Justice for None: Texas Justice Book #1 (20 page)

That was as far as he got before Val smashed the barrel of the pistol into his face, slashing Jasper’s cheek to the bone. Blood flew, Jasper’s eyes rolled and he sagged toward the pavement. But Val didn’t let him go down. He grabbed Jasper by the hair, twisting his fingers into the greasy blond tangle, jerked him back up and shoved him against the side of the Lincoln just in time for Smith’s front teeth to meet the downward arc of the pistol’s barrel. Jasper threw up his hands to protect himself, but Val battered them down then continued to hammer at the man’s face and head with the barrel of the pistol until Jasper’s knees buckled.

A deep laceration in Jasper’s scalp pulsed blood in an angry flood and bone peeked through the gash on his cheek. Broken teeth glittered in the gutter alongside Jasper’s hearing aid, its plastic case cracked down the middle. But Smith was still conscious, still looking up at Val, his eyes bright with fear and hatred. He knew he was going to die.

You’re damned right he was.
Val jammed the 9mm into Jasper’s eye socket and cocked the hammer. His finger tightened on the trigger, centimeters from sending Jasper on to the next life.

“Good bye, Jasper.”

Kyle screamed, a shriek that sliced right through the black spell Val was under, jerking him back from the edge of insanity.

Val released Jasper to crumple to the pavement, turned and dropped into a crouch beside the stroller, keeping Jasper and Garland in the corner of his vision.

“Hey,” he said to the boys. “It’s okay.” Kyle’s eyes were pinned on his father’s face, tears running down his cheeks. Max looked even more frightened than his brother, though his eyes were dry. Those tears and that fear shamed Val, but he didn’t have time to apologize or make amends. He stood and turned back to the Lincoln.

Two doors down from Campisi’s, a tall brunette in a very short skirt came out of Dee’s Bridal Boutique, She stopped when she saw Val and Jasper, turned and darted back inside. Jasper had struggled to hands and knees by then. Blood spooled from his mouth into the gutter.

“This pistol is going to put you back in Huntsville,” Val said. “A convicted felon with a gun is an automatic remand.”

Still on his knees, Jasper plucked his hearing aid’s amplifier from the gutter and spat out a piece of broken tooth before he replied, his words coming out cottony through busted lips.

“Now, boss, I never seen that pistol until you pulled it on me,” he said as he fingered the crack in the hearing aid’s amplifier. Slowly he pushed himself up the side of the car until he was standing shakily, leaning against the Lincoln for support. He touched his mouth and winced then shook his head, still looking at the hearing aid. “You broke my listener.”

Quickly, Val did the math: the cops would arrive to find Jasper Smith pistol-whipped and Val holding a gun. One call downtown would supply the information that Val was a suspect in the death of Gus Perdido and Abby Sutton…the uniformed cops wouldn’t even try to sort this out on the street; they’d hook up Jasper
and
Val and let the DA sort it out.

Val lowered the pistol. The gun was gory with blood, the stainless steel dark with it. He ejected the clip from the pistol, racked the slide to eject the bullet under the hammer then pitched all of it into the Lincoln’s back seat to clatter among the cast off beer bottles.

“Get out of here, Smith,” he said.

“You going to kill me if I don’t?” Smith asked then laughed, flashing broken teeth and a mouthful of blood. The fear had left his eyes, replaced by burning, feral contempt, like a hyena eyeing a wounded lion. He turned and dropped heavily into the Lincoln, pulled the door closed and laid his battered head back against the headrest.

“I think we made our point, daddy-O” he said to Garland. “Let’s roll it before the law puts the light on us.”

But Garland was in no hurry. He took a sip of his beer, his eyes on Valentine. The old man hadn’t made a move or spoken a word of protest as Val had pistol-whipped Jasper. In fact, the incident hadn’t even seemed to make a dent in Garland’s beer buzz.

Garland tucked the beer bottle between his thighs and reached for the gear shift. “This ain’t over. I want what’s due me,” he said as he slipped the Lincoln into drive and eased away from the curb.

