Artist (25 page)

“Let’s do it,” she said.

The phone rang while Watt was digging around in the bathroom. He ignored it, found a bottle of pain pills, took three and chewed them up, swallowing them with water from the tap. He was shocked the police hadn’t stormed the house yet. In the first few minutes, he dragged himself from room to room, trying to anticipate where they would come in. A look out the front window told him they were out there. They knew where he was, no doubt about that.

In the meantime, he had to do something about the ankle. It was throbbing now, each pulse sending waves of pain up his leg. Underneath
the sink he found a roll of gauze, not as good as tape but good enough for now. He used the whole roll, winding the material around his ankle, under his foot and back until he had a kind of clumpy shoe that would stabilize the ankle and cushion his foot. He could walk, not well, but enough to get around the house. There was nothing to do now but pick his position and wait for them to come for him. The phone rang again.

“He’s not picking up. No way he could have gotten out?” Cassie asked, but she knew the answer.

  Dupond shook his head. “He’s there. We’ve seen movement in the house. He didn’t come out the front. Anyone inside would have poked their head out.”

“So, what do you want to do?” Cassie asked, looking at Dupond. She was waiting for the answer, the right answer. If it had been up to her, they would already have been in the house. In every situation she had encountered, where the option was fight or flee, she always chose to fight. In most cases it worked out. In one case it ended with the worst tragedy of her life. Every instinct told her the right thing to do was go into the house, find Watt, and kill him. If Ronnie was here she would say it, do it, without hesitation. She looked at Dupond. Could she stand to lose another person she cared about? What was it that drew her into these situations? Was this her life? An endless series of deaths?

Dupond said, “We’re going in. Now. We don’t have anything to gain by waiting. If he’s got someone in there, no telling what he’ll do while we’re out here fooling around. If he doesn’t, he’ll be waiting for us.”

Inside, Watt moved from the living room into the kitchen. From there, he could just see the front door and the windows beside
it. The back door was behind him, and to his left the carport entrance he used to get into the house. He had five shots left in the revolver from the undercover cop and he wondered if he would have enough time to use one on himself. No matter.

The kitchen was small enough, even wit
h his ankle he could move. He would have a point blank shot at anyone coming through the carport door. The front would be a longer shot but close enough. The back door was a problem. The time it took to turn around would leave him vulnerable. He could feel the pain pills kicking in now, the throbbing in his ankle receding to a dull ache. The panic he felt at his situation was ebbing also, a welcome feeling of resignation set in. The final act, the final canvas was about to be filled.

The timing was off. Dupond kicked the back door open and immediately retreated. Slade was set to come in through the front, Cassie through the carport side. The fro
nt door was locked and stubborn. Slade kicked it three times before the frame gave away. Cassie heard the back door give, a resounding crash. Rather than kick her way in, she opened the unlocked door with her hand, rolling in low to the floor as quietly as she could. Slade pounded away on the front.

There was nothing in front of her. She was midway t
o the length of the kitchen, a single step in. The smell of good cooking and fear mixed into a ball that settled in her stomach. To her left she could see the living room, a cheap couch, a small television, a picture on the wall, smiling parents wrapped around a pink bundle. Dupond was yelling something, or someone was, she thought it was Dupond but it could have been someone else.

Movement on her right, above her.

Watt was on the kitchen counter, a linoleum covered stretch of wood running from the carport wall halfway into the tiny kitchen. His back to the wall, he had line of sight in all three directions. Cassie was already past him, he was behind her and to the left, behind the door, when Dupond came in the back, through the washroom, in a crouch. Watt fired once, Dupond went down and he swung the revolver, four shots left now, is a counterclockwise arc.

Cassie heard the shot, a tremendous bang in the tiny room, hesitated and fell backward, threw a shot blindly over her shoulder. The b
ullet passed through the windowpane set into the door, sending glass splinters flying. Most passed harmlessly over Watt’s shoulder. One lodged in his cheek. The shower threw him off as he tracked Cassie back and his shot blew through the back of a kitchen chair.

Slade heard the first shot, kicked wildly at the door which finally gave in. He went in standing up, gun level with his shoulders, saw Watt, saw Cassie firing as she fell. He fired at the same tim
e Watt killed the kitchen chair, the bullet passing high. Watt rolled off the counter, hit the floor hard. Slade fired again, aiming dead center at the kitchen counter. His shot missed wide left this time, but passed through the cabinets underneath, past Watt,  rupturing a fire extinguisher Andrea Bosh kept clamped to the cabinet next to the stove. She carried it from New Jersey to New Orleans for no particular reason other than her mother had told her always keep one around. The extinguisher exploded, sending white powder everywhere.

Dupond was hit in the left hip and fell on his weapon. He rolled away from the wound, heard two shots, felt bits and pieces of something cascade around him. Another shot, then another, and found himself in a cloud of white, wondered if he was dying. Slade’s voice cut through the cloud.

“Floor! He’s on the floor!”

Cassie came back in, standing up now, the door blocking her right, fired blind at the countertop
, back toward the carport wall and away from Dupond. Watt, lying on his back between the counter and the back wall, shot back at the flash and missed. Cassie, blinded by powder, went over the countertop feet first, landing on Watt. She heard the breath go out of him. Watt grabbed at her legs, got a grip on her belt, pulled her down on the floor. He couldn’t breathe, couldn’t see. Cassie’s back hit the edge of the kitchen sink going down. She was fighting back, swinging with her left, trying to get the hands off her belt, fighting to get her weapon down. Watt pulled her down hard, bit her shoulder, burying his teeth in. The pistol fell out of her hand.

