Love Gone Mad (35 page)

Megan’s thoughts flood in a mind rush: the night he took a knife to Marlee, the locker room, the elevator—it’s a heated broth of confusion and fear, and she wants to run. But she can’t, not here, not with the kids at home and not with her legs so weak and rubbery. Volts of panic burst through her, sending shock waves of inertia to every part of her body.

Conrad’s lips move—he’s saying something—but Megan hears only the blood rush in her ears. Her hands are like jelly, and she’s frozen with terror.

He nears her and reaches out.

In a mindless blur, Megan—somehow galvanized—hurls the pot of near-boiling water in his face. Conrad blinks and says nothing as his mouth twists into a grimace of pain. He blinks a few times, shakes his head, and moves in.

Megan sprints around the butcher-block island.

Conrad—his face crimson and blistering, the skin curdling—circles the island. His movements are feline, like a lion stalking prey through the veld.

Megan cries out, but it’s garbled. Her heart slams like a piston; her muscles quiver; every nerve ending in her body fires frantically.

He lunges for her, but Megan scrambles away. She gropes for something and her hand slaps onto the kitchen counter, her eyes steadily on him. Plates rattle and shatter onto the floor.

He circles the island. The skin on his face bubbles; his eyes are reddened, puffy.

Megan finds it behind her: a slicing knife is in her hand. She circles away from him.

“I’ll cut you, you son of a bitch,” she hears herself shriek.

He lunges toward her.

She lashes out. The knife slices through the air. Misses.

He draws back and circles the other way.

Something changes in Megan. Suddenly, she feels no fear. Instead, a flush of rage—like white heat—sears through her. She waves the knife—left, right—feints, ready to thrust or slice.

He lurches to her left and comes at her from the right.

She lashes out and the knife slices the back of his hand. Blood seeps from a severed vein, oozes and drips to the floor and spatters in crimson bursts.

He smiles, disregards the seep and drip of blood, stares at her, and feints again.

She slashes and misses.

“You knew I’d come back and catch you both …”

Megan backs away as Conrad lunges in each direction. God, he’s so fast, shifting from one angle to another. With her free hand, she slaps again at the counter, grabs a frying pan, and flings it. It whips through the air and smashes into the refrigerator.

“Mommy!” Marlee shrieks from upstairs.

“Stay where you are, honey! Don’t come down!”

“What’s happening?” Marlee screams.

Conrad’s eyes dart toward the stairway and quickly back to Megan. With melting skin hanging from his face, he circles the island.

Megan slashes; he jumps back. She thrusts and he quickly sidesteps the blade.

In an instant, he clamps a huge hand on her wrist and yanks her arm with such force it feels like it’s ripping from its shoulder socket. Then he twists her arm and the knife clatters to the floor.

He clutches her arm and a fistful of hair. Everything swirls as Megan is hurled across the kitchen. Air bursts from her lungs as her back slams into the pantry door. The impact leaves her breathless, and she crumples to the floor.

“Mommy!” she hears Marlee cry.

Megan struggles to breathe. She gasps, and through a haze, sees Conrad above her. She hears Marlee shriek again—a horrified yelp, closer now—and Megan tries to tell Marlee to run, but she can’t get air, can’t get a word out. A hoarse, guttural sound erupts from her throat, nothing sensible. Her lungs feel like they’ve collapsed. She tries to get to her feet, but she’s weak and dizzy, and Conrad’s heavy boot thuds into her belly. It feels like her guts rupture. Nausea rises in a sickening eddy. She retches, gags, and chokes, and the room dims. Things seem far away as Conrad’s knee thumps onto her chest and crushing pressure pins her to the floor.

Conrad grabs the knife.

C
oming through the kitchen door, Adrian hears a deep thump.

His insides jump when he sees Megan on the floor, her features twisted in agony.

Conrad Wilson straddles her, clutching a raised knife.

Adrian moves quickly, but it feels like a languid flow of time. He hurtles toward Conrad. The knife flashes like a sliver of light, and he sees Conrad’s melting face—purple, blistered, contorted. He hears Marlee shriek as Megan retches and the knife plummets down in a lethal arc.

Adrian’s sneakers grip the tiles; he feels momentum build as he hurtles across the kitchen, and he senses the impending impact as he closes in on Conrad. He feels the power-packed spring in his legs as he bursts forward, but it feels like a freeze frame stoppage—as though he’s plowing through some viscous substance, glue, or mucilage. Yet it’s only a fraction of a second. He slams into Conrad, hurling him to the floor. Conrad lands on his back with a deep thud. Adrian tumbles on top of him.

Conrad pushes up; his power is incredible. Adrian leaps to his feet as Conrad rises from a crouch. Adrian rears back and swings from his hip with all his weight, his fist slams into Conrad’s jaw. Conrad’s head snaps back. He grunts from the force of the blow, yet stays on his feet. Even in that adrenaline-fueled moment, Adrian wonders how the man could withstand such a punch. Conrad moves forward. Adrian’s other fist shoots out; he gut punches Conrad, landing a heavy blow to his midsection. Air whooshes from Conrad’s lungs, and the knife slips to the floor. But Conrad stays on his feet.

Adrian lunges, but in a catlike move, Conrad sidesteps him, grabs Adrian’s torso, and clamps his arms around Adrian. Conrad’s hands lock, then squeeze. It’s a viselike bear hug, constricting like a python’s embrace. Adrian’s ribs and spine compress and his face fills with blood. It feels swollen, like it’ll explode. His chest feels too small for his lungs and heart; Conrad’s grip tightens. Adrian can’t get air; he can’t expand his chest to breathe.

His knee plunges into Conrad’s groin, but Conrad holds on, and suddenly Adrian is hoisted up and hurled back, and he tumbles through the air; the kitchen spins and he hits the floor. Bouncing like a discarded doll, the back of his head cracks onto the tile floor. There’s an explosion of pain and white lights burst in his eyes.

Conrad looms over him.

Adrian’s head clears; he kicks and thrusts his feet at Conrad, but it makes no difference. Conrad drops down—his knees crash into Adrian’s chest and Adrian’s breastbone feels crushed. Conrad straddles him, and his hand clamps onto Adrian’s windpipe. Adrian is pinned, choking, as desperate gurgles ripple from his throat.

Conrad has the knife.

Adrian bucks his hips. Conrad pitches up and then comes down, still straddling him.

Adrian clutches Conrad’s wrist and stops the knife thrust. The blade quivers as each man pushes. The knife sinks slowly toward Adrian.

Adrian tries to roll to the side, but he can’t. Conrad is too heavy, far too powerful. His weight is overwhelming. Conrad’s free hand curls into a fist as he drives a punch to Adrian’s temple, but Adrian turns his head so the blow only grazes him, slamming his skull against the floor. A shower of lights bursts in his eyes, but Adrian holds on.

Adrian lurches sideways as the knife plunges down and pierces his left arm, near the shoulder. A lancing pain sears though his biceps and digs deeply. A shocklike sensation—like a blue light—shoots through his flesh. His arm spasms, then flops helplessly at his side. Adrian retches and fights the urge to vomit.

The blade rises—a lethal steel sliver in Conrad’s fist.

Adrian hears Megan shriek, then groan; he hears Marlee scream. Adrian sees blood, smells its coppery odor, sees it ooze and drip—Conrad’s blood, his own—flowing, seeping everywhere, on and around them; it’s a slippery puddle in which they writhe on the floor; and Adrian feels Conrad’s power, smells his breath, sees his scalded face, sees the blisters on his flesh, sees a huge vein pulsing on Conrad’s forehead, sees mucous dripping from his nose, and sees the bubbling spittle on his lips and the wild look in his blood-reddened eyes. In that moment, the craziest thoughts swarm through Adrian’s mind. His brain is afire with the instinct to survive, to avoid that abyss, the endless darkness, and he knows for certain he should have blown Conrad away that night in the cemetery on Bald Hill. He should have squeezed the trigger, shot out his brains and taken his life, wasted him—it would have been so easy—but he hadn’t. And this is what it’s come to, at this moment in their home, with Marlee screaming and Megan groaning. Adrian thinks she’ll somehow save him—she’ll grab a kitchen knife and thrust it into Conrad’s neck, then twist it and slice through his carotid. She’ll stab and slice, spraying his blood everywhere. But deep in Adrian’s mind, he realizes Megan is semiconscious on the floor and Marlee’s still shrieking, even as the knife begins its final plunge, and Adrian realizes he’s weak and draining. He’s sucking air, losing the struggle. In that split second of suspended time, Adrian realizes it’s over. Everything he’s ever known is coming to an end—the way it did for Dad in those final deathly seconds thirty-four years ago. Adrian knows he’s dying, and he accepts that life will leave him. There are no more thoughts, no revelations, and nothing passes before his eyes—no backlit tunnel or white light or dreamy images, or visions, or illusions. It’s not a misty, ethereal experience. It’s Marlee screaming—the very last thing he’ll ever hear. There’s Conrad above him, grunting, his face contorted with hatred and looking like a wild animal, as the knife plummets. And in that fateful moment, Adrian hears an ear-shattering roar and sees Conrad’s right eye burst open, as his face and head explode in a red, foam-filled blowback of blood, bone, and brains.

P
olice are everywhere, burly guys in blue. Sirens whoop insanely. Cops swarm through the house. Cameras click and whirr; flashes burst brightly in the kitchen; there’s a blurred circus of movement and noise; it’s all confusing. Adrian hears Megan trying to console Marlee, whose shrieking continues. Amid the tumult, Adrian hears men talking: cops, a fireman, and EMTs. He hears radio static, crackling, buzzing, and then more sirens. So many people, so much movement, everything seems to tumble and spin out of control. He’s not really certain where he is, but it must be home because he can hear Megan and Marlee, even though they’re far away.

Adrian lies on something soft. It moves a bit, and he realizes the EMT guys have him on a gurney; they’re rolling him out to an ambulance. “You’ll be okay, Doc,” one says. “It’s a nick to the brachial artery. You lost a lot of blood, but we’re getting plenty of normal saline into you, and they’ll hook you up in the ER.”

“I feel so sleepy. Whadya give me?”

“Just a shot to mellow things out.”

Adrian peers up through a haze and sees the IV bag hanging from a pole and a pulse oximeter on his index finger. He hears more voices, all blending now, and then more cameras click and it’s all fuzzy. His lips feel thick. His tongue, too. It seems to flop in his mouth, and it’s tough to get words out, so he’s mumbling something, slurring his words, and everything drifts lazily. And now he’s swaying gently. He’s certain the EMT guys shot him up with morphine, maybe Demerol. It’s like a kiss to the brain.

Suddenly, Megan’s there and plants her moist lips on his. She whispers, “I love you.”

He says something but isn’t sure what it is. He thinks he reaches for her and feels her hand. He’s being wheeled through the mudroom, then the garage, where he sees the rafters above, past the snow shovels, rakes, and weed whacker and out to the ambulance. The morning air hits him like a shock. His eyes tear. Everything is blurred and the gurney’s rolling. Megan walks beside it and pulls a blanket up beneath his chin.

“How’re the kids?” he asks thickly. Suddenly things spin, and yes, he’s starting to drift down some foggy trail. Meandering now, just wandering, he isn’t sure where. He knows his eyelids are fluttering—a sure sign of stupor, going to another world—and he can no longer feel his hands. Things are going dim, and the world wafts away. Soon he’ll be somewhere else, if he’s not there already.

He thinks he hears Megan say something, but he can’t make it out. There’s the fragrance of her hair, the feel of her skin as she bends over him and kisses him again. It’s a soft, warm, moist feeling, her lips on his. She’s incredibly delicious—unmistakably Megan. Like no other woman ever in his life.

“Love you,” he slurs, and he closes his eyes and then opens them, and of all things, there’s Mulvaney’s huge, lined face—the granite jaw, those weathered Irish features—and Mulvaney’s smiling at him through a rolling fog bank. It feels like he’s somewhere in the English moors because everything’s hazy, like in a dream.

Mulvaney says something, but it’s indistinct. Adrian feels the gurney rising, and then he’s in the ambulance. The gurney wheels collapse as he slides into the compartment. It smells antiseptic, like an OR. He feels Megan stroke his forehead. She pulls the blanket up again.

Patty’s still talking, but his voice is fading.

Adrian’s slipping away, just drifting somewhere, even as he’s inside this ambulance—yes, that’s where he is—and there’s a keening sound as the siren wails and then he’s hovering. He feels Megan next to him, hears Marlee, too, and it’s so peaceful. He could stay this way forever.

M
ulvaney goes into the living room.

“You get his statement?” he asks Harwood.

“Yeah, Chief. Got it all,” Harwood says and pockets his digital voice recorder.

Mulvaney plops down in an armchair and then says, “How ya doin’, Doc?”

“I’m okay,” Grayson replies, feeling an ache deep in his bones.

“Rough day, huh?”

Grayson nods, takes a deep breath and shakes his head wearily.

“That’s some powerful piece; it packs quite a punch.”

“It’s registered. I have a permit.”

“I know. A Walther 380. One of the best.”

Mulvaney waits and then says, “You know the guardian and his wife are dead.”

“Captain Harwood told me.” Grayson shakes his head again and sighs. “It’s a shame. The pastor was a good man … had a view of life that’s hard to hold in this insane world. He had hope for humanity.”