Ethan fired at him a couple more times as he leaped to his feet, and ran after him. “Don’t shoot me, dammit!” he yelled at Joanna, who was climbing out of the window, Ox’s gun in her hand. She ignored him, finished off the clip, but she didn’t hit Blessed. He heard her say, more to herself than to anyone else, “I only got him in the arm, dammit. I missed him but good this time.” She yelled after him, “Get him, Sheriff, get him!”
Ethan ran into the woods, stopped, and listened, all his training and experience coming to bear. He didn’t hear anything, not even a breaking twig. The man had known enough to stop too. That meant he wasn’t a fool and he knew the woods. Ethan heard Joanna yell at the top of her lungs, “Sheriff, don’t get too close to him. Don’t look him in the eye!”
Just what he needed. “Stay back!” he yelled, then stilled again. Ethan knew these woods as well as any Titusville native, any ranger, knew them certainly better than this maniac. He heard Blessed now, heard him running, breaking branches, stumbling, heard his hard breathing, and he smiled. He ran directly to his left, knowing where to run to keep as fast and quiet as possible. He was nearly to the road. It was then he heard the sirens blasting through the still night. Blessed had to hear them too, had to know they’d block off the road.
Ethan smiled. Gotcha. He broke out of the trees not six feet from the asphalt when three patrol cars raced by. He fired his Beretta into the air. All three cars screeched to a stop. Marco Hayes leaped out of the driver’s seat, his gun drawn.
“Sheriff? What’s going on?”
“A. man alone, tall, kind of skinny, ski mask. His gun’s empty, but he could have another one. He’s close, in the woods. His vehicle has to be nearby. Did you see a car by the road when you went by?”
None of them had seen a car, but it was dark, and they’d been over the top with excitement, focused on getting to his house. The car could be well hidden.
Ethan put his finger to his lips and listened. He couldn’t hear Blessed moving now. Was he still again, and waiting? Had he walked here from Titusville? No, that made no sense. He had to have a car, or maybe a motorcycle.
But where had he gone?
And then Ethan knew. Adrenaline rushed through him, making him nearly airborne. He yelled to his deputies, “Everyone get to my house. He’s gone back. Hurry!”
Without another word, Ethan took off running into the woods, not trying to mask his noise. When he neared the edge of the woods at the back of his property, he heard a gunshot not twenty feet from the side of his house. The man had another gun or he wouldn’t have gone back. Or maybe Joanna had been the one to fire. Only a single shot, and that scared him more than a firefight.
He saw cars pile into his driveway, heard men’s shouts fill the night. He didn’t see Blessed.
“Joanna!”
She didn’t answer. When he reached the shattered bedroom window, he realized he was afraid to look inside, afraid he’d see that Autumn was gone, her mother bleeding on the floor. And Ox?
He heard his deputy Larch yell, “Sheriff, front door!”
He ran around the side of his house to see Ox and Blessed, locked together like wrestlers, burst out of the front doorway, roll across the porch, and land hard on the flagstone steps. Both men were grunting and heaving as their fists pounded, blood from Blessed’s arm spreading over both of them. Ethan saw Blessed had a gun.
“Stay back!” Ethan yelled at his deputies. “Don’t shoot! You might hit Ox!” He got within six feet of where the men pummeled and battered each other when Blessed managed to jerk his arm out of Ox’s hold and fired. The bullet barely missed Ox’s face. It was so close it had to deafen both of them.
Ethan raised his gun. Enough was enough; he had to end it. He aimed carefully, only to have Ox suddenly roll on top of Blessed. All of them watched, guns leveled at the two men, when suddenly it seemed like Blessed was embracing Ox, but Ox wasn’t fighting him now. He was holding Ox close, and the two were staring at each other, Ox’s body blocking any shots. Neither man moved.
Moments passed before Ox came to his feet, Blessed coming up behind him, pressed against his back. Ox stood there, not moving, protecting him. All of them saw the gun pointing to Ox’s neck.
“Stay back, all of you, stay back, or this boy here’s dead!”
