Part 30 (1/2)

I toss the phone onto the desk and look at Armitage. I feel like kicking him after what he did to me. He's watching me, his expression telling me he might try to talk his way out of this, so I put my temper aside and recite to him his Miranda rights. ”Do you understand those rights?”

He nods, then sighs, puts his forehead against the floor as if he's considering pounding it against the wood. ”It wasn't supposed to happen this way.”

”What way is that?”

”No one was supposed to get hurt.”

I hear my molars grinding. ”What the h.e.l.l did you expect when you rammed that buggy with your truck?”

”It wasn't like that. It was an accident. I was frightened. I hit my head and I suspect I was in shock. I panicked.”

”You killed an Amish man and two children. You devastated a family.”

He chokes out a sound of indefinable emotion. ”I know what happened. Like I told you, it was an accident. Once I came to and realized what had happened, I felt ... it was the worst feeling I've ever experienced in my life.”

”I guess that's why you stopped to render aid while that man and two innocent children were lying on the shoulder dying. That's why you called nine one one. And that must be the reason why you tried to kill me tonight. Because it was an accident, right? Because you care?”

He shakes his head as if disbelieving I could be so callous. ”You don't understand.”

”I don't want to understand.” Disgusted, I glance toward the hall, watching for the flash of police lights through the front window. ”Is that your truck I found in the barn?”

The look he gives me is so cold, so devoid of anything human, that I feel the hairs on my arms p.r.i.c.kle. ”I'm not going to answer any more questions until I have an attorney.”

”That's your right.” I force a smile that feels like broken gla.s.s on my face. ”You know we've got you dead to rights, don't you? No matter what you say or do, you're going down.”

Closing his eyes, he sets his forehead against the floor.

Movement outside the French doors draws my attention. I glance over, expecting T.J., wondering why he's come around the rear. Shock jolts me when I discern the slender figure in the black dress and ap.r.o.n. The pale face and white kapp. I catch a glimpse of the shotgun an instant before the blast shatters the door.

Gla.s.s and fragments of wood pelt me. I drop to a crouch, but not before something hot tears through my right hand, knocking the .38 from my grasp. I watch in horror as the weapon clatters away. I start to retrieve it, but shock freezes me in place when Mattie steps through the destroyed French door, a shotgun in her hands, the muzzle leveled at me.

The room falls silent. Papers from Armitage's desk flutter down. Pain thrums in my hand and shoots like a hot wire to my elbow. I glance down to see blood dripping on the floor next to my foot. A sliver of wood the size of my thumb sticks out of the top of my hand and through the palm.

My .38 lies on the floor to my right four feet away. ”Mattie.” My voice is so low and rough I barely recognize it. ”What are you doing?”

Her expression chills me. There's no shock. No emotion. Her demeanor is calm, her eyes filled with purpose and deadly intent. Armitage wriggles toward the gun, uses his foot to slide it closer to him. ”Give me the key to these handcuffs, Burkholder.”

I can't tear my eyes away from Mattie; I can't make sense of her being here. Disbelief is a bullwhip snapping at my back, laughing at me, flaying my flesh, drawing blood, slicing me open so that some vital part of me pours onto the floor like entrails.

”Mattie,” I say, ”put the gun down.”

”Shoot her,” Armitage says. ”Kill her. Do it!”

”For G.o.d's sake, don't.” I look at him, motion toward Mattie with my eyes. ”Backup is on the way. Stop this or you're going to get her killed.”

”The key.” His lips peel back in an animalistic snarl, and for an instant he looks as if he's going to pounce and tear me to shreds with his teeth. ”Give it to me. Now.”

I turn my attention to Mattie, try to break through the sh.e.l.l of whatever she's surrounded herself with to get to the warm and caring person beneath. The woman I've known for half of my life. The girl I'd once loved more than my own sister.

”Mattie,” I whisper. ”Honey, don't do this. Think about David. He'll be alone without you. Please. He needs you.”

She looks at me, but her eyes skim over me as if I'm not there. ”David doesn't matter anymore.”

Something sick and ugly moves through me. ”What do you mean?” I ask.

”He saw us.”

”Saw what?”

”He's the only one who knew,” she tells me. ”He was going to ruin everything.”

”What did you do?” Panic and urgency and cold, hard fear echo in my voice. ”Mattie, for G.o.d's sake what did you do? Where's David?”

My words have no effect. When she looks at me, her eyes are devoid of everything that had once made her a human being, a mother capable of love and compa.s.sion. Her mind has fractured and something evil has crawled out of the crevice. I'm no longer her friend, but an impediment to her goal. And I know that no matter what I say or do, this is going to end badly. It's only a question of who will die and at whose hand.

The shotgun is an old break-action, double barrel, probably handed down to her from her father. A deadly weapon to be sure. But there's only one shot left....

I try to flex my injured hand. Fresh pain sends red streaks across my vision. I don't think any bones are broken, but it's badly damaged. Even if I can reach my .38, I'm not sure I can grip it or pull the trigger.

Armitage gets to his knees, his eyes on me. ”I'll happily take that key off your dead body. Give it to me!”

Ever aware that Mattie is less than ten feet away with a shotgun, I ignore him, try instead to engage her. Get her talking, bring her back to a place where I can reach some small part of her. ”Do you want me to give him the key?”

She looks at me, and for an instant she looks like her old self. As if she's going to lower the weapon and burst into laughter. She'll tell me this is a big joke and we'll spend the next ten minutes laughing our a.s.ses off.

But there's an icy glint in her eyes. A sheen I've seen before in the course of my career. She has the dead eyes of a killer. And I can't help but think: Please don't make me kill you.

Armitage is staring at Mattie, his eyes narrowed, his expression anxious and sharp. ”Everything's going to be all right, Matt,” he tells her. ”Just get the key from her and take these cuffs off me. We'll take care of her and then we can go. Just you and me. Like we planned.”

Like we planned.

Until this moment, I've been able to keep a handle on all those gnarly suspicions trying to claw their way into my brain. Keep my emotions at bay. I'm in cop mode and focused on staying alive, stopping this by whatever means necessary. But the realization that Mattie knew, that she was a willing partic.i.p.ant in the murders of her husband and children, knocks me off kilter.

A thousand memories of her rush my brain. Mattie, my big sister and best friend rolled into one. Mattie, the instigator of mischief. The girl who could make me laugh until I cried and ease my hurt with a single word. She was the one person in this world I'd trusted and admired. Looking at her, I know that girl, the person she'd once been, is gone, replaced by a stranger I've never really known at all.

”Mattie, I'll do whatever you want.” I raise my hands, making sure she gets a good look at my injured hand. ”I'm going to give him the key, okay?”

With my left hand I reach for the compartment on my belt. Next to me, the banker's lamp atop the desk casts soft light onto the blotter where slivers of gla.s.s glint like diamonds. No one turned on the overhead lights so it's the only source of light in the room. The lamp's electrical cord dangles less than a foot from where I stand.

Snapping open the handcuff compartment, I make a show digging out the key. ”Everything's going to be all right.” But my focus is on my .38, which is on the floor, next to Armitage.

”Hurry up.” The doctor glances at Mattie. ”Matt, honey, get the key from her. Quickly, before the police arrive. Take these cuffs off-”

I kick the power cord. The lamp flies off the desk. Light plays crazily on the ceiling and then the lamp crashes to the floor. The room goes black. I drop and dive toward the .38.

Armitage shouts, ”Kill her! Shoot her!”