Cloaked in Blood (42 page)

He rolled down his window.  “Get
in.”

“Helen thinks I should head back to Beach
Cliffs, commander.  She’s afraid that if something happens to
me, a whole lot of testimony will be lost.”

Johnny couldn’t help but grin.  “Of
course, she wouldn’t want Marcos off the hook because she dragged
you somewhere you shouldn’t be.  Go back.  Nobody knows
you’re here, Datello.  Though, I’m starting to think it’s high
time we gave your wife a little peace of mind.”

Something passed between them in that
moment.  Maybe it was an apology, or forgiveness.  More
likely, it was understanding, the knowledge that somehow, right now
would always matter more than ancient history.

Datello nodded curtly.  “Be careful,
Orion.  I’d hate to see Helen get hurt after everything she’s
survived so far.”

On that subject, Johnny had never agreed
with anyone more in his life.

Chapter 42

Crevan pressed one finger to his lips. 
His gun was drawn, a bullet chambered.  The only other sound I
heard was the soft snick of the safety’s release.  I opened my
mouth to protest, but he silenced me with a glare, the likes of
which, I’d never imagined he’d issued in his life.

In that moment, I saw the mirror
again.  It was more a feeling that others had been the
recipient of such a homicidal rage before, because I’d certainly
never seen myself that way.

I knew his world just turned as red-black as
mine had ever been the night I killed Rick Hamilton, the night I
crushed the bones of Umberto Gutierrez’s nose into his brain and
then snapped Andy Gillette’s neck.

Oddly, the knowledge that I finally knew who
set it all into motion didn’t cause the return of my murderous
insanity.  I felt calm, a sense of peace I thought I’d
experienced at other times in my life, but now realized was as
foreign to me as my desire to see someone rot in prison.

Death would be too kind for Aidan
Conall.

The little babies in my belly picked that
moment to kick.  Unconsciously my hand smoothed over the swell
of my abdomen.  The whispered touch bore a message. 
Shh.  It’s all right.  Mommy’s right here, and Daddy
will be here very soon.

Johnny would come.  All of this would
end.  Crevan wouldn’t become what I am.  I would become
what my father always wanted me to be – not Aidan, but my real
father Wendell.

A garage door rumbled on the other side of
the house.

“Crevan, we can arrest him,” I said.

“With what evidence?  No, Helen. 
No.  We’re doing this my way.  I’ll hear it from his
lips, and then we end this.”

“If he confesses at gunpoint, that equates
duress, and nothing he says will be admissible.  Let’s just
arrest him, take him in, get a search warrant, have David’s
forensic accountants –”

“Shut up!” he hissed.

Footfalls clicked down the hallway.  We
hid inside what I presumed was Aidan’s study.  The walls were
lined with dark shelving and scores of books.  At one side of
the room was another black piece of furniture.  It was too
dark to be certain, but logic dictated that it must be Aidan’s
desk. 

Crevan would know better than I what room
his father would find sanctuary within after a grueling day – doing
what?  Knocking off the last person that could testify to his
crimes?

It would be difficult to murder someone in
jail and simply walk out.  The ensuing lockdown would detain
any visitor.  And Aidan was too well known to slip in and out
unrecognized.  Maybe he didn’t kill Sherman. 

In the silence, all sound was
magnified.  I heard the brass fixture at the door rattle
lightly, twist, a latch release.  I held my breath.

The room burst into light.

Crevan lifted his gun and pointed it Aidan’s
head.

“Hello, Father.”

Aidan startled and dropped the mail he
carried in his left hand.  Was that where I inherited the
lefty trait?  A shudder of revulsion rippled through me.

“Crevan, what the devil – put that gun…”
Aidan’s eyes met mine, flickered with something quite unpleasant
and not so different from hatred on steroids.  “You.  I
might’ve known.  What sort of lies have you told my son about
me, Dr. Eriksson?”

“Shut up, you piece of shit,” Crevan
snarled.

Aidan’s left hand balled into a fist.

“Don’t touch him, Aidan.  Not unless
you want to learn in the next second whether or not there really is
a heaven or hell,” I said.  To Crevan, “Honey, put the gun
down.  You don’t want to do this.  Death really is too
kind for him.”

“Maybe it is,” Crevan said thickly, “but at
the moment, the idea of letting him live after knowing what a liar,
what a hypocrite he really is makes me sick. 
Sick
,
Father.  Do you hear me?  You make me physically
ill!”