The Ox Ethan knew, the Ox he worked with, a man who was so tough he could beat the stuffing out of most other men without breaking a sweat, simply stood there, no expression on his face. He knew his deputies couldn’t believe Ox had folded, that he’d stopped fighting. It looked like he was now willingly protecting Blessed, letting him press his gun into his neck. Ethan raised a warning hand. “Blessed, we’re not moving. Look around you. You’re surrounded. Let Ox go, tell him to lie down. I won’t let you take him as a hostage. You hear me, Blessed?”
Blessed laughed, eerie and low. “No, Sheriff, Ox is my little buddy now, right, Ox?”
Ox didn’t move, didn’t speak, simply stood quiet in front of Blessed.
“Right, Ox?” Slowly Ox nodded.
Blessed yelled, “I want the kid! Bitch, I know you can hear me. You’ve probably got your gun aimed right at me. You send Autumn out now or this good old boy buys it. Now!”
Ethan heard her curse, knew she had no more bullets. She kept clear of the front door, but she was close. She shouted, “You’re not taking Autumn, you monster! Go back to that mad old woman and tell her it’s over. You’re not getting Autumn!”
His deputies were staring at Joanna, whose head came around the front door, but no one moved a whisker. Ethan figured he had maybe three more rounds in his clip.
He called out, “Why does the mad old woman want Autumn?”
Blessed screamed, “She’s not mad! It ain’t none of your business, Sheriff. I’m gonna hurt you bad for that, Joanna. Now I’m gonna kill me this big guy.”
Ethan said, “Wait, Blessed! Talk to me, maybe we can work something out. Tell me why you want the little girl. Tell me why she’s so Important to you.”
He didn’t think Blessed would answer, but he did, his voice high, nearly a wail. “I gotta have her. You hear me? That’s all you gotta know.”
Joanna walked slowly out of the front door.
Ethan felt his heart drop to his boots. “Joanna, get back inside!”
“No, Sheriff,” she said, her voice as calm as the night. “He can take me if he’ll let Ox go. You just have to take care of Autumn, give her her last two pills.”
“Joanna—”
She waved him away. “Will you let him go, Blessed, and take me?”
“You thieving, conniving bitch! What would I want you for?” Blessed yelled. “We should have put your lights out as soon as Ma realized—” Blessed jerked the gun away from Ox’s neck and fired at her as she jumped back into the house.
9
BLESSED FIRED AGAIN into the open front door, and the bullet chipped off a huge hunk of the door frame. He yelled and stepped back toward the woods, pulling Ox back with him, firing at them with each step. Then his gun clicked empty, and he turned and ran. Ethan’s deputies fired after him. He doubted any of their bullets hit him this time unless through blind luck. It was simply too dark, and he’d been running like a berserker, in and out of the shadows and the trees.
Ethan knew Blessed had to be running scared. He’d not only failed, he was wounded. Ethan split up his eight deputies into pairs. To the three pairs who were going after Blessed in the woods, he said, “Listen to me carefully—this is not bullshit. Do not look at this guy in the face, you hear me? He’ll hypnotize you, and you’ll start acting like Ox. Yeah, that’s what he did to Ox, believe me. Do not look at his face!” He sent his other two deputies to their cars, watched them roar out of his driveway to cover the road. They’d try to keep Blessed pinned inside the woods until the others found him. If they didn’t, Blessed would disappear into the Titus Hitch Wilderness, at least that’s what Ethan would do. He had no clue whether Blessed was experienced in a wilderness. Maybe Joanna would
know.
Ethan wasn’t surprised when Faydeen roared up in her old Chevy Silverado. Between them, they got Ox into her truck and on his way to Dr. Spitz’s house.
Ethan stayed at the house, afraid to leave for fear Blessed would come back yet again. He spoke to his deputies on his cell phone, instructing them to push into the woods if they couldn’t find an escape vehicle. Push in and take care—who knew if Blessed had a third gun? At this point, nothing would surprise Ethan. He heard Joanna speaking quietly to Autumn just inside the front door.
