KnockOut

by Catherine Coulter

  “Big Louie was ancient when he died, and he died a couple hours after my grandfather passed. My dad had them buried together. Believe me, no one told the authorities about that. Big Louie was my constant companion when I was a little kid. I guess I didn’t want to let him go. Big Louie doesn’t mind being Louie the Second, do you, boy?”

  Big Louie woofed and butted Ethan’s hand with his nose.

  Glenda’s husband, Jeff, came striding into the room at that moment looking like a wild man until he heard his wife laugh. He sucked down a deep breath, looked at his wife, winced at the black eye. “Oh, babe, I told you not to mix it up with Cloris over at Ty Harper’s bar.”

  Glenda laughed. The headache was nearly gone. “I could take big-mouthed Cloris, trust me.”

  Some of the tension leaked out of the room. Thank God, Sherlock thought.

  Twelve people ate outside on a long picnic table covered with two red-and-white checkered tablecloths and what seemed like enough food to feed them twice over.

  Sherlock saw one barbecued rib left on the huge platter, a couple of pieces of zucchini, and that was it. She was so full that the single lonely rib dripping with barbecue sauce didn’t even tempt her. They drank coffee and tea and soft drinks under the slowly darkening sky. The air was cooling, and Joanna put her own sweater around her daughter’s shoulders. It was turning into a fine evening, what with the beautiful mountains hunkered around them, changing colors every minute in the fading light.

  Jeff took Glenda’s hand and rose from the large picnic table. “I need to get my princess to bed, maybe put another ice pack on her eye.”

  Slowly, everyone got themselves together, and the mood changed. For a while there, it was sharing a meal with friends, the conversation light, but now, as night was closing in, Blessed loomed large again.

  Two deputies would remain, keeping watch.

  Savich and Sherlock remained seated. Joanna knew there would be more discussion. She thanked each of the deputies, watched her daughter solemnly shake their hands. When only the five of them remained, Autumn leaned up and whispered to her mother, “I have to go to the bathroom.”

  “I’ll take you,” Ethan said immediately, and started to get up.

  “No, no, I’ll go with her,” Joanna said. “We’ll be right back.”

  They walked into the cottage through the kitchen, Autumn’s hand in her mother’s. Big Louie, so full he could barely move, followed them, tail at half-mast.

  Joanna was opening the door to the half bath off the kitchen when she heard Lula hiss. She had been sleeping on the rocking chair in the guest bedroom. Joanna didn’t hesitate. She shoved Autumn inside the bathroom and whispered, “Stay put, Autumn. Don’t you move, you hear me?” She quietly closed the door. She nearly yelled Ethan’s name at the top of her lungs, then stopped. If Blessed was here, it meant she could kill him, then it would be over. She’d had to give Ox back his Beretta. She raced to the gun cabinet she’d seen tucked away just inside Ethan’s bedroom and pulled out a small Smith & Wesson, checked the clip. It was full.

  She heard a man curse softly. He was in the guest bedroom. She crouched down and listened. Joanna knew to her soul it was Blessed this time, not some poor soul he’d hypnotized and sent after them. She wanted to end it right this minute, end it once and for all. Joanna ran down the hallway. She heard Lula hiss again, then saw her come flying out of the guest bedroom, tail bushed out, growling deep in her throat, more indignant than afraid.

  Joanna was terrified, but it didn’t matter. She crouched and ran toward the bedroom. She knew he was in there, waiting for what? Autumn to come strolling in? Or her? Don’t look at him. Just shoot him. She went in low, like she’d seen on TV, saw him standing beside the bed, Autumn’s blue pajamas in his hands. He’d pulled them out from under her pillow.

  Joanna knew he was looking at her; she felt the weight of his will pulling at her to look back at him, to look at his eyes, but she kept her head down, stared hard at his hands holding Autumn’s pajamas. They were rough hands with thick purple veins standing out on the back.

  Shoot him! Now!

  “Hello, Joanna.”

  She aimed her gun straight at where she knew he stood. She stood too close to miss. All she had to do was pull the trigger and he’d be dead, but her finger wouldn’t move.

  His voice was soft and deep, mesmerizing, almost singsong. “You were a surprise, Joanna, you and Martin’s daughter. Did you know he changed his name when he was twelve, said he couldn’t stand his real name? Do you want to know what his real name was? His name was Harmony. Mother loved his name, but he hated it, said it sounded like he was a New Age dip, and he wouldn’t back down.

