She nudged Ed with a foot-stay down.
"Well, there you are." Craig smiled, so cool, so good-looking in his brown sport jacket. Or so she once would have thought. "You"ve led me on quite a chase."
"How did you know? That he"s my grandfather."
His lips curved to a smirk. "I"ve known since the beginning."
Kaitlan searched for words and found none. Her mind had blanked to white.
She gripped the slick tile of the counter. Maybe if she told him she was pregnant ... But that wouldn"t stop him. Not now.
Sound filtered from the hall-a muted shuffle. Her grandfather, trying to be quiet.
In a casual move Craig turned and fired.
"No!"
From outside her line of sight came her grandfather"s wrenching "hngk!" She heard him fall.
Kaitlan screamed. Blindly she shoved back from the island. Run, run to him! Run, run to him! she told her feet, but they cemented to the floor. she told her feet, but they cemented to the floor.
Craig lunged around the island for her.
Ed leapt up, whipped back the frying pan like a baseball bat, and swung. He smashed Craig square in the cheek.
"Ah!" Craig dropped to the ground. The gun flew from his hand and spun around on the tile. Ed threw down the pan with a clang and heaved toward the weapon.
Dazed, Craig thrust himself up on one elbow and caught Ed"s ankle. Ed dove toward the floor, chin first.
Kaitlan screamed again and jumped from their path. Ed landed half on top of Craig, and the two men grappled. They clutched, seeking hold, punching each other"s heads. Kaitlan"s eyes jerked with their movements, trying to find the gun. Neither held it.
They rolled to one side, Ed on the bottom. Black metal poked from beneath his thigh.
Kaitlan stumbled forward, reaching shaking fingers for the gun. The men rolled again. The gun disappeared.
Ed slugged Craig in the temple. Craig"s head ricocheted to the side. Rage flamed his face red, a vein throbbing in his forehead. He slapped his hands around Ed"s throat and squeezed.
Ed"s mouth sagged open. His eyes widened, his fingers clawing talons at Craig"s deathly grip. He dug a foot against the floor and pushed. His body jolted a few inches backward.
The gun popped from beneath his legs. Kaitlan grabbed it.
She flew up straight, weapon glued to both hands, pointed down. Trying, trying to aim at Craig, but she"d never held a gun before, and what if the bullet went through him to Ed?
Craig"s teeth clenched, spittle at his mouth. He shifted his knees to either side of Ed, clamped his fingers tighter. Ed"s face purpled. Desperationglazed his eyes.
Kaitlan folded over, rammed the barrel into Craig"s side, and pulled the trigger. The explosion was loud loud. Her arms jolted.
Craig convulsed and jerked up. His face slackened, his hands falling from Ed"s throat. Shock quivered across his features like the shedding of snake skin. Slowly, dumbfounded, his head rotated to Kaitlan.
Their eyes met.
Craig"s rolled up. His neck flopped to one side.
Ed shoved him hard in the chest. Craig slid off him and collapsed.
Kaitlan threw down the weapon and ran to her grandfather. He lay on his back in the hallway, feet facing the kitchen. Not moving, his face waxy. Blood stained his left shoulder. Vaguely Kaitlan registered a gun some feet away.
Kaitlan threw herself beside him and cradled his head in her hands. "No, no, please." A sob wrenched from her lips. "Grandfather, listen to me. Please don"t die!"
Behind her-an animal cry of rage.
Something wrapped around Kaitlan"s throat. Yanked her from her grandfather. She caved sideways and slammed onto her back.
Above her, upside down, Kaitlan saw Hallie Barlow"s fury-drenched face.
CHAPTER sixty-seven
All breath cut off.
Time stalled, the world jerking into slow motion. Kaitlan"s hands floated to her neck, fumbling at the thing around it. Cloth Cloth ... ...
The scene warped into normal speed.
Hallie wormed around to Kaitlan"s chest, lifted her head, and deftly wrapped the fabric strip twice. Kaitlan glimpsed a flash of black and green.