Ethan’s deputies hunted Blessed Backman for two hours. They found no car, no truck, no motorcycle. He’d either vanished in a puff of smoke or gone so deep into the wilderness it would take a week to find him. Ethan called the ranger station, told them the situation, had Joanna give them Blessed’s description—mid-fifties, maybe five-foot-ten, thin, not more than one hundred fifty pounds, long, thinning gray-brown hair, brown eyes. With a look at Ethan, she’d told them his last name was Backman. Blessed Backman? They were related to this maniac? Ethan had never liked alliteration, and at this moment, he hated it. No, Joanna had no idea if he Had a car, a criminal record, or any scars.
Ethan called law enforcement in the half-dozen towns surrounding Titus Hitch Wilderness. He had them check their criminal databases, but there was nothing on Blessed Backman. He couldn’t think of anything else to do, except find out whatever he could from Joanna.
He called his deputies back in. None of them, they told him, had seen a thing. Because of what had happened to Ox, Ethan spoke to each of them in turn. They all seemed okay, thank God.
When Ethan walked into his living room at nearly two o’clock in the morning, it was to see Joanna stretched out on his sofa, spooning Autumn, both of them deeply asleep. Even though it was empty, Joanna still held Ox’s gun, a Colt that had belonged to his grandma, an old lady known hereabouts for extinguishing a cigarette at ten feet with a shot.
Ethan stepped outside to give instructions to his two deputies, Glenda and Harm, stationed in his driveway for the rest of the night. “Listen carefully. I know you realize there’s something hinky about this guy, and there is. Remember what I said—if he comes around, you don’t look at him, okay? You saw what he did to Ox. Keep your eye’s down if you see him, and keep shooting.”
“Sounds like this guy’s some major-league voodoo artist,” Glenda and, and looked him square in the eye.
“I think we can start with that. I think he’s also a lot more—he’s out of control.”
Glenda ran her tongue over her lips. She was scared, and that was good.
He had no idea what Blessed would do next. “Keep alert,” he told them at least twice.
When he called Dr. Spitz, he told Ethan it appeared that Ox was going to be all right. His headache had lessened in the past hour. Dr. Spitz said he’d never seen the like, but this deal about hypnotism, he couldn’t swallow that. Maybe it was drugs or some sort of psychotic episode. Even with all Ethan’s assurances that it appeared to be some sort of powerful hypnotism, Dr. Spitz remained skeptical.
All Ethan was sure of was that Ox would have shot Joanna Back-man without a moment’s pause.
Who was Blessed Backman? Who was the mad old woman?
He stepped back inside and stared down at Joanna, a woman he hadn’t known existed four days before, and her little girl. Autumn suddenly twitched in her sleep—probably a nightmare, and no wonder. Should he wake her? Before he took a step toward the sofa, Joanna began rubbing the little girl’s cheek, soothing her. From what he could tell, she was still asleep. It was an instinct, he supposed, and he wondered if you just did that when you had a kid.
Autumn stopped moving. She sighed deeply, pushed back against her mother’s stomach.
Joanna Backman. Who was she, really? Why did Blessed Backman want Autumn so badly?
“Meow.”
Ethan looked down to see Mackie rubbing his face against his jean leg. He scooped him up and, out of long habit, smoothed his whiskers. It was then he noticed Lula tucked in tight against the little girl’s stomach.
Beneath the coffee table, Big Louie snorted in his sleep, crossed his paws over his nose. He opened one eye to stare at Ethan a moment, then closed it again. He wasn’t more than two feet away from the sofa.
Ethan picked up one of his grandmother’s afghans off the back of his big TV chair and covered them with it. Just before the cover went down, Lula stared at Mackie, gave him the fish eye, and scooted closer to Autumn.
Ethan looked out to see Harm and Glenda talking in the front seat of the patrol car.
He went downstairs to the basement, turned on the single hundred-watt lightbulb, and fetched a piece of plywood from behind an ancient rattan patio set dating from the fifties. He boarded up the window in his bedroom, Mackie padding at his heels, not making a sound, his ears forward. Mackie was on alert, rightfully so.
Ethan didn’t think he’d sleep with all the questions ricocheting around his brain, and the gnawing concern that Blessed might still be nut there, waiting, but he did, Mackie curled up against his neck, his whiskers twitching against his ear.