  “Mother thought you were a good mother, Joanna, but I didn’t. I saw through you to the selfish twisting rot in you right away.”

  His words nearly made her jerk her head up. Nearly. Why wouldn’t her finger pull the damned trigger? “Turn around, Blessed. I won’t look at your face, you hear me? Turn around! Now, or I’ll shoot you!”

  “No, you won’t, Joanna; you really don’t want to.” His voice continued, soft and soothing, deeper now. In her mind she felt his voice turn to thick liquid that was flowing warm into her blood, then racing through her veins to her heart. As if from a great distance, she saw him raise Autumn’s pajamas in his hands and rub them against his cheek, and her heart pounded, filled to overflowing with revulsion, and something else. He said, his voice making her blood boil inside, “You can’t, and you know it.”

  Joanna couldn’t help herself; she jerked her head up, met his eyes for only a fraction of time, and fired.

  33

  THE EXPLOSION WAS HUGE in the small room. It deafened her instantly, and the recoil made her stumble back a step to keep her balance. The room was spinning around her, and she felt nausea roil up into her throat. She wanted to fall down, but she didn’t, she just stood there, weaving like a drunk, the gun now hanging loosely at her side.

  The world stopped, simply came to a halt and left her standing alone with nothing on her mind, her only focus Blessed, standing directly in front of her, closer now, his eyes, hazy and deep, like fingers, lightly feathering her face, and his mind flowed in her blood, smooth and sweet. No, that couldn’t be. Why was she thinking like that? Why wasn’t he dead? She’d shot him straight-on. But he was standing in front of her, studying her face as if she were an insect he’d never seen before. She stared back at him, felt his mind probing at her, and she hated him, hated him so much she was choking on it. Why couldn’t she move?

  Autumn, she thought, but the image of her daughter floated away.

  In a very deep part of her, Joanna knew she’d failed. But she couldn’t fail, she had to destroy this evil. She tried to focus the gun on him again but couldn’t find the will or the strength to even lift it. She heard him laugh, heard him say, in that same soft velvety, singsong voice, “You were mine the second you walked into the room, Joanna, and you’ll do what I want you to. You’re not going to use that gun, except maybe in your mind, or on yourself. I want you to lie down on the bed and fold your hands over your chest, look like you’re dead rot, lying in a casket. That’s a nice start.”

  “Mama!”

  Autumn ran into the bedroom, her eyes on her mother, not on Blessed, who was smiling at her. “Mama! Are you all right? Mama, what’s wrong?” Autumn ran up to her mother and hit her hard on the arm. Joanna didn’t move; she was looking at the bed. She took a step toward the bed but Autumn shoved her back.

  “Come here now, Autumn. Come to your uncle Blessed.”

  Autumn looked him dead in the eye and said, “No. You’re a bad man. Go away. Leave us alone.”

  “Don’t be afraid of power, Autumn. You and I will go away together to where you’ll be surrounded by people who will value you, who will help mold you into what you’re meant to become. Your mother doesn’t understand, she never will. She’s common, unimportant, merely shackles to be cut away to free you.” He extended his hand to her, the thi
ck veins bulging madly, purple and ugly.

  Autumn yelled as she hit her mother again, “You’re horrible! Let my mother go! Mama, come back.” She kept hitting her mother, on her arm, on her shoulder, jerking on her hand.

  Blessed looked bewildered. “You’re an amazing girl, Autumn—you can look at me and still you can resist me.” He slowly shook his head at the child who was staring right into his eyes. He then spoke in his natural voice, higher and sharper, with a kind of a country whine, “You’re really looking at me, aren’t you? Well, it makes sense, since you’re Martin’s daughter. I couldn’t stymie Martin either. See, you don’t know what you can do because your mother can’t teach you anything; she can’t even accept you for what you are, what you will become.

  “Come here now, Autumn. You and I have a long road to travel. I imagine that idiot sheriff will be coming along real soon now. We have to go.”

  Autumn didn’t move.

  “You will come with me or I will have your mother hurt herself. Look, she wants to, all I have to do is tell her to pull the trigger.”

  “No!” Autumn looked at her mother, who was still standing motionless, looking at the bed, the gun held out in front of her now, straight at Blessed. She looked vacant, like she wasn’t there. Autumn shook her mother’s arm hard. “You took my mama!”