"You killed my brother." Hallie grated the words, inhuman. "He tried to help me, and you killed killed him." him."
From far in the back of her head, a logical voice cried out. The front door The front door. Craig left it unlocked for Hallie to come in. She"d heard the shots.
Kaitlan"s jaw crunched open, her lungs seeking, craving oxygen. For a wild second she saw herself as Ed on the kitchen floor beneath Craig"s stranglehold. Kaitlan"s hands scrabbled through thick air, scratching at Hallie"s face.
"Why"d you come home yesterday, huh? Why"d you have to spoil it?"
Someone screamed. Margaret. Margaret.
Hallie"s stone fingers tied the cloth ends once and pulled opposite directions. The world faded gray.
Thudding footsteps on the tile. Ed braying a cry, and Margaret screaming again-where was was she?-and Hallie"s head swinging up, her hands firm on the cloth, mouth cursing, shouting, "No, no, get back!" and still there"s no breath, and Kaitlan"s lungs shriveling, the ceiling spotting black-red - she?-and Hallie"s head swinging up, her hands firm on the cloth, mouth cursing, shouting, "No, no, get back!" and still there"s no breath, and Kaitlan"s lungs shriveling, the ceiling spotting black-red - Hallie"s face whisked away.
Something hit flesh with a wet smack.
A body thudded.
The cloth loosened-not enough, not nearly enough. Kaitlan hands slashed at it, tearing, her lips racked apart and gurgling air.
Ed"s face appeared-"Stop, I"ll get it." He thrust her fingers off, and his went to work, untying, unwinding, and Kaitlan"s throat expanded, her windpipe hawking, gusting in oxygen. Her head lolled, and she saw Margaret looming above Hallie, aiming a gun with iron hands, tears streaking her face.
Margaret with a gun, how crazy is that? Kaitlan thought, and then the hallway whirled into a black hole and voided to nothing.
Part 4
Truth
CHAPTER sixty-eight
For the fourth day in a row, Kaitlan sat in the ugly orange armchair at her grandfather"s bedside. The hospital room smelled of steel and emptiness. A setting sun slanted through half-drawn blinds, lining the floor with streaks of yellow. Feet tucked beneath her, temple resting on her fist, Kaitlan fought to keep her eyes open.
She couldn"t seem to get enough sleep. Not that the world wanted to give her any.
She"d had two long interview sessions with the San Mateo Sheriff"s Department. Not to mention dodging the media everywhere she went. And the public in general.
No charges would be filed in her shooting of Craig Barlow. Self-defense, they said.
But it wasn"t just a lack of rest. Kaitlan felt a deep tiredness in the marrow of her bones. She carried it around with her, a stone in her chest. Yesterday Margaret said it would pa.s.s eventually-that Kaitlan had lost much and been through multiple levels of shock, and that didn"t heal overnight. Margaret was still reeling herself.
They both agreed they and her grandfather were alive only by the grace of G.o.d.
More than once they prayed together for their own strength and healing. "Get us through this, G.o.d," Kaitlan had promised Him, "and I"ll give my life to You. All of it."
She wasn"t quite sure what that would mean. But it was a bargain she intended to keep.
Sighing, she changed positions.
Craig lay in this same hospital, under guard. The bullet had torn through his upper intestine, missing his heart and lungs. With all the evidence against him, he had confessed. When he was discharged, it would be to jail. He faced two counts of first-degree murder, other counts of aggravated a.s.sault, plus tampering with evidence and other charges regarding his disposing of his sister"s final victim.
Under interrogation, her brother wounded, a barely controllable Hallie Barlow had melted. She related in detail each murder, including her sinister planning of the third one. Kaitlan still could hardly believe the story. How could Hallie have done this? And if someone seemingly as nice as Hallie could be so black inside, what did that say about the human race?
Kaitlan had turned these questions over and over in her mind.