Val watched Garland exit the parking lot and make a U-turn on Mockingbird, looping across four lanes of oncoming traffic. Tires squealed and horns blared as Garland punched the gas, fishtailing the Lincoln down the middle lane, one arm jutting out the window, middle finger extended.

“Bad men,” Kyle said, snot bubbling from his nose. Val wiped it away with the tail of his shirt.

“You got that right, Kyle,” he said. “But daddy will take care of them.” He gave the boy a reassuring smile then stood and wheeled the stroller back to the tow truck. He secured the twins and the pizza and cranked the engine, catching a glimpse of himself in the rearview mirror as he reached for the gearshift. There was blood on his face. Val grabbed a Wet-Nap from the diaper bag and cleaned his face as he headed west toward the highway.

You’re damned right Daddy would take care of them.

33

A
call from Renee Petersen of the Dallas Morning News awakened Victoria from a fitful slumber. She made the mistake of answering the bedside phone without checking the caller ID then ‘No commented’ the nosy witch until the reporter finally slammed down the receiver in frustration, but only after insisting that Victoria have Val call her back.

Right. Victoria wasn’t a messenger service for Valentine’s ex-girlfriends, especially not the smart, pretty ones. She turned the phone’s ringer off and tried to go back to sleep, but it was useless. Every time she closed her eyes images of the murders at the jail assaulted her. Like jerky film footage from a bad horror movie, she saw Albert Pico and Sandy die; Randall Rusk charging down the corridor at her, the bloody knife in his hand; Axel Rankin as limp as a rag doll, his head twisted at an impossible angle; and, finally, the deputy firing point blank into Rusk’s face. Victoria shuddered in her bed, wrapped her arms tight around herself and tried to shove the memories into the darkest corner of her mind, to padlock them down and toss away the key. Val had set that example for her, she suddenly realized…but she wasn’t Valentine. He had embraced the darkness long ago. Had given himself over to it.

That thought made her cold to the marrow. As cold as Val’s eyes had been when he had spoken of the men he had killed. The
seven
men he had killed. She shivered again. She couldn’t deal with that train of thought. She was too tired to think straight. But there was no hope of getting more sleep. She sat up, shrugged off the covers, turned her feet out onto the floor, and dragged herself out of the bedroom and down the stairs, limping all the way. She could at least spend time with the boys, get lost in their world for a little while, a distraction from her nightmares and her troubled marriage.

She found Val’s note on the kitchen table. She was reading it when he wheeled the stroller in through the backdoor with a pizza box and a six-pack of beer balanced on top.

He looked haggard, but not contrite. His eyes had the same icy edge they had contained earlier that afternoon. It dried up any words she might have mustered.

Val didn’t seem to have anything to say either, other than a brief ‘Hello.’ He got out plates while she unloaded the boys and placed them in their highchairs.

They ate the pizza in relative silence. Even the boys were unusually quiet.

And that silence was causing Val’s brain to cook at a slow broil. He knew that the boys were still getting over his bloody confrontation with Jasper Smith. He sat there and stared at his plate, his teeth grinding, head filled with dark static. He’d make Garland and Jasper pay for this. He’d kill them both if he had to.

“What are you thinking?” Victoria said suddenly, her tone hesitant.

Val realized then that he was hunched over his untouched pizza, his hands knotted into fists. The flesh on his face felt hot and tight. He shook his head and picked up the pizza. He wasn’t going to tell Victoria about his most recent run in with Jasper and Garland. It would only make the situation worse. If that was possible.

It was almost funny when Val considered that only two hours before he had promised himself that he would leave this to Jack Birch and the DPD. He had intended to make that same promise to Victoria. To repair the rift between them before it tore them apart. But he couldn’t make that promise now. He couldn’t live up to it.

“Nothing,” he said, mustering a brittle smile. To cover it, he put pizza in his mouth and chewed, barely tasting it.

“The Suttons,” she said dully, but it wasn’t a question. She dropped her eyes and went back to her food, eating without appetite, her stomach balled into a clammy knot.

