Everything She Wanted

by Jennifer Ryan

  His hand shook when he reached for the woman’s hand. He didn’t touch her, but stared at his shaking hand hovering over hers with blood splattered over his glove. The need to run overtook him, but he held it together. He picked up her hand, put the gun in it with her finger on the trigger, turned her hand and pressed the back to his glove to transfer the blood and gunshot residue—­thank you to every CSI show he’d ever seen. He scraped her hand on the floor to smear the blood, so it looked like that’s how her hand landed, the gun slipping from her grasp to lie just out of reach.

  The metallic scent of blood filled the air as well as the pungent smell of gunfire. He stood and took a few steps away from the bodies, staring until his eyes watered. He blinked to clear his vision, then turned and walked back to the patio doors. The sunset painted the sky in pinks, oranges, and purples. The pleasant scene didn’t erase the bright red blood in his mind. He sucked in a deep breath of the cool fresh air and sighed it out. He tore the mask from his head and walked around the house to the front, keeping to the trees and bushes for cover. He went back past the gate and down the street to his car. He bit back the pain and walked as normal as he could on his bad leg. Every step pulled at the cut and made it bleed more. The last thing he wanted was some nosy neighbor saying they saw some guy limping down the street.

  He opened his car door and slid behind the wheel. His hands still shook, even when he grabbed the wheel and held on tight. The shiver rippled over and through him.

  He’d left his cell phone in between the seats in the console. It beeped with four missed calls. He reached for it, jumping when it rang a split second before he picked it up.

  “Evan, honey, what’s going on?” his mother asked, panic and desperation in her voice.

  He choked out only one thing before he hung up. “It’s done.”

  EVAN TOSSED HIS bloodied shirt into the fireplace behind him. The chill that took over his body the moment he’d gotten into his car and drove to his parents’ place went bone-­deep. Even the fire’s heat didn’t penetrate to his altered soul. He couldn’t take it back. He couldn’t tell his father how sorry he was it ended this way.

  “You had no choice. We had no other way to solve this problem. Now, it’s done. We’ll get through this and everything will be ours. It will be okay.” The tremor and the trace of disbelief in her voice sank into his mind and made him doubt too.

  How could anything be right again?

  The man he beat to death left a black mark on his soul, but not like killing the woman and especially his father did. The man’s death had been an unfortunate accident. Sometimes, he didn’t know his own strength, especially when he was blind drunk. Tonight, he’d known exactly what he was doing.

  The shirt turned to ashes. He tossed in his bloody pants, smothering the flames for a moment before they flared back to life and consumed the bloody slacks. Would the nightmare in his mind consume every bit of happiness from his life from now on?

  “Once we get through the next few weeks, everything will get back to normal.”

  Normal? He didn’t know what normal was anymore.

  “Evan! I’m talking to you.”

  “It’s done. What more do you want?” he snapped.

  “I want to know what happened, so I’m prepared for when the police show up to inform me of my husband’s death.”

  Evan hung his head and stared at his bare feet on the hardwood floor. He sat on the stone hearth in nothing but his boxer briefs. Bloody bandages, gauze, cotton pads, and medical tape lay scattered at his feet. He pressed his hand to his bandaged and wrapped thigh, remembering the deep gash he’d cleaned and dressed when he got home. He picked up the glass of Scotch off the floor and drank deep, hoping the burn would wake him up and make him feel again. Nothing.

  Evan gave his mother the bare bones version of what happened, refusing to elaborate as she tried to ask questions.

  “I’m not sure how long it will take the cops to find them. I imagine they’ve got a maid and gardening ser­vice. Someone from Dad’s work will wonder where he is when he doesn’t show up to work. It might take a few days.”

  “Plenty of time for you to shake this off.”

  Like his mother did so easily. She sat there like he’d just told her nothing more serious than he’d gone out to run some errands.