The narrowed eyes widened just a
fraction.  “Is that a fact?  I should think your own
behavior would make you physically ill, Crevan.  Sleeping with
that man, touching him in ways God never intended.  What a
disappointment you are.  You want to kill me?  Go
ahead.  I’m certain you’d find prison quite to your
liking.”

The hand holding the Glock wavered.

Aidan’s grin was nasty.  “You see what
I’ve had to put up with for all these years, doctor?  He
doesn’t have the guts to do anything he puts his mind to.  Now
where his libido is concerned –”

“You really should stop talking now,” I
said.  I stepped closer to Crevan and put my hand over his
wrist, pushed the gun down to his side.

“Disappointing indeed.  I’d heard such
magnificently bloody rumors about you, Dr. Eriksson.  Was I
misinformed?”

I slid my left hand behind my back and
removed the gun I’d taken from Johnny’s nightstand. 
“Certainly not, Aidan.  But why are you being so formal all of
a sudden?  Or do you really dislike the name my real father
gave me?”

“I thought perhaps you didn’t have one of
those dear, that the demons from hell merely dropped you on some
poor unfortunate soul’s doorstep.”

“Crevan, get out your handcuffs,” I
said.  “We’re arresting this son of a bitch, and once and for
all, you can put the nightmare of your childhood behind you.”

“Arrest me?” Aidan chuckled smugly. 
“Whatever for, dear?  I’m a pillar of my community.”

“You’re a murdering son of a bitch, and if
it takes me the rest of my life to prove it, I will gladly do
so.”

“Careful what you wish for, son,” Aidan
said.  “Now be a good boy and run along, and maybe Father
won’t cut you out of his will for this transgression.  I would
like to have a word in private with the good doctor.”

Another distinctive sound echoed, this one
behind Aidan.  His smug expression bled into the white creases
on his face.

“And I would prefer that you leave Helen
alone, once and for all,” Wendell said.  He stepped close
behind Aidan and jammed the .50 caliber Desert Eagle, silencer
still attached, into the soft depression behind the man’s right
ear.

“No, don’t kill him,” I half pled, half
warned.  “I don’t want him dead.  He needs to be exposed
for what he is.”

“Yes,” Wendell said.  “I couldn’t agree
with you more, but you see, Sprout, I know something you don’t know
about this man.  He’d rather die, and therefore will say or do
anything to provoke Crevan into pulling the trigger.  If you’d
be so kind as to disarm your brother now, I’d appreciate it.”

Crevan’s gun lifted swiftly.  “This is
one time, I’m more than happy to let him provoke me, Wendell.”

“Wendell?  My, now, this is getting
more interesting by the moment.  I thought you were
dead.  Don’t tell me that the demon spawn liberated you from
prison.”

“Stop calling her that!” Crevan
shouted.  Spittle flew from his lips.  “If you hated
children so much, why not sell both of us, Dad?  Why keep
me?  Or is that the truth?  You loved her enough to give
her away.  You hated me so you kept me to torture for the rest
of your life.”

Aidan had the temerity to laugh.  “It
just keeps getting better and better, son.  Here’s a conundrum
for you.  You don’t pull the trigger, and your sister goes to
prison – along with her father.  Do you think I won’t tell the
police that I was accosted by two dangerous murderers in my own
home?  I will.  She’ll give birth to her child behind
bars.  And while a jury might be empaneled to judge me, who do
you think they’ll believe – the man who has done so much for this
city, or the murdering bitch from the east coast who sprung her
serial killer father from prison so he could help her murder
me?”

It was Dad’s turn to laugh.  “You’re a
fool.  You think I don’t know where to shoot just to scramble
your brains enough so you can’t talk?  Helen’s FBI buddy will
go through this place and not leave a stick of furniture or a speck
of dust undisturbed until they can prove that you’re the scourge
upon Darkwater Bay.  Meanwhile, you’ll be crapping your pants
and drooling in prison, unable to tell a soul that I’m alive or
that Helen did anything but save her brother’s life.”

“Save his life?  I’m not threatening
anyone’s life here,” Aidan said.  “Unlike you on that rooftop,
eh Wendell?  I saw what that cannon of yours will do to a
man.  I won’t have a head left if you pull the trigger.”

