Midnight Before Christmas (14 page)

As if someone had just attacked her. Attacked and beat her.

There was one other alteration in her appearance, one Carl noticed almost immediately.

She was now holding a small handgun. And it was pointed toward his head.

“I
’M NOT LETTING YOU
take Tommy!” Bonnie shouted. Her voice was abnormally loud, and Carl realized it wasn’t for his benefit. She was playing for the larger audience.

“Bonnie,” he whispered. “Don’t do this.”

“I won’t let you hurt him!” she continued, still shouting. “I won’t let you beat him like you did me. Like you’ve beat him so many times before!”

“Bonnie, please.” He pulled Tommy close to him. “I’m begging you.”

“You’ve made us live like slaves, like prisoners. Always in fear of when you might strike again.” It was like she was shouting lines from a play, lines she had practiced and rehearsed in the mirror well ahead of time. “I know if you beat Tommy again, you’ll kill him. I’m his mother, Carl. I can’t let that happen.”

Carl couldn’t think what to do. He felt paralyzed, frozen. If he tried to run, she might shoot him. But if he stayed still, she almost certainly would.

“Don’t try to run off with Tommy,” she said. “I won’t let you take him. I won’t let you hide him away somewhere and kill him slowly.”

That was it, Carl realized. It was like a cue. She wanted him to run, so she’d have an excuse for shooting him. Well, he wouldn’t give it to her. If she was going to shoot him, it was going to have to be in cold blood. With a stationary target.

“I just hope you haven’t killed Tommy already,” she continued, still blasting out each word. “He’s hurt so bad.”

Carl squeezed Tommy closer to him. “Bonnie—
no!”

Bonnie held the gun out at the farthest extreme with both hands. “I’m sorry it has to be this way, Carl. But I can’t let this go on. I won’t let you kill me. I won’t let you kill Tommy.”

It was coming now. Carl could feel it. He could sense that the dialogue had ended and the time had come for action.

He looked down at his son. “I love you, Tommy,” he whispered. “I always have. Always will.”

“Carl, no!” Bonnie shouted for the benefit of the invisible audience. “I won’t let you hurt him! I won’t let you!”

He could see her hands tightening, see the tiny bones in her hand flexