Murder on the Third Try

by K. P. Gresham

  “Leave. Now.”

  The driver didn’t have to be told again. He hit the accelerator and zoomed onto the highway.

  Bo looked back at Warren. “Maybe we shoulda put the deputy in his car.”

  Warren shook his head. “He needs blood bad. He won’t make it to the hospital.” He nodded for the two men to get back in their truck. “I’ll stay here until the ambulance comes. You boys better get up to the house.”

  ***

  James W. had never felt so helpless in his entire life. Deep in his gut he knew the numbers were stacked against them. The bad guys had the guns. He had no back-up. And the people he loved most in the world, save Elsbeth and his son, were in mortal danger. To put it bluntly, his ox was in a ditch.

  “Let’s all take a seat in the front room, shall we?” The citified mannequin that Matt had identified as Rutledge turned his attention to James W., and the sheriff didn’t mind one bit if the hate in his eyes was showing.

  Rutledge snickered. “Don’t care for me much, hmm?”

  James W.’s eyes flashed with rage. “I’m guessin’ the buzzards laid you and the sun hatched you.”

  The ex-police chief looked confused at first, then laughed. “A colorful metaphor, to be sure.” He gestured with his gun toward the front room. “Go.”

  James W. did as he was told. He headed straight for the opposite side of the room to protect Pearl who had dropped into the rocking chair. Mandy had allowed the movement, since it was obvious Pearl was about to pass out. He put a hand on Pearl’s shoulder.

  Kodak fixed his weaselly stare on Mike. “Grab a chair, preacher. We can’t forget your condition.”

  Matt did as he was told and placed the chair across the room in the kitchen’s archway. Good idea, James W. thought. Keep us apart so they can’t see us in one glance. Plus, Matt was now blocking a full view of Angie’s sprawled body. He sat down.

  “And where would you like me to sit, Kodak?” Rutledge’s voice dripped with venom, catching James W. by surprise. This was unexpected. Was there trouble in Rutledge’s ranks? His suspicions were confirmed when he saw that Rutledge’s weapon was pointed at Kodak, not at Matt.

  Kodak looked surprised, but played it cool. “In the recliner, sir. You’ll be most comfortable there.”

  Rutledge’s lips curled into a sneer. “And put my back to you? I don’t think so.” Rutledge looked over at Mandy. “I guess you were right all along.”

  Though James W. didn’t understand the comment, apparently Mandy did. “Just a chip off the old block. Father.”

  Matt’s head snapped around, and James W. watched him wince at the sudden motion. “Howard Rutledge is your father?”

  Mandy lowered her weapon, but upped her posture. “More like I’m his bastard child, but we got over that, didn’t we?” She looked to Rutledge.

  “I wanted you to prove yourself,” Rutledge allowed. A satisfied smile crossed his face. “And you have. Daughter.”

  For a moment James W. wished he had a chair to sit on. The revelations kept on coming.

  This could be the chance he needed. Rutledge, Mandy and Kodak were apparently caught up in a power struggle and Mandy had just won. No one was paying attention to the hostages in the room.

  And Mandy was only three feet away from James W. He looked from Rutledge to Kodak. Who was the greater risk? Rutledge, the sheriff decided.

  He lunged for Mandy’s gun, grabbed the hand that held it, and pointed it at Rutledge. In one motion, Mike was off the chair, grabbing Rutledge’s gun hand and aiming it toward the ceiling. It went off, a deafening blast in the small room. Plaster rained down upon them as Matt and Rutledge wrestled for the gun. It slid across the floor.

  Pearl let out a shriek. James W. and Matt turned in time to see Kodak pull Pearl from the chair and hold his gun to her head. “Drop ‘em boys, or she dies.”

  ***

  “Madre de Dios!” Aaron pounded his fist on the wheel. “I think we broke the axle.”

  His pronouncement didn’t surprise Bo. He’d known driving through the dried creek bed on the far side of Pearl’s farmhouse would be bumpy, but that last hole had almost put the two men through the windshield. “Close enough.” He opened his door to climb out of the truck.

  “Hold on.” Aaron reached behind the seat and pulled out a rifle, then nodded toward the glove compartment. “My handgun’s in there.”