  “We’ll act surprised and horrified by what’s happened. I’ll tell the police that your father and I had quietly decided on a separation. We’ll keep it simple. I’ll be your alibi. You’ll be mine. We had dinner here together. You stayed the night as you often do. It’s that simple and straightforward. We don’t know who that woman was. Your father kept her a secret from both of us.”

  “Who she was,” he repeated. “I still don’t know who she was.” Except the woman his father looked at with something in his eyes he’d never seen there when he looked at Evan’s mother.

  “She doesn’t matter. She can’t hurt us anymore.”

  “Are you sure about that?” He’d gotten lucky when she attacked him. If he hadn’t gotten her in that choke hold, she’d have kicked his ass. “He cared about her. I think he really loved her. Somehow, that makes this worse.”

  “It would have been worse, because she’d have taken everything. You think she’d have put up with you always asking him for money to bail you out of one jam after the next, not to mention jail? She’d have influenced him and made sure he drew further and further away from us. All she wanted was his money. She wanted it all for herself, so don’t grow a conscience on me now. It’s done. End of story. From here, we put this behind us and move on. Nothing and no one will get in our way.”

  Chapter Five

  THE DARK WINDOWS loomed like evil eyes in the big house. Not a single light welcomed her, setting off another round of chills up her spine. She’d left several messages for her sister this evening. Concerned by her silence, Kate packed up Alex in his car seat and drove back here to check on Margo and Donald. Something about the look in Donald’s eyes when she left hours ago, and the way he secretly handed her that key, disturbed her on a deep level. That deep dark place inside everyone where monsters exist and evil is a presence that makes your bones go cold.

  Kate parked in the driveway behind Donald’s BMW. The quiet wrapped around her. She didn’t like it.

  She pulled Alex from the backseat and carried him by the car seat handle around the car to the walkway. Two steps toward the front door, the garden lights went on, along with the motion lights by the front door. Donald must not have reset them for the earlier sunsets this time of year. Nearly eight o’clock, she wondered for the hundredth time if Donald and Margo took her Mercedes and went out to enjoy a quiet dinner at a local restaurant and spend some quality time alone together. She hoped that’s what they were doing. A romantic evening out that would make her sour gut seem ridiculous. Margo would chastise her for being overprotective. Like always.

  She unlocked the door, walked into the dark foyer, and flipped the switch on the wall, lighting up the entry and part of the living room. Something alerted her to danger, but she couldn’t say what. Maybe it was the quiet, or the darkness that kept everything beyond the overhead light masked in shadows.

  She closed the door behind her and called out, “Margo, Donald, are you home?”

  No answer. Not even a surprised, “We’ll be down in a minute,” from her sister as she lay locked in Donald’s arms in a rumpled bed upstairs. She didn’t really expect an answer, but not getting one set off another round of alarms in her head.

  Alex whimpered and sucked harder on his pacifier. Even he sensed something wasn’t right. Afraid to leave him alone by the door, she grabbed the car seat handle and carried Alex with her through the living room toward the dark kitchen. Some kind of sixth sense drew her in that direction. She stopped short before crossing the dining room when the scent registered and her mind filled with past images of her mother, bruised and
bloody, on the floor at her father’s feet. The unique metallic scent would never be forgotten. Imprinted on her soul, she’d recognize the smell of blood anywhere.

  Fear stole her breath. She set Alex down on the floor, not wanting to take him with her into the kitchen to discover whatever lay beyond the darkness. She turned on a lamp by a side chair to keep him in the light, though it wouldn’t change the nightmare of what she suspected she’d find in the kitchen.

  Alex reached for her hand. She gave him her finger. He squeezed tight, like even he didn’t want her to go in there. She didn’t want to either, but had to know what happened to her sister and Donald. She didn’t want to believe what her senses told her.

  “I’ll be right back, sweetheart.”

  Kate dropped her purse beside Alex, dug out her cell phone and the switch blade she kept for protection when she met clients in a bad neighborhood. She flipped open the knife, leaned down, and kissed Alex on the forehead, took a deep breath to muster her courage, and stood and walked through the dining room.