“Not from this one,” Wendell jabbed another
into the small of Aidan’s back, “but this .22?  It’s my gun of
choice you know.  The damn thing shatters and doesn’t leave
enough for ballistics.  And it’s a revolver.  No casing
left behind.  The children suspected your crimes, came to
confront you and simply found you wounded on the floor of your
den.”

“Do it, Wendell,” Crevan pled.  “It
solves everyone’s problems.”

“Don’t be ridiculous!  Daddy, you’re
not a murderer.”

“The assassin truly was self defense,
Sprout.  But…”

“But nothing,” Crevan coaxed.  “I don’t
care how many people you’ve killed, as long as he’s one of
them!”

“What makes you think I wouldn’t gladly go
back to prison if it saves Helen’s future, Aidan?” Wendell
said.  “It’s all I’ve ever wanted for her.  As for how I
got out?  Well, my daughter had nothing to do with that. 
There isn’t one shred of evidence that she did.  And if Crevan
here arrests me tonight, it’s your word against mine.  When
the truth comes out, when I testify to what you told me about
selling your own daughter, probably hundreds of other innocents,
who do you think folks will believe?  Decorated police
detectives, the father who was so concerned that he faked his own
death to protect his daughter from men who wanted to sell her into
slavery, or the man with the mountain of evidence against him that
will surely be revealed? 

“Admit it,” Dad said.  “You wouldn’t
have killed Lyle Henderson yourself if you weren’t desperate to
keep all of this hidden.  I saw you leave that apartment,
Aidan.  Do you really think that the medical examiner won’t
find your skin cells under his fingernails?”

“Daddy, is that true?”

He nodded.  “I was across the street
when his assassin failed.  I planned to confront Lyle, tell
him that his partner was trying to tie up all loose ends, including
him, when lo and behold, who backed out of the apartment and took
the time to wipe his prints off the doorknob, but this upstanding
gentleman right here.  Did you kill Melissa when you were at
the jail tonight too, Aidan, or did you simply suggest to her that
suicide was a better option than life in prison?”

“I don’t know what you’re talking
about.  I have no idea who Melissa Sherman is, and I’ve never
been to a jail in my life.”

“Yet,” Dad said.  “Helen, the cuffs
now, if you please.”

“I’ll be out before the three of you can run
for cover,” Aidan scoffed.  “Two murderers and a queer. 
I like my chances.”

Crevan stepped close, pressed the gun over
Aidan’s heart and pulled the trigger.  “Not anymore,
Dad.  Not anymore.”

Chapter 43

The exit wound nicked Dad’s left
shoulder.  He pushed me away.  “I’m fine, Sprout. 
Get his gun.  We’ve got to… oh Christ.  There won’t be
residue on his hands.  We’ve got to find something that will
hold an imbedded bullet and fire that gun from Aidan’s hand before
we run like hell out of this place.”

Crevan dropped the gun to the floor. 
“That won’t be necessary, Wendell.  I’ll confess.”

“Like hell you will!” Johnny appeared behind
us, winded from running. 

I threw myself into Johnny’s arms.

“Are you all right?”

I nodded.  “Johnny, Crevan didn’t know
what he was doing.  Aidan wouldn’t stop –”

“Shh,” he murmured.  “The less I know
the better.”

“But –”

“For God’s sake, Helen, would you listen to
the man for once?  He’s trying to turn a tragic mistake into
something plausible.”  Dad gripped his shoulder and
grimaced.  “I need to get out of here, Johnny.  Can I
trust that you’ll keep Helen safe now?”

“‘Til death do us part,” he said.

“Daddy, you can’t drive this way.”

“Take him home, Helen.  Danny’s there
waiting for us.  Crevan and I will clean up this mess. 
You weren’t here.  You know nothing.  Are we clear?”

I nodded.  “But what’re you going to
tell everyone?”

“We came to arrest him.  Crevan went in
the front, I took the back.  Aidan saw him, knew why he was
here.  They fought for the gun, it went off, and Aidan was
killed.  Simple.”

“Crevan?”  I turned to my brother, now
trembling with the aftershock of what he’d done.  I tugged him
close to me.  “Listen to Johnny.  Don’t let Aidan
win.  Don’t let this ruin your life.  I love you, do you
hear me?  I want my sons to know their uncle as much as I want
their grandfather to be part of their lives.”