  Bo reached in and grabbed the Colt 1911.. His eyes rounded when he saw the weapon’s fire power. “Pretty heavy stuff.”

  Aaron held up the rifle and nodded toward the handgun. “Pick your poison,” he said.

  Bo shrugged, checked to make sure the Luger was loaded, then jumped down from the truck.

  The two men crawled up the creek’s embankment and peeked over the edge to survey the situation. Only two buildings of the farm complex were lit up. The house, and a gardening shed behind the barn. They headed for the gardening shed first.

  Both men bent low as they crossed the open field. They stopped at the barn to catch their breaths. Bo nodded toward the house. “Looks like a crowd in there.”

  Aaron nudged his way to the corner, and checked out the garden shed. “Not so much back here. The lights are on, though.” He brought his rifle to his shoulder. “I’ll go see if anyone’s there.”

  Bo watched the large man disappear around the corner. Something in Aaron’s resolve had Bo’s radar beeping on high. This guy was way more than a simple gas station owner. Bo crouched low, as he waited for Aaron’s return. He was back in less than two minutes

  “Musta been where James W. set up the surveillance unit,” Aaron whispered. “All the screens have been busted out.”

  “Someone must’ve been in there to watch the monitors. Any sign of a deputy?”

  Aaron shook his head. “No. But there was a lot of blood.”

  Bo wiped at his mouth. Damn, they needed more information. “Let’s do a circle around the house. Scope things out.”

  Aaron nodded. “We’d better split up. At least one of us needs to live long enough to get Hogan out of there.”

  Bo looked up with a jerk. “Hogan? Who’s that?”

  Aaron blew out an impatient breath. “Hogan. Hayden. Whatever. I’ll go around the back.”

  Bo watched the rotund linebacker move quickly toward a cluster of trees. Whoever Aaron was, at least he was on the preacher’s side.

  Bo held his gun at the ready and headed for the front of the house.

  ***

  Breathless, Mike stood locked in horror as Kodak held the gun at Pearl’s neck

  “Good job of disarming the bitch,” Kodak said to the sheriff. He turned to Mike. “And you. Now’s your chance to take out the Chief.”

  Rutledge threw off Mike’s hold. “Don’t think for one moment I didn’t know this is what you were up to,” he growled at Kodak. “But Hogan won’t do it. I know.”

  Mike glared at Rutledge. Won’t do what, he wondered. Then it came to him. The memory again. This time more clearly.

  A dark night in Miami. Mike got wind through a friend in the D.A.’s office that they had served a warrant for Rutledge’s arrest.

  Mike wanted to be there, in the room, when they took Rutledge down. But Rutledge had contacts in the D.A.’s office as well.

  Mike wasn’t a rookie cop, however. He saw the trap Rutledge had laid when he got to the dark, vacant house. Instead of going to the kitchen door as instructed, Mike had picked the lock on the patio’s French doors and made his way to Rutledge’s office.

  The Chief had been sitting in an easy chair by the fire, a gun at the ready on the carved oak table next to him. For Mike, standing in the doorway opposite from the door the Chief was expecting him, he had a perfect shot at the man who had killed his father and his brother.

  Why hadn’t he shot Rutledge?

  Kodak took no notice of Mike’s inner turmoil. “Sheriff, just like before. Put your gun, or should I say Mandy’s gun, on the floor and kick it this way. Gently.” Kodak forced Pearl back
into the chair. He placed his Glock against the back of her head. “No tricks, please.”

  James W. put the weapon on the floor, but he kicked it wide of Kodak’s reach. “Oops,” he said. “Got away from me.”

  “No matter. Take a seat on the couch.”

  Mike could see James W. didn’t like the idea, but neither did he have much of a choice. As he moved toward the couch, Kodak nodded toward Mandy. “Keep him company.”

  When both were seated, Kodak grabbed Pearl by the hair and jerked her off the chair. She squealed in pain. “Kick that gun this way,” Kodak ordered.

  Tears spilling down her face, Pearl reached out with her foot and tapped the gun to him. He slammed her back down into the chair, then glared at James W. “You screw with me like that again and she gets hurt.” He shoved at her head and it flopped over like a ragdoll’s.