  Donald’s feet were highlighted just inside the kitchen entrance in the soft light barely making it this far into the house. She stopped and gave herself a moment to take it in. Dead. Lying on the kitchen floor. She couldn’t help him. No one could. But she’d make the bastard responsible pay.

  Her heart pounded against her ribs. She continued on and stood at Donald’s feet. She spotted her sister, lying dead on the floor in front of Donald in the dark. She reached for the light switch, stalling for only a second before she turned it on and illuminated the gruesome scene in front of her.

  Her heart stopped and a scream rose to her throat, but got choked off by the gush of tears that ran down her cheeks in a torrent. No sound escaped her lips, but the scream of outrage and grief rang out in her head. The depth of her grief squeezed her heart until it shattered, tore her insides to shreds, and she couldn’t breathe.

  The scene didn’t seem real. The blood a mocking kind of horror to her mind’s denial of what lay before her. She swiped the tears from her eyes with the backs of her hands. Noting the knife and phone in her hands, she closed the knife and stuffed it in her pocket. The phone she held on to until she could collect herself. She sucked in a ragged breath and tried to think through her pain and see what really happened here, because what it looked like couldn’t be the truth. The gun near her sister’s hand lied about the sweet, gentle sister she knew and loved. Margo would never shoot Donald. She detested guns. She loved Donald.

  The scattered and broken dishes on the counter and floor told her there’d been a struggle. She and Margo were expert kickboxers. They’d studied together for the last ten years. Kate taught classes, so a struggle seemed normal if someone tried to hurt her sister. Margo wouldn’t hesitate to fight back.

  Soup smeared down the cabinet and puddled on the floor. Apple slices lay scattered around both bodies. A bloody steak knife lay just under the cabinet lip on the tile. She studied Donald’s face and body. No slice marks that she could see. Unless Margo stabbed him in the gut, he hadn’t defended himself and gotten sliced on the hands or arms. Blood pooled at his middle, making it more likely Margo shot him. But why? How did she get the gun? Where did she get the gun? Did Donald try to shoot her and she took it from him? Not possible.

  She hated to look at Margo with her head a bloody mess, her skull blasted open. No way Margo shot herself. She wouldn’t do that. She loved Donald. She loved Alex. She had every reason to live, especially now that Donald had left his wife and they were going to be married and be a real family.

  Something nagged at Kate. She made herself look, think, find the things that lay beyond the obvious picture. Margo’s knuckles were red and swollen. She’d gotten in a few punches. Donald’s face didn’t show any bruising or swelling. She hadn’t hit him. She’d go for the face, the ribs.

  Kate’s eyes settled on the bloody knife again. Away and across from Margo, someone must have knocked it from her hand and it skittered across the floor. The small splatters of blood led back toward Margo and the counter where she’d been making the food. Someone surprised her. Kate scanned the floor and spotted it. Small drops of blood on the other side of Margo, a splatter on the drawers, another on the refrigerator. Cast off from the knife after Margo sliced someone open.

  Satisfied she’d seen everything, she turned her back and called the police.

  “Nine-­one-­one. What is your emergency?”

  “My sister and her fiancé are dead. They . . . they’re d-­dead,” she rambled. “Someone shot them.”

  “What is the address?”

  Kate absently rattled off the address, her eyes glued to Alex in the other room. His mother and father were dead. Everything they’d tried so hard to build together gone in the blink of an eye. He’d never remember them.

  “Ma’am, what is your name?” the operator asked, like she’d had to repeat the question several times.

  “Kate Morrison. I . . . I’m Margo’s sister.”

  “The police are on the way. Please stay on the line and . . .”

  Kate dropped the phone, unable to do this. She’d wait for the police, but right now, she needed to sit and hold Alex. He needed her. He’d keep the grief from sucking her under. Margo dead. It couldn’t be real. She didn’t know how to live without her sister. They’d seen each other through so many bad times. They’d made each other better, competing to always be better than the other. They’d promised each other they’d never be alone.

