In for the Kill

71

Myrna lay curled into a ball near the headboard, where she'd waited for almost certain death. She looked small there, and vulnerable.

Harmless.

She smoothed her hair back from her eyes, then climbed out of bed and stood with her arms crossed tightly across her body, squeezing herself as if for reassurance that she still existed. But she no longer appeared to be in shock. Her deep-set dark eyes were moving about slowly, taking everything in, assessing. When they met Quinn's gaze she averted them and stared at her son Jeb, who was standing over his dead brother, obviously distraught by what he'd done. Tears were streaming down his cheeks.

Tension had suddenly drained from the room, leaving the acrid stench of cordite, the reverberations of gunfire, and a heavy sadness. The air seemed weighted and stilled by death.

Jeb wasn't quite sobbing, but Quinn thought the convulsive breakdown might come at any second. And who could blame Jeb? He'd just saved his mother's life by killing his brother. The two brothers might not have met before tonight, but they were of the same blood. Quinn knew from other homicides what a devastating effect that could have. It wasn't like killing an unconnected stranger, which was enough of a horror in itself.

He moved toward Jeb. "You did the right thing," he said softly, but Jeb seemed not to hear.

Instead he looked over at his mother, still standing hugging herself.

He racked another round into the shotgun, brought the barrel up, and swung it around to point at Myrna.

She saw it and knew it was too late and knew what was coming. She stood taller, dropping her arms and staring defiantly at her son.

Quinn's gun had barely cleared his shoulder holster. Around him he sensed the sudden uncoordinated motion of the others redrawing or raising their weapons.

The shotgun fired first, filling the room again with thunder, and Myrna flew back against the wall, bouncing in the corner as she went down.

Quinn wasn't looking at her. He'd been concentrating on Jeb beyond his gun sight, like the others in the room, praying he could get off enough shots in time to stop him. Watching Jeb do the same awkward dance his brother Sherman had done as the bullets tore into him.

When he was down, Pearl reached him first. She kicked the shotgun away, under the bed, so hard it felt as if she'd broken a toe.

Jeb could see only white ceiling at first, and then watched the dark forms advance toward him. They still seemed afraid and were keeping their weapons aimed at him. He would have tried to reassure them only he didn't have enough strength. What he'd had to do was done.

He was thinking about the swamp of the past, how you could never escape it entirely. It was always with you, awake or asleep, tooth and claw. And eventually…

A voice from far away: "She's dead. Shotgun from that range, there's not much left."

The big cop, Quinn, was bending over him, blocking the light, saying something.

"Why'd you do it? Why kill your mother?"

The big man's voice was unexpectedly gentle, puzzled. Jeb felt compelled to answer, and he knew there wasn't much time.

"When Mom and I lived in Louisiana," he said in a hoarse whisper, "we were dirt poor. Lived by the swamp. We took in boarders."

"What?" Quinn asked, kneeling to get closer, still puzzled.

Instead of answering, Jeb started to close his eyes. They didn't make it all the way.

"He's gone," Pearl said.

"Holy Mary!" one of the cops said. "Shot his own mother."

Quinn looked down into Jeb's half-closed eyes, as if there might be an explanation there. But nothing was there, no one behind the eyes.

Quinn sighed and straightened up. He could hear sirens outside, one of them nearby that abruptly ended its shrill singsong yodel below in the street. They'd be on their way up soon. More uniforms, plainclothes cops, a crime scene unit, paramedics, the medical examiner, all to shape the wild violence and death that had occurred here into something categorized, comprehensible, and not nearly so horrifying-on the surface. Cop world.

"What did he tell you?" Pearl asked.

"I don't know. Something about being poor in Louisiana and taking in boarders."

"Boarders?"

"I have no idea what he meant. Maybe he didn't, either. He was shutting down."

"Long time ago," Pearl said. "I guess it doesn't matter now."

Quinn looked down and saw blood on the toe of his shoe, from when he'd knelt over Jeb.

"Guess not," he said.