After
dinner, Val made the boys their favorite cheesy, low-fat popcorn and the four of them watched Shrek Forever for the seven-hundredth time. Valentine knew every line by heart. The words kept coming a second before they were spoken on screen. It made his head hurt. But the twins had a great time, especially the tickle-war with their mother during intermission while Val microwaved more popcorn and broke out boxes of Juicy-Juice. But there was no tickling coming Val’s way. Or anything else for that matter. Victoria was polite, but spoke little, concentrating her attention on the twins.

The boys didn’t seem to notice that the space between their parents had taken on the oppressive pressure of an impending storm. Or the fact that their father kept circling the house, peering out windows, while their mother watched him with fear in her eyes. No, Max and Kyle had the best family night in weeks.

By 8:30, the boys were already nodding off, but Victoria didn’t want to put them down in their nursery. She wanted them close. And so did Val. He fixed a palette of blankets and pillows on the floor and their mother snuggled down with them like a mother cat with her kittens.

Victoria’s father called on her cell phone at 8:45. She took it in the kitchen. Val could feel his ears burning. Or maybe it was Victoria’s hide? Val knew Andrew would be grilling her about her actions of the last two days. Andrew, a former chairman of the State Republican Party, would have undoubtedly heard all the details from his network of friends in high and low places, and he wouldn’t take her risking her life lightly. Victoria was his only child and he protected her like a rhino with an injured calf.

Val’s relationship with Andrew had started out rocky. About what you’d expect when you impregnate a man’s unmarried daughter. When Andrew had been told of the pregnancy by an ecstatic Victoria and a scared shitless Valentine, the old man had cracked a series of jokes about shotgun weddings. Victoria had laughed her ass off, but Valentine and Andrew had known it wasn’t a joke. If Val hadn’t come up with a wedding ring he would have come down with an overdose of buckshot.

Victoria was on the phone for half an hour. When she came back to the living room, she didn’t relate the conversation to Val and he didn’t ask. They watched old movies on Channel 39 until 11:00 then trooped upstairs, each of them carrying a sleeping twin. They put the boys in their crib and turned on the nightlight.

Outside the half-open nursery door, Victoria grabbed Val’s rumpled shirtfront, pulled him in tight and turned her face up to him.

“I’m supposed to be at daddy’s tomorrow at 9:00, but tonight I just want you to take me to bed. I don’t want to fight; I don’t even want to talk. Okay?”

Val nodded. It was as much as he could have hoped for. It wasn’t forgiveness or understanding, but it wasn’t rejection either.

For the moment he could live with that.

34

Victoria
awoke alone in bed, Val’s side of the covers thrown back in a tangled mess. She turned out of bed and almost screamed when her injured toe hit the floor. After a moment of muttered cursing, she limped down the hall, not bothering to brush her hair or her teeth, and looked into the nursery. The crib was empty. Then she heard the boys in the kitchen below. Max was laughing and squealing while Kyle was chanting gibberish at top volume. Val shushed them.

“Keep it down, there, buckaroos,” he said in his best John Wayne imitation, which sounded more like Slim Pickens, “You’re mother is still in the bunkhouse counting sheep. Eat them there vittles.”

Victoria hesitated for a moment before turning back the way she had come, her troubled thoughts on Valentine. The man was just too damned stubborn to be turned off any path he chose for himself. And this path, facing down Jasper Smith and Garland Sutton, could only lead to more violence, but what could she do about it? He wouldn’t listen, wouldn’t even talk about it. The whole situation made her beyond weary. She wanted to crawl back into bed and pull the covers over her head. Instead, she trudged back to the master bedroom, grabbed some clothes and headed for the bathroom. She propped her foot on the side of the tub and peeled the bandages off her toe. God it looked awful, black and blue and yellow. Her right hand wasn’t any prettier. The cut wasn’t large, but it looked bad, a crooked line of scabbed and welted flesh. The jailhouse doctor had put six stitches in it.

She stripped out of her nightshirt and climbed under the steaming spray. As she soaped and scrubbed, wincing as the washcloth found a fresh bruise or scrape at every curve and corner, she considered how she would deal with Valentine. She knew he wasn’t going to let Jack handle this. Val would either kill someone or get killed, but what could she do about it? She knew screaming and threats wouldn’t work, nor would begging, which she wasn’t good at anyway, but she was good at one thing, thanks to years of criminals and trials: being a ball-busting witch. So, no sex and no conversation beyond the absolutely necessary. She doubted that would break him, but her only other option was divorce and that
wasn’t
an option. She’d kill him first.