Unlike the first two random murders, Hallie Barlow had targeted Martina Pelsky. Studying her habits, Hallie learned Martina was bicycling the town every afternoon, leaving campaign flyers at houses. Martina was meticulous about this project, sectioning the town into grids. But Hallie didn"t want to risk an outside killing in daylight. She watched until Martina"s task took her near Kaitlan"s neighborhood. What better place to lure Martina than Kaitlan"s out-of-the-way garage apartment?
In preparation Hallie managed to "secretly borrow" Craig"s key to Kaitlan"s apartment-just long enough to make a copy.
The day of the murder Hallie drove past Martina as she biked not far from Kaitlan"s home. Hallie stopped and invited Martina to "her place," expressing an interest in helping with the campaign. "No worries, I"ll bring you back here," she smiled. Hallie was such a likable person. Without a second thought Martina left her bike in the woods and climbed into Hallie"s SUV.
Hallie tried something else new-bringing a camera for pictures. She would have plenty of time afterward to haul the body away and straighten Kaitlan"s place.
But fate intervened. While Hallie was taking the photos, Craig showed up, bearing a half dozen red roses to leave as a surprise for Kaitlan. Shocked out of his mind at what he stumbled onto, he swung into frantic protection mode for his sister. He had Hallie call the salon to make sure Kaitlan was there-only to learn she"d left early and was on her way home.
In sheer panic Craig and Hallie fled before she could spot their cars.
The roses.
Kaitlan had cried many tears over them. To think Craig had bought those flowers for her hours before he picked her up. Before, driven and desperate, traveling a dark streak of his own, he turned into a monster for the sake of his sister.
Didn"t he feel bad about what he was doing to his girlfriend? a detective asked him.
"Anything for family," Craig had replied.
Now behind bars, Hallie was reportedly grief stricken and suicidal. She"d been placed on special watch.
A search of her apartment turned up the fabric, hidden at the bottom of a box of books in her closet. Plus sc.r.a.pbooks full of old photos of Hallie"s and Craig"s mother. Authorities searched for one picture in particular that Hallie had mentioned-a full-length shot of her mother, dressed in black pants and a green blouse. The day her mother walked out of her life, Hallie told detectives, the woman had been wearing that outfit.
Most important, detectives found Hallie"s journal that had recorded her downward spiral. Quite appropriately, she"d t.i.tled it Obsession Obsession. So far only a few of its pages had been released to the media, but what Kaitlan heard had been heart-stopping.
On TV talking-head psychologists were going wild with the story. Childhood abandonment issues, they said. Bitter anger welling up when Hallie happened to read Darell Brooke"s novel Life After Death Life After Death-about a murderous doctor using fabric of black silk with green stripes to kill. The women Hallie strangled were representations of her mother, the psychologists surmised. Each victim Hallie perceived as a poor mom, abusive to children. Not worthy of life.
Hallie reportedly sees none of this. Her answer to why she killed?
"I don"t know."
Such sensationalized publicity for the King of Suspense. All copies of Life After Death Life After Death-an apropos t.i.tle for a book now thirty-five years old-sold out almost overnight. The publisher had rushed a large reprinting.
But this kind of publicity Kaitlan"s grandfather did not enjoy. Beyond his closed hospital room door a private security employee posted himself in a straight-backed chair. No reporters allowed. Except for Ed.
Kaitlan stretched and blinked at the wall-mounted TV. It was on but muted. Commercials.
In his bed her grandfather was sleeping.
He was scheduled to go home tomorrow. It could have been sooner after the surgery to remove the bullet in his shoulder, but he"d lost a fair amount of blood and struggled with weakness. Except for his tongue. Kaitlan had seen her grandfather send more than one nurse scurrying.
The door cracked open. Ed stuck his head inside. Kaitlan smiled and motioned for him to come in.
Ed entered, closing the door quietly behind him. "He asleep?" he whispered. He soft-footed it over to sit in a wooden chair beside Kaitlan.
"I was until you bothered me," Kaitlan"s grandfather crabbed. Beneath the covers his legs shifted. He opened one eye. "That you again, Wasinsky?"
"Yes, sir."