  Kodak turned his attention to Mike and Rutledge. He sneered. “Hogan, I’m about to give you the chance of a lifetime.” He pointed his gun at the Chief. “Pick up the Chief’s gun.”

  “I will not.”

  The sound of Kodak’s gun firing in the small room was deafening. The Chief grabbed at his shoulder. Blood spurted from between his fingers. “You sonuvabitch!”

  Kodak simply nodded, a calm look on his face. “Preacher, pick up the Chief’s weapon.”

  “I said no.”

  Kodak shook his head and placed the barrel of his Glock to the back of Pearl’s head. “Now.”

  Mike looked at Pearl. She was shaking with fear, but her eyes held a flicker of anger, too. Kodak pulled her hair, and the flicker sparked to rage. Was she considering a move to overtake Kodak? She’d never succeed.

  Mike had no choice but to pick up the weapon Rutledge had dropped.

  Kodak’s grin was victorious. “I like this.” He gestured with his weapon toward the Chief who was desperately trying to stop the blood flowing from his shoulder. “On your knees.”

  The Chief was in too much pain to argue. He did as he was told. “You’re a dead man,” he spit out.

  “No. You are.” Kodak nodded to the preacher. “Time for you to take your revenge, Hogan. Kill him.”

  Mike swallowed back the rage that was begging him to do exactly that. Here for the killing was the man who had murdered his father and brother. God, how he wanted to pull the trigger.

  The Chief stared at Kodak. “He won’t do it.”

  Mike jabbed the weapon into the back of Rutledge’s head. “What makes you so sure?”

  “You’re a gutless prick. You had a chance to take me out four years ago. But you couldn’t stand to pull the trigger. No matter how much you hated me, you were a yellow-bellied coward. The same as you are now.”

  The Chief was right about one thing. For damned sure, Mike had had every chance to pull that trigger back in Miami.

  But he hadn’t.

  Because he wouldn’t kill for hate. Now he remembered. The words of his father had come back to him then, just as they were coming back to him now. Killing a man out of hate is a sin, his father had said. God didn’t create us to hate.

  “No,” Mike whispered. “He created us to love.” That was it, he remembered. In that moment he had found a new purpose. And just as he did that night back in Miami, Mike placed the gun on the floor.

  The Chief chuckled, nodded to Kodak. “I told you he wouldn’t pull the trigger.”

  “She’ll pay for your cowardice, Hogan.” Kodak yanked Pearl’s arm and was about to crack it at the shoulder, when the window behind him shattered.

  ***

  Bo lowered the Colt 1911 in time to see the puny thug go down. Pearl was screaming, but he was pretty sure it was because she was now covered in her captor’s blood.

  There was a commotion taking place to the right, somewhere behind the front door. He couldn’t see what was going on from where he stood.

  Keeping his weapon at the ready, Bo ran toward the house.

  ***

  James W. lunged toward the handgun that Matt had tossed on the floor, but Rutledge was closer and quicker. Despite the bullet in his shoulder, the kingpin picked up the weapon in his right hand and folded his left hand over it.

  “Back on the couch,” Rutledge spat at James W., then turned the gun on Matt. “You want to die, you sonuvabitch? No problem.” He aimed the weapon directly at Matt’s heart.

  The sound of the blast made James W.’s ears pop. Shocked, he waited for Matt’s body to fall to the ground, then sucked in his surprise when it was Rutledge who crumpled to the floor. What in the world? Then he understood.

  He turned to see Pearl Masterson, her face covered in Kodak’s blood and brains, lower the gun to her side. Her hands began to shake, but her eyes held steady.

  “Pearl!” James W. ran to her. “You killed Rutledge! My God!”

  “That’s right,” she said. She lifted her diminutive chin defiantly. “I’m God made. Jesus saved. And Texas raised.” She tossed the gun aside.

  ***

  The blast of an explosion sounded distant, but it was enough to disturb Angie into consciousness. The surface below her was hard, and she had no idea where she was. She forced her eyes open to get her bearings.

  She was indeed lying on a floor. But where? She looked up at the stove, then over at the wall covered with index cards. Oh, yeah. Matt’s crime board. She was in Pearl’s kitchen.

  The effort of getting up seemed too much to pull off, but she turned her head to look into Pearl’s front room. Pearl and James W. were in her direct line of sight. Both were covered with blood. The whole room was covered in blood. Where the hell was Matt?

