after she pulled the trigger — an emptiness that Jessi felt, too. She wished there was some way to make her feel better.
Maybe she’d think of something, but even if she did, Jessi would have to do it on her own. She didn’t dare tell her mother what really happened. Mom was honest to a fault, and Jessi didn’t want to tell her something that would rip up her insides.
It would be her secret. Her burden to carry. The least she could do for the woman who risked so much to save her. Twice.
A knock on the door.
Jessi didn’t feel like seeing her mom right now. She’d left the living room because she’d been too clingy all morning, asking her how she was like every five minutes.
“You have company,” Mom said from the other side of the door.
Then she opened it and Destinee was there. Jessi leapt from her bed and raced into a hug.
“Oh, my God, I’m so glad you’re okay!” Destinee hugged her back, both of them crying.
“I thought I’d never see you again, either!”
Jessi’s mother closed the door and left the girls alone.
“Thank you so much for trying to save me! That was so brave of you.”
“Nobody messes with my friend,” Destinee said, raising her fists. “Hey, wanna see something cool?”
“Okay.”
Destinee lifted her shirt, showing a pink and brown circular gash on her stomach. “My battlescar.”
“Oh, my God, I’m so sorry.”
“No, it’s cool! I mean, yeah, it would’ve sucked if I died, but I didn’t, so it’s freaking awesome. Plus, all the kids wanna be my friend now. Even Amber Carrington!”
“No way!”
“Yeah. And … believe it or not, she’s not that bad.”
“Stop it!” Jessi punched her in the arm.
“She’s not as cool as you, but she’s not a total b-word, either. And if your mom ever lets you come back to school, I’ll make sure she puts you in with the cool kids. Not that you aren’t already the coolest kid around. Everyone’s asking about you.”
“Yeah, not sure I like that.”
“Relax, I’ll tell them to back off if it’s too much.”
“Thanks.”
They hugged again, and Jessi felt like maybe things might finally return to something like normal. Maybe she could be a friend to Mallory like Destinee was to her — someone to make her smile again.
Epilogue 4
Two weeks later …
Jasper Parish stood in the dark bedroom waiting for the door to open, holding his suppressed pistol.
He listened as the car pulled up outside.
Then he waited for the door to open.
There were two voices, hers and his.
He waited, slowing his breathing and preparing.
The door opened, the lights went on.
Oscar Gonzalez entered, leader of a drug cartel that had scared residents, political figures, and especially reporters who’d found their numbers thinned whenever they wrote a story about him.
He was drunk as he entered, not expecting company.
“Who—”
Jasper fired the pistol twice, hitting him in the head both times.
His body stood for a full twenty seconds before it fell to the ground, just as Madam Pandora walked in and screamed.
“Quiet or you join him!” Jasper said, gun trained on her.
“Do you realize who you just killed?”
Jasper laughed. “Do I look worried?”
“You should be.”
“Listen up. You get one chance to live. I want something you have.”
She glared at him. If she was worried about dying, Madam played it cool. “What?”
“The flashdrive.”
“I don’t have it.”
“Then you’re no use to me,” Jasper said, firing just to the right of her head.
She screamed, finally showing emotion.
“Last chance.”
“It’s in the safe.” She pointed to a spot in back of him. “Behind that painting.”
Jasper glanced at the oil of an ocean, then pulled it off the wall. He looked at the safe, then back at Madam. “What’s the combination?”
“How do I know you won’t kill me after I give it to you?”
“Tell me the combo, then I’ll give you a twenty second head start.”
She told him.
Then ran.
Jasper opened the safe and found weapons, cash, drugs, and the flashdrive.
He pulled a small flattened black duffel from his pocket and stuffed the contents of the safe into the bag, all except for the weapons. No need for those.
He took the flashdrive last and dropped it in his pocket.
Then he opened the window, looked outside, and saw Madam’s car backing out of the driveway.
He raised his pistol and fired six times into the car.
He watched as it kept moving backward, then hit the wall outside the house across the street.
Her body slumped forward and the horn began to blare.
Jasper left. Time to head back home, talk to Spider, see whose names were on the list.
And then he had work to do.
THE END
&n
bsp; The story continues…
What to know what happens next? The series continues with No Stopping.
GET NO STOPPING TODAY
A Note From The Authors
If you’re one of those readers that loves to skip to the Authors’ Note before you read the story, please turn back now as there WILL be spoilers for No Return.
More than any other series so far, Nolan and I knew the trajectory No Justice would take from the first book. We had No Return in mind as we wrote the series opener, knowing that we wanted to lead up to a big showdown between Paul Dodd and Mallory Black.
We knew that Dodd would be back, which is why we seeded bits into the second and third books, reminding you that hey, this guy is still out there, and a threat.
We knew that he would take Jessi again.
And we knew that we wanted to mirror the first book’s ending. We like symmetry here at Collective Inkwell. The ending of No Return felt like an awesome season finale if No Justice were a TV show.
The only thing we weren’t sure about was whether or not Mal would pull the trigger.
We wrestled with this decision for months.
I lost sleep not wanting to fuck things up.
On the one hand, we wanted Mal to remain a hero — to not cross that line. She is a cop, after all. And being a cop, a good cop, is core to her being.
We’re in a world that needs heroes, people who stand up to evil, who fight for those who cannot fight for themselves, and, at the end of the day, do the right thing.
On the other hand, Dodd is really fucking evil! We’ve explored with Jasper whether it’s ever right to do the wrong thing for the right reasons. It’s not an easy question to answer. Doubly hard when it’s Mallory having to make the call.
Having gone through what Mal went through, and seeing this vicious child rapist and killer already escape once, who wouldn’t want to remove the threat?
Given all that had happened, I couldn’t see a way that she wouldn’t pull the trigger in the heat of the moment. Not this time.