  “Yes, I did, but she’ll be all right if you come with me. If you don’t, I will make her kill herself.”

  Autumn closed her eyes.

  “Open your eyes. Stop that foolishness. What are you doing? What—?”

  Dillon had taken a sip of tea as he listened to Ethan describe Blessed’s attack on Saturday night when Autumn screamed at him, Dillon! Help, he’s in the bedroom and he’s hurting Mama. Dillon!

  The tea spewed out of Savich’s mouth. He had his SIG in his hand and was running toward the house in under three seconds, yelling over his shoulder, “Ethan, get your deputies outside Joanna’s bedroom window; you cover the front of the house. Blessed is here!”

  He slammed through the kitchen door, Sherlock six feet behind him, heart pounding, her SIG in her hand. She was running into the back hallway when she heard a man’s voice yell, “You keep away or I’ll kill Joanna, you hear me?”

  Autumn screamed at him, “Dillon, don’t look at him!”

  “You look at me right now, fella, or she’s dead, you hear me?”

  Savich raised his face to stare at Blessed Backman. He didn’t know what he’d expected Blessed to look like, but this pallid, middle-aged man with his stooped narrow shoulders, his baggy pants belted too high over a golf shirt, his light brown hair thinning—this man wasn’t it. He didn’t look like a bogeyman in a horrific nightmare. Except for his eyes. There was something moving behind his eyes, something corrupt, something hot and twisted. This man looked like he saw things others didn’t. He looked like he saw the flames burning in hell and warmed his hands over them. They were Tammy Tuttle’s eyes.

  He watched Blessed’s face take on an immense focus, felt his ungodly need to get inside his head, to control him, destroy him. And he felt the instant Blessed realized he couldn’t get in.

  Savich smiled. “I guess not, Blessed.”

  Blessed’s eyes flared wild and panicked, and he howled, “No! Who are you? There can’t be two of you!”

  Savich said, never taking his eyes off Blessed’s face, “Autumn, look at this man who let his gift be corrupted. Let Joanna go now, Blessed. Release your hold on her.”

  Blessed swung those mad burning eyes toward Joanna. “Oh, no, the bitch will do as I say.”

  Joanna brought the gun up slowly, very slowly, and she aimed it at her head.

  Savich shot him.

  The force of the bullet knocked Blessed against the wall, sending a picture thudding to the floor beside him. As he slid down the wall, he stared hard at Savich. He looked momentarily bewildered before he slammed his palm against his shoulder, and his mouth opened and closed as he watched the blood ooze bright red between his fingers.

  Tammy Tuttle’s face was bright in Savich’s mind. This man was as mad and dangerous as she had been, and he knew he should kill him because he would never stop, never. But he slowly lowered his SIG.

  Sherlock ran to Joanna, took the gun, stuck it in her belt, and shook her by the shoulders. Autumn kept hitting her mother’s arm. Sherlock yelled right in her face, “Wake up, Joanna!”

  Tears streamed down Autumn’s face as her fists flailed at her mother and she cried over and over, “Mama, come back, come back!”

  Sherlock continued to shake her until Joanna blinked, her eyes finally focusing on Sherlock’s face. She looked dazed, but she was herself again. “What happened? Autumn? Where are you?”

  Autumn clasped her mother around her waist, squeezed hard, and whispered, “Dillon shot Blessed. It’s going to be all right now. Sherlock, you’re sure Mama’s okay?”

  “Yes, I’m sure,” Sherlock said, and hugged the two of them against her. She saw Dillon jerk the case off a pillow, watched him drop to his haunches and apply pressure on the wound.

  Blessed was moaning in short gasps, deep in his throat, obviously hurting, and that was fine by Savich. His eyes popped open, and he stared up at Savich.

  “How did you do that?”

  “Sounds like a question for your guru, Blessed. Press your palm hard over this pillowcase, and the chances are good the bleeding will slow. Don’t press hard enough and you might bleed to death right here in the sheriff’s guest bedroom. I doubt anyone would feel sorry about it.”

  Joanna walked to stand over him, but she didn’t look at his face. She looked at the blood smearing his hand and kicked him hard in the side.

  He moaned, tried to spit at her but couldn’t. “I stymied you. I should have had you put that gun in your mouth right away and—”

  “When you stymied me? That’s what you call it? I felt you, you bastard, trying to make me crazy, trying to make me see and feel horrible things. I should have walked in here shooting. I should have emptied my gun into you.” She kicked him again, in the ribs, and he gave a long, lovely cry of pain. “You got anything else to say, you monster?”

  He looked at her hard, but she still didn’t raise her eyes to his face. “Look at me, woman!”

  “Forget it, Blessed, or I’ll shoot you again,” Savich said. “You should step back, Joanna.” He looked up to see Ethan standing in the bedroom doorway, his two deputies behind him. “Ethan, could you call 911? We’re going to have to do this carefully, blindfold him so he doesn’t attack anybody else. I’ll ride in the ambulance with him.”

  Joanna said, “Stymie. That’s what this pathetic worm calls what he does to people’s heads.”

  “Stymie,” Ethan repeated, as if tasting the bizarre word. He went down on his knees beside Blessed, pulled a handkerchief out of his pocket, and tied it around Blessed’s head, covering his eyes. “Try to take off the blindfold, Blessed, and I’ll kick you from here to the Sweet Onion River.” Only then did he dial 911. Faydeen answered on the first ring, as Ethan knew she would. Whenever she was on call for 911, she walked around with her cell phone clipped to her bra.

  “Sorry to interrupt your lovely Tuesday evening, Faydeen, but we need an ambulance out at my place. We got Blessed Backman here, and he’s got a fresh bullet wound in his shoulder.”

  “Good going, Ethan. Hey, why didn’t you kill the miserable bug?”

  34

  WHEN ETHAN CLOSED his cell he said to Savich, “Faydeen wants to know why you didn’t kill the miserable bug.”

  Savich said, “I seriously considered it for a second, but I had to let it go. Sorry.”

  Ethan shook his head. “We can’t kill him now, dammit. I mean, I’d like to, but I can’t, you know? Now we even have to keep him safe. All right, we’ll deal with it.”

  “He couldn’t stymie Dillon,” Autumn said. “Dillon’s like me. We’re—what’s the word, Mama?”

  Joanna patted her. “You and Dillon are gifted, thank heaven. You’re
both special in a very good way.”

  Autumn appeared pleased with that. Gifted. Savich realized it was a good word, the right word, and Joanna had taken a giant step in understanding her daughter’s gift to think of it in that way.

  Savich rose and looked down at Blessed. He felt Sherlock’s hand on his arm and placed his hand over hers, squeezed. “We got him, sweetheart. It’s over.”

  Joanna looked at him now. “He looks so ordinary. That makes him even scarier.”

  That was the truth, Savich thought. They listened to Blessed moan and curse, and, strangely, ask for his mother. Sherlock pulled him away, said quietly, “You remembered, didn’t you, Dillon? You remembered when you got close enough to Tammy Tuttle you saw her clearly. She couldn’t fool you like the others. She couldn’t—what does Blessed call it?—she couldn’t stymie you.”

  He nodded. “Yes, I remember. I guess it makes sense.”

  “No,” Sherlock said, shaking her head, “it doesn’t make sense. None of this makes any sense.” She drew in a deep breath. “You lucked out.”

  Savich shrugged. “Fact is, there wasn’t a choice. He was going to make Joanna kill herself. I had to stop him.”

  Joanna said, “That much power in this paltry little man, it scares me to death. Thank you, Dillon, for my life.”

  Savich smiled at her.

  Ethan said, “Joanna, you don’t look woozy or disoriented. Actually, you look okay. How do you feel? Headache?”

  “No, no, I’m fine, don’t worry, Ethan.” She sounded surprised, and vastly relieved. “Maybe he didn’t have enough time with me.”

  “Possibly so,” Savich said thoughtfully. “Okay, later, when we get this squared away, I want you to tell me exactly what you felt the moment you looked at his face, his eyes.”

  She nodded. “I can do it now—fact is, I don’t even remember looking at him, not at first, but it didn’t seem to matter. Do you know, I was certain I’d shot him, that I’d fired my gun, dead-on. For whatever reason, he wanted me to believe I’d pulled the trigger. But I hadn’t.” She looked down at Blessed again, at his blindfolded eyes, and kicked him one more time, on his leg. He jerked and gasped out, “You damned bitch, I’m going to have you roast yourself, have you hop right into a bed of coals, get you ready for hell.”