  ***

  Mike stared into the vacant, lifeless eyes of his nemesis. Howard Rutledge was dead.

  The world seemed to spin around him, and he felt like he was watching the scene from a distant corner. He grabbed the recliner to steady himself. Blood was everywhere. And bodies. He closed his eyes against the horror.

  That’s when he saw his father. It wasn’t a replay of the last time Mike had seen his dad alive—the dreadful day when Mike Hogan Sr. had bled to death in his son’s arms on a Miami dock. This time his father was alive and smiling, surrounded by a familiar light that Mike had seen before. He didn’t remember when. The light surrounded Mike in an all-encompassing womb of love that filled his ears and eyes and throat.

  His father spoke. “Well done, son.”

  “Matt! Look out!” James W.’s shout pulled him from his father and the light.

  Mike opened his eyes. Mandy Culver, Kodak’s gun now in her hand, stood in front of him. She pointed it directly at his face.

  ***

  Bo reached the porch steps and stopped for a second to catch his breath. At the rate his heart was racing, he wasn’t sure if he could hold the Colt steady enough to make a good shot. He took one last, deep breath, then quietly moved onto the porch. He sidled up to the window, then peeked inside.

  Mandy Culver was aiming a gun at the pastor. What the hell?

  “—Pick you off like fish in a barrel,” she was saying. “Starting with you, Hogan.”

  Bo swung around to shoot, but his swift motion caught the church lady’s eye. She moved her aim to the window, and fired.

  Bo felt the whiz of a bullet burn by his right arm, then the hot iron of a second bullet tore through his left shoulder. “Sonuvabitch!” he yelled out in pain as he fell to his knees.

  ***

  “Here I come, Dad,” Mike thought as Mandy turned the gun back on him. He looked her steady in the eye. “I know where I’m going. Do you?”

  Mandy’s eyes sparked with rage. “Don’t pull that pastor shit on me, Hogan. I know what you are.” She moved her finger to the trigger and steadied her aim.

  The gun, a couple of fingers and a lot of blood flew from her hand. Mandy turned toward the kitchen where the shot had come from and was greeted by a bullet to her knee, then another to her belly.

  Mike pivoted and saw Angie, still on the floor, her pistol trained on Mandy’s falling body. A
ngie climbed to her knees, then her feet. “Nobody messes with my family, you bitch,” she said to the whimpering Mandy.

  Mike picked up the gun Angie had shot out of Mandy’s hand, then stared at the daughter of Howard Rutledge. Blood streamed from her hand and knee and gut, and she was beginning to shake from shock.

  “I’ve got this.” James W. hurried to Mandy’s side. “Pearl, get me some towels. Quick.”

  Mike took one last look at his assassin, then turned to Angie. “You can put that away,” he said, nodding toward the pistol in her hand. “We’ve had enough shooting for one night.”

  Angie lowered her weapon, then ran into his arms.

  Chapter Forty-One

  The Choice

  Three hours after the last shot was fired at Pearl’s house, James W. drove up to his house. Wordlessly Angie got out of the back seat, went around the squad car and opened the door for Matt. Pearl made no move to get out of the front seat.

  “Elsbeth will be home,” she said.

  James W. popped off his seat belt. “I’ll handle her. You’re staying here tonight.”

  The four of them headed for the front door. The work lights in the back yard silhouetted the otherwise dark home against the night sky. James W. noted Elsbeth’s car wasn’t in the driveway. Where was she?

  Still, grateful for the silence, he opened the front door. They all needed time to process the carnage they’d survived at Pearl’s.

  Matt and Angie headed for the couch, but Pearl stopped in the doorway. “I’m not sure this is a good idea.”

  James W. took her wheeled carry-on from her. “You belong with family.”

  She touched his cheek and headed inside.

  James W. was about to the shut the front door when a pair of headlights appeared down the road. He shielded his eyes to see if he knew the vehicle. He did. Bo’s truck pulled into the driveway. Aaron jumped from the driver’s seat. James W. sighed with relief when he saw Bo gingerly get out from the passenger’s side. “How you doin’, Bo?”

  “Sore as hell, but it’ll heal.”