Latimer's Law (21 page)

Chapter 14

“Y
ou’re too stupid even to do this right.” Marsh’s voice was harsh and loud, but he was not yet shouting. “You left the safety on. It works like this.” With a flick of his thumb, he toggled a lever at the side of the pistol, held his arm out at an angle and put a bullet in the floor.

Abby screamed, her hands flying up to her ears.

Marsh took hold of her arm with his left hand, the black barrel of Cade’s gun still smoking faintly in his right. “Stupid bitch. Bet you didn’t even know there was one in the chamber. Where did you get a gun?” He didn’t wait for an answer; he pulled the trigger again, this time putting a splintered hole in one of the activity tables and the sofa behind it.

Then Marsh put the barrel up against Abby’s temple. Cade’s words blazed through her brain like a bolt of lightning.
The only way it’ll end is with you in the hospital and him in jail, or one of you dead, probably you.
How right he had been.

Tears flowed, but she was too shocked to make a sound, not even a sob, not even a plea. This was it. This was where it all ended. She had pushed too hard, and when the gun hadn’t fired when she pointed it at the floor in front of Marsh and squeezed the trigger to scare him away, he had taken the three strides between them and ripped it out of her stunned, foiled hand.

“You know what’s stopping me from shooting you right now, Abigail? Do you?”

The front door crashed open for the second time in five minutes. Her first thought was that one of the clients had arrived anyway, despite the sign on the door, and fear spiked through her heart. But it wasn’t a client—it was Cade standing in the doorway, looking like something out of a horror film, the left side of his face bright red and raw. The thought was fleeting and words wouldn’t come for a moment. Her second thought was that Marsh’s head was pivoting to point toward Cade, and with it the gun. Abby found words at last.

“No, Cade,
run!
He has a gun!”

She saw Cade’s blue, blue eyes sweep the room, and then, unbelievably, a grin split his scarred face. “Hi, honey, I’m home!” Abby’s mouth dropped open in her astonishment—was this really Cade, standing in her doorway as if nothing in the world was wrong? Her terror-addled brain demanded to know how he’d appeared, like a genie, just when he was most needed. She had left him sound asleep an hour’s drive up the interstate and taken his only means of transportation! A split second later terror rushed back in to displace her astonishment.

Cade’s grin was the most feral thing she had ever seen, and if it had been directed at her, she thought she would have fainted where she stood. Marsh took the gun away from her head and held it half behind him, as though Cade could somehow have missed seeing it.

“I don’t believe we’ve met, neighbor,” said Marsh. Abby strained away from him, looking wildly around the room, trying to find something within reach to strike at him, and had to settle for trying one-handed to pry his fingers loose.

“We haven’t been formally introduced, no,” Cade agreed, with patently false cheer. “But I know plenty about you.” His chin jerked toward Abby. “Abby, baby, come over here.”

Marsh was panting now, and sweat had sprung out on his face and throat. “You need to get out of our house, before I call the cops, friend.”

Cade put out a hand and took two steps into the room. “I like my plan better. If you leave now, I might not tell the cops what I know about you—might even stick around to explain how I was cleaning my weapon there when it went off, twice, because yeah, maybe I’m just that stupid, too—when they show up, because you gotta know your neighbors have already called. Gunshots at a day care.” Cade tutted.

“Let me guess. Those are your clothes Abigail’s got on.” Marsh sneered in Cade’s direction. “Guess she really couldn’t do much better than a sideshow freak like you. Look at you. She’s desperate—she’s got you fooled. You’ll do anything she asks. All she’s got to do is promise you a little tail, right?”

Now Cade’s smile was truly awful to behold. Abby stared at the two of them, at Marsh mocking Cade’s disfigurement, and Cade continuing to ease into the room. He hadn’t closed the door behind him, leaving an exit if they could use it before Marsh could fire the Beretta again.

“Now, that’s just not nice, Marshall McMurray,” said Cade softly. Abby saw Marsh flinch at the sound of his name—Cade knew too much about him already, and the simple use of his name had changed all the rules of the game. “Abby’s real special, the sweetest lay I’ve ever had. And the way I hear it, you can’t get it up, not even for her.”

Marsh’s grip on her arm shifted as he clenched his fingers even tighter, grinding the small bones in her wrist together. Abby went to her knees, her mouth open in a gasp.