  Alex stared up at her. It hit her hard. Margo kept her promise. Kate wasn’t alone. She had Alex. He needed her. He was hers. She’d make sure he got everything coming to him, and the man who did this to her beautiful sister and Alex’s father would pay.

  Chapter Six

  BEN THOUGHT ABOUT what Sam said about settling down. He never minded sharing his bed. In fact, he’d gone too long sleeping alone. The thing was, he enjoyed the sex, but not the sleepover. He had no trouble connecting with a woman on a sexual level. He went out of his way to treat them right, because his dad had been a prick to his mother, degrading everything she did from her cooking to her looks, even though she didn’t deserve a single insult. He made sure the women who came into his life had nothing to complain about his behavior. Except one thing. The distance he kept emotionally.

  J.T. seemed content to eat his dinner from Ben’s lap, so Ben grabbed his fork and took a bite of his favorite fettuccini Alfredo with spinach and broccoli. J.T. stole a long noodle and sucked it into his mouth, a huge smile on his sauce-­covered mouth.

  J.T. ate half of Ben’s dinner, ignoring his own chicken nuggets and fruit. Ben ate half the apples and coaxed J.T. to eat more of them. He only wanted the noodles. At least he ate a bunch of spinach drenched in the sauce without even knowing it.

  “I can’t believe you got him to eat that,” Elizabeth whispered across Sam.

  “Got him? Who could stop him?” Ben laughed with Elizabeth and gave J.T. a hug. He liked the little boy and couldn’t help wondering what it would be like to have his own son. He didn’t really have to think too hard. All he had to do was look at the other men around the table sitting with their kids. Tyler would find out soon enough when Noah came into the world.

  Waiters cleared the dinner dishes and Morgan opened her presents with a lot of help from Emma. As the oldest child in the group, she took charge, holding up each present for everyone to see and repacking it for Morgan, so she could open more gifts.

  Morgan opened his gift last.

  “Ben, I love the books. Thank you.”

  “You’re welcome. No one should trust me to buy baby clothes. Books seemed an easy alternative choice.”

  “And the spa day?” Morgan asked.

  “After what you’re about to go through, you deserve a spa day. I’ll even come over and hang out with Tyler and help take care of Noah while you get your facial, mani, pedi, and massage.”

>   “You’re on,” Tyler said, raising his beer in salute.

  “I’ll hold you to that,” Morgan said.

  “It’s a promise.”

  Grace, Sam and Elizabeth’s daughter, didn’t want to be outdone by her little brother and climbed into Ben’s lap for dessert. Sam tried to pluck J.T. out of his lap, but J.T. whined and struggled to stay put.

  “Leave him, Sam. I’ve got them.”

  “Dog pile on Ben,” Jack teased.

  “At least let him have some dessert,” Jenna said, a laugh in her voice.

  “My hands are too full of kids. It’s cool, let them eat.”

  “I helped Aunt Elizabeth frost the cake,” Emma announced.

  “You did a great job, Sugar Bug,” Marti praised her daughter.

  As much as Ben liked being with the family, the large group overwhelmed him. The noise, the comradery, and the laughs made all the things he’d longed for as a kid surface along with the bad memories.

  Family get-­togethers were a time to fear and endure. His uncles drank as much as his father. Seemed that their fun lay in one-­upping the other in how mean they could be to each other, the women, and even the children. His older cousins joined in, having learned it’s better to be a part of their so-­called fun than to be on the receiving end of their sharp tongues and backhanded smacks on the shoulder or cracks to the head that only elicited more laughs. His mother and aunts either joined in the drinking, or ended up trying to reason with unreasonable drunks until the inevitable fight broke out. Someone always left bloody, whether it be man, woman, or child. It never ended well. The end of the party was never the end of the fight. No, his father would pick and pick at his mother, him, until his father lost his temper and hit one or both of them. The good nights were when he passed out. Ben thanked God every day he didn’t inherit his father’s addictions. To booze. To drugs. To hurting others for sport, thinking it made him feel better when all it really did was prove he was a colossal heartless asshole.