Slade saw someone, he assumed it was Cassie, go over the counter. Dupond finally managed to roll over far enough to get his weapon up. The white cloud was thinning in the air. Cassie screamed, a bone-chilling shriek Dupond would never forget. Gun in his hand, he started pulling himself across the floor.

Watt managed to get his hands around Cassie’s throat. Fighting blind, Cassie fought to pull them away. Watt had his legs around her waist now, pinning her lower body. Cassie tried to breathe, got nothing. She was locked down now, couldn’t roll away. Watt managed to roll her over, pushed his weight down hard on his hands. He expected to die any minute, didn’t care, couldn’t care. The feel of the woman’s neck under his hands
was simply magnificent. If he could kill her, here and now, he would gladly die at the hands of the rest.

Cassie’s lungs were exploding. Red tendrils crept into the blackness around her. She groped blindly at the hands, couldn’t move them, reached out, pushing against the broken remnants of the countertop, trying and failing to get Watt from on top of
her. Her hands fell back and her right arm, now dripping blood from the wound in her shoulder, fell on to something hard and jagged. She wrapped her fingers around it, felt the weight, and blindly swung the shattered remnants of the fire extinguisher bottle at Watt’s head. The impact traveled up her arm, a solid blow to the forehead. Watt’s fingers loosened around her neck and she swung again. And again, connecting with another pair of solid hits. Dazed now, Watt let go. Cassie sucked in air greedily and swung again. And again. And again. Watt crumpled. Cassie kept pounding. Blood flowed from the side of his head. She hit him again. When his skull shattered she was still swinging and when Slade, finally able to see through the cloud of white powder, pulled her off she wouldn’t let go of the fire extinguisher, waiting for Watt to move again.

Slade pulled
Cassie away, out of the kitchen and into the living room where he laid her, still gasping for breath, on the carpet. Dupond he left where he was, after checking the wound. The man was hurting, and would be for a while, but the bleeding was already slowing down. The house was a shambles, three doors blown away, the kitchen counter a ruined mess of linoleum and wooden splinters. Glass shards and white powder covered everything. Dupond, leaning against the wall, took it all in, looked at Slade. Somewhere in the background, a baby was crying.

“That went well,”
Dupond said.

Dupond was in the hospital for a week and left on crutches. Cassie picked him up in a department car, took him to his apartment and tucked him in bed. Slade was there, waiting, with takeout Chinese. Dupond went after it like a man who had eaaten only hospital food for seven days. Cassie, her throat still bruised, sipped egg drop soup, and washed it down with iced tea.

“The weird thing is,” Slade said after a few silent minutes, “is that Reed is happy as a pig in mud. We caught the murderer
. It doesn’t matter that in the process, Pavone will be out a few months with a fractured skull, DeSalvo is out with a broken collarbone, Dupond here got shot, and Cassie won’t be giving any speeches for a while. He’s the only one left to put in front of a camera. Just the way he likes it.”

“I’ll bet he told you about the polls,” Dupond said.

“He’s up twelve points,” Slade said “Pretty soon he’ll be Number One with a Bullet.”

“God bless his little heart.” Dupond said.

Afterwards, Cassie dug through Dupond’s dresser, found a t-shirt, sniggled into bed beside him. Dupond managed to sit up and wrapped his arm around her. The television played old movies. Once, she got up to make coffee and give him a pain pill. Dupond fell asleep after a while. Cassie
lay in bed, watched one more movie before turning off the light. She went to the stereo and flipped it on, snuggled in hard against Dupond’s back. He stirred, rolled over, and put his arm back around her. “What’s that on the radio?” he said, already well on his way back to sleep.

Cassie listened. “Emerson, Lake, and Palmer,” she said. “Pictures at an Exhibition” and slept for the next eight hours.

The author would like to thank you for reading this book. As you know, reviews are the lifeblood of any writer. If you enjoyed this little story, please leave a review. Here’s the link to take you
to the review page.

Artist
is the third book in the Remote Psychic Thriller Series. Be sure to check out the others.

Origins
-
New Orleans, 1973 - The CIA uncovers two young kids with uncanny psychic ability. A renegade agent wants them for his own. When Ronnie Gilmore and Cassie Reynold fight back, things get deadly fast. 
The ability to Remote View makes Cassie and Ronnie high value assets in the Cold War contest playing out in the early 1970's. The discovery of their power sets off a battle that ultimately means full scale war between factions within the government. 
Backs against the wall the two young psychics must face overwhelming odds to maintain their freedom and control of their own lives. When push comes to shove, Cassie Reynold proves to be the deadliest 13-year old girl you'll ever meet.

Fatal
– Cassie Reynold and Ronnie Gilmore face new a new threat with the death of Philip Archer. When Ronnie is kidnapped, Cassie must cross the country in a desperate bid to gain his freedom. The results force Cassie to face her worst nightmare.

Short Stories by Eric Drouant

Horror Murder Life War
– Contains a selection of short stories by Eric Drouant written while he was in Afghanistan.
The following stories are included in the collection

Revenge and Redemption
– Pat lane is a good man driven to an extreme act. Who is the bad guy here, the killer or the victim?

Machines
– Life perspective from a dying old man.

Corners
– The decisions we make when we’re young will color our lives. Turning a single corner can take you places you never wanted to be.