10
Sunday morning
Ethan smelled coffee. For a moment it surprised him because he never programmed the coffeepot before he went to bed. Was he imagining it?
He sat up in bed. No dream; it was coffee he smelled, real and rich and sinful.
Then he remembered. He leaped out of bed, dislodging Mackie, who gave a pissed-off meow, and ran toward the door. He realized he was wearing only boxer shorts, grabbed his jeans, and jerked them on. He stopped to pull on a sweatshirt and paused in the kitchen doorway. He saw Joanna standing in front of his brand-new Kenmore stove, an egg carton, a quart of nonfat milk, onion remains, and a depleted bag of four grated cheeses he used to sprinkle on his tacos lined up on the counter next to her. He watched her whip the mixture with a fork, then pour it into a heated skillet. The sound of the sizzle, the smell of the butter, made his stomach growl. He realized he hadn’t eaten since lunch the previous day—well, not counting the pizza slice with Autumn. He smelled the turkey bacon microwaving and inhaled deeply. Big Louie and Lula sat on the floor, staring fixedly at the microwave, not moving, waiting for the ping. Mackie threaded through his legs to join his sister and Big Louie in their vigil. Autumn was setting the table. She was saying, “I like these plates, Mama, they’re cute.”
They were a Mexican motif, bright and cheerful, presented to him by his mother three years ago when he’d moved back to Titusville. He’d packed his own very nice Italian service away, and thanked her.
“Don’t forget the milk for the coffee, sweetie.”
Autumn lifted the carton of nonfat milk from the counter and set it on the table. She began folding paper napkins, placing them care-fully beside each plate.
It was such a domestic scene, so very normal. It reminded him of years ago when there were three yelling, laughing children banging around the kitchen, ready to eat every scrap their mother served up. It was remarkable. He said from the doorway, “I hope you made three extra slices of turkey bacon for my anorexic pets.”
Joanna dropped the wooden spatula and made a frantic grab for Ox’s Colt, six inches from her hand.
He held out both palms. “It’s okay. It’s me, please don’t shoot me in my own kitchen.”
“Not a problem,” Joanna said. “The clip is empty.”
Autumn froze at the sound of his voice. Then she gave him a huge grin. Big Louie barked, Lula meowed, and Mackie never looked away From the microwave, which pinged a half-second later.
“Good morning, Sheriff,” Joanna said. “I hope you don’t mind our taking over your kitchen.” She opened the microwave door, pulled out the covered plate of bacon, dabbed off the extra grease with a paper towel, and looked down at the animals. They were talking nonstop, at full volume. Ethan took down paper plates from the cab-inet and crumbled a single crispy bacon slice on each plate, set them in a straight line on the floor. The ba
rks and meows died, the silence instant.
Her fear was still palpable. How was he to get information out on a woman who was still so scared, still so on edge she’d have shot him? He said, “I’m tempted to join my varmints. Everything smells great.”
“I took coffee and peanut-butter toast out to Glenda and Harm, What a name, where did it come from?”
“Her dad really liked The Wizard of Oz, but her mom insisted on the normal spelling.”
A laugh spurted out. “No, Harm’s name, not Glinda the Good Witch.”
“His granny was always preaching at him to never get ‘In Harm’s Way/ always spoke it with capital letters. It stuck when he was about twelve. He doesn’t use his real name. Thank you, Joanna, for feeding them.”
She nodded and picked up the spatula, went back to the eggs while Ethan opened cans for the animals. He petted each of them. “Okay, guys, you’ve had your dessert, now go over and eat your main course. That’s a nice name you’ve got, Joanna. Where’d it come from?”
She was weighing how much to tell him; he saw it clearly on her face. He’d love to get her in a poker game, she’d lose her knickers.
“Joanna was grandma’s name,” Autumn said, carefully placing a knife beside a plate Ethan saw was chipped. “I never met her; she died when I was little. Remember, I told you, Ethan. She died of the big C.”
“I remember. I’m sorry,” Ethan said to her.
Joanna shrugged. “She was actually my great-grandmother, and she was ninety-four.”
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