By the time she had applied the rudiments of makeup, re-bandaged her wounds and dried her hair it was almost 8:15. She was supposed to be at her father’s in Fort Worth at 9:00. There was no way she was going to make it on time. Quickly, she dressed in faded jeans and a yellow blouse, slung her purse over her shoulder and hurried downstairs.

With breakfast finished, Val was kneeling on the living room floor wiggling Kyle into a pair of blue pull-up diapers. Max was sitting nearby with a Raggedy Andy book in his hand, tracing the lines of text with one chubby finger and moving his lips, pretending to read. As Victoria entered the room, Valentine bent down, pressed his mouth against Kyle’s belly and blew, making a loud farting sound. Kyle squealed and wriggled, waving his arms and laughing so hard that snot bubbled from his nose.

Val pulled Kyle’s shorts up over the diaper and settled back on his haunches. “Remember, when you have to go potty, you tell paw-paw or mommy,” he told him. “They’ll take you to the big boy’s bathroom. Got it?”

“Pee-pee!” Kyle yelled up at his father, grinning so wide that drool spooled from his chin. “Poopy!”

“Poopy! Pee-pee!” Max echoed, looking up from his book, his finger still marking his spot.

“Let’s stick with potty. And not so loud,” Val said as he lifted Kyle up and set him on his feet. “Whisper it.”

“Potty!” Kyle bellowed in his father’s face, spraying Val with spit.

Victoria stood quietly on the threshold of the room. Val was so good with the twins. He hated the ‘Mr. Mom’ tag, but he was as nurturing as any mother, yet the dark side of him, the razor’s edge, was always there. Which one was the real Valentine and which the mask? She didn’t have a clue. She wasn’t even sure if Val knew the answer to that. Though she loved him desperately, the danger he seemed to crave made her fear for the safety of her children, a fear she wasn’t sure she could live with.

“Who wants to see Paw-Paw?” she called out as she strode briskly into the room. She didn’t even glance at Valentine as she grabbed the diaper bag off the sofa. She had nothing to say to him. She was all out of words.

“Paw-Paw!” The boys exploded into hopping, yelping dervishes. “Paw-Paw!” They charged their mother, grabbed her legs and tried to climb her like a tree.

“Hold up there monkeys.” Val rose and scooped up Max, shifted the boy to his left hip then picked up Kyle and tucked him under his right arm like an oversized football. “Watch your tails as you go through the door.”

Val carried them to the front door, jouncing and jiggling them with every step. Victoria held the door open and he carried them down the front walk to the Jeep. He had already transferred the twins’ car seats from the tow truck. He piled them in, kissed them both then turned to his wife.

She didn’t meet his eyes. Didn’t say anything. Not a good sign.

“There’s two days’ worth of clothes there and I packed those cowboy shirts your dad gave them last Christmas. They fit now, but they’re still ugly as hell.”

Victoria nodded without looking at him. She reached for the Jeep’s door handle.

“I’m sorry about all of this,” he said, but she didn’t look up. She pushed the button and started to open the door. Valentine put a hand on the doorframe and kept it from opening. Her eyes flashed up at him then, her expression icy. Her courtroom face. The face that scared defendants and their lawyers into plea deals. It was just as effective on her husband.

“Don’t stand there and lie to me, Valentine,” she warned him. “Not again. Don’t you dare.”

Val started to protest but stopped himself just in time. He finally just nodded.

“I’m going to be late,” she said and tugged at the door. Val removed his hand and stepped out of the way. She slid in.

“I love you,” he said. “That’s no lie.” He knew he was on thin ice, but he hesitated to say more.

“I know that,” she replied. “But it doesn’t change anything. You’re going to do what you want to do no matter what I say. You’ll kill them and go to jail or they’ll kill you.”

“I—” Val began, but she wasn’t waiting for a reply. She pulled the door closed, cranked the engine and backed down the driveway without looking back.

Shit.