Cade looked right at her for the barest second, brows lifting slightly, his head inclining in what looked like a nod of approval, and it was as if he had sent a thought straight into her brain. She continued her slump to the floor, making herself as heavy as possible, pulling Marsh off balance, and in that moment Cade breathed, “Mort,
fass.
”

From outside the house came a black-and-tan streak, swift and silent as a wolf, the hunting stride and bared, eager teeth even more frightening than the gun.

The pistol’s barrel lifted from its hiding place behind Marsh’s back, and Abby screamed again, pivoting on her hip bone and pulling hard, wedging her leg between Marsh’s feet as Mort came on. Cade threw himself to the floor behind his dog, and the gun spoke once more.

“You sick
creep,
” Abby screamed, kicking, striking with her hand, clawing at Marsh’s fingers around her arm, drawing blood on the back of his hand. She was suddenly on her feet and aiming kicks at his midsection and legs where he lay on the floor. Kicks that hurt her feet in the worn sneakers, but obviously also hurt him, given his grunts. “You
bastard,
trying to shoot a dog!”

Cade stood to one side, his booted foot holding Marsh’s right arm to the floor, and bent to pick up the pistol. His hands made a quick motion and now the gun was in Cade’s hand, pointed at Marsh.

Mort stood with a front paw on Marsh’s chest, his muzzle no more than one hot breath from Marsh’s taut throat, ears pricked forward, tail motionless. The dog was unharmed and very, very focused on his task.

“Rip his throat out, Mort,” Abby sobbed.

“Abby,” Cade said.

“What’s the command for him to kill, Cade? Give it!”

“Abby.”

Marsh’s chest heaved, but other than that he was utterly still, his eyes wide and terrified, fixed on the pricked, eager and terrifyingly attentive ears of the shepherd.

Abby aimed another kick at Marsh, and Mort growled when Marsh’s body flinched. A dark spot appeared at the front of Marsh’s jeans, and spread slowly.

“Abigail,” Cade said for the third time. Her head turned to him, but her gaze and attention were still on Marsh. Cade was holding out the gun to her, butt first. “If you want him dead, here you go. I won’t stop you.”

At last Abby turned to him, stared at the gun in his hand, then at Marsh, then at the wedding album lying on the table next to the bullet hole.

Then she reached out and took the gun from Cade. Her hands trembled, and she nearly dropped it. It took two hands to hold properly, but in a second she had it aimed, and a finger on the trigger.

“That’s what you came for, isn’t it?” Cade said quietly. “That’s why you took my gun, to shoot him.”

Abby shook her head, staring down at Marsh. Cade would have to call off Mort before she could fire the gun, unless she knelt down and put it to Marsh’s head. She couldn’t risk shooting the dog. “No, I... All I wanted was to get a few things, enough that I could...that I could...shut it all down, start over somewhere else.”

“No, you want him dead for what he’s done to you. That’s why you took my gun. So why don’t you go ahead? Do it now, before the cops come. We’ll say it was self-defense. No one has to know except us.”

“I...I took your gun because...because...” Tears welled and fell, blurring her vision, and she gripped the gun tighter. “I...”

“Shoot him, Abby. Do it now. If you shoot him in your house, it’s self-defense. We can make that stick. You’ll have to show the cops your bruises, and tell them what McMurray has been doing to you all this time. There’ll be a mess in court, but in the end it’ll be over, and he’ll be dead. Isn’t that what you want?”

Abby turned, the gun still held at the end of her rigid arms, pointing at Cade’s hip. His gaze flicked down to the gun, then up to her eyes.

“Isn’t it?” he prompted, shifting a half step to one side, out of the sight line of the muzzle, keeping his foot on Marsh’s arm.

“Yes.” Her mouth quivered loosely, and her own ferocity terrified her. She wanted Marsh dead, dead and bleeding, beaten to a bloody pulp right there on the carpet. But that meant killing the last part of herself, the one spark of hope and resistance that still burned in her heart. And it would obliterate any respect Cade might have had for her. “I mean no! Oh, God, Cade, no. I just didn’t want him to h-h-hurt me, not ever again. That’s why I took your gun. And your truck. I’d have given them back. I was coming back, just as soon as I could get there, only
he
came, and I was so frightened and I had the gun but the safety was on and I couldn’t— I c-c-couldn’t— I didn’t— I just want it to stop. It has to stop, Cade. It has to stop.
He
has to stop.” The words tumbled out, making no sense to her. The gun pivoted in her nerveless hands, spinning on her finger through the trigger guard as her hands unclenched. Deftly, Cade caught it, pulled Abby close and wrapped his arm around her.

Outside, they could hear sirens.

“I’ll go,” Marsh whispered, hardly daring to speak with Mort’s teeth at his neck. “I’ll go right now, and never touch her again. Just...just...c’mon, call off your dog—”

Cade looked down at Abby. She stared up into that blue gaze, the gaze that seemed startlingly new each time she met it.

“Tell me what you want, baby,” Cade murmured.

Her mouth shaped into a square of awful grief, and a wail burst from her throat. “I want my life back, and I don’t want you to hate me for everything I’ve done.”

Cade nodded. “Then go out to the driveway and meet the squad car, Abby.”

“W-what are you going to do?”

“Mort and Marsh and I are just going to wait here.” His smile was bleak. “Marsh and I have a couple of things to talk about. Just so he’s clear on where things stand before he goes to jail.”

“Cade—”

“Go.”

“Tell me you don’t hate me. Please tell me you don’t—”

Cade turned a dark look toward her. “Never beg, Abby.”

Abby gulped hard, snuffled back a sob and fled the living room for the hot, humid, glare-bright morning outside her house, where the man she thought she might be in love with stood over her brother-in-law with a gun and a killer dog.

* * *

“Which way back to Carson Street?” Cade asked, aiming the truck for the parking lot exit from the sheriff’s department, where they’d just spent the past couple of hours giving detailed statements to the deputies who’d arrested Marsh.

Abby pointed left. “I’m sorry about your gun, Cade.”

Cade shrugged. “They need it for evidence. It’s standard procedure when shots are fired. I’ll get it back when this is over. If I really needed a gun, I could go home and get my service weapon out of my gun locker.”

“You know, I’ve never even asked, in all this time. Where do you live?”

“Ocala. I rent half a duplex.”

Abby shook her head. “It’s crazy.”

“A duplex in Ocala is crazy?”

“No, I mean...it’s only been three days, but after all we’ve been through, I feel like I’ve known you for years. But I didn’t even know what town you live in. We’ve talked about...”

Cade heard her voice choking up a little, and stole a glance. She was swallowing hard, getting a grip on herself.

“It’s like you know my darkest secrets. And I know some of yours.” She turned her head and caught him looking at her. “But all the little stuff...nothing.” She faced forward and stared out the window, unblinking. Cade thought perhaps she was trying not to cry. She’d been strong while the deputies were taking her statement. Though tears had threatened more than once, she’d taken hold of her courage and followed through. He was proud of her. Marsh was in a cell and she was safe for now, but Cade knew that emotional walls toppled most easily when the storms were over.

“You know what matters most to me.” Cade pulled out onto the street.

Abby was silent for a block, then spoke again, her voice husky with emotion. “Well. I’m sorry anyway. You’ve lost a lot because of me. Your vacation, your fishing reel and now your gun. I’m even wearing your clothes.”

“Since we’re counting, don’t forget my spare condoms.”

Abby turned an astonished face to him, and Cade laughed outright. She reddened, but then she let out a half-choked laugh. “I’m...um, not going to apologize for that, but I’ll replace them, if you’d like. Turn right at the next corner. That’s Carson.”

Silence bloomed again as they approached Abby’s house. Cade sensed their adventure winding swiftly to its end. With Marsh in jail for at least a few days until his arraignment and bail hearing and Abby in her own home again, there wasn’t much reason for Cade to stay around. He would probably have to return to Wildwood when or if Marsh’s case went to trial, but beyond that, he couldn’t see a reason to stick around.

Except he desperately wanted to. But why would Abby want him in her life? Sure, the sex was great, and he’d been a help to her in the past few days, but was that foundation enough for anything more? Beauty and the Beast was a fairy tale. His appearance wasn’t going to change. Being in a sheriff’s department again today after the time away the past two weeks and more had only reinforced the feeling that staying in law enforcement was more and more the wrong choice for him. The officers had stared openly at his face, and a couple of them had even asked if he was the deputy who’d been at that bad meth lab bust they’d heard about. Some of the glances seemed judgmental, as if the officers thought Cade had been careless or sloppy in his job. He had briefly entertained the idea of asking if the Wildwood Sheriff’s Department was looking for officers, but he’d abandoned that thought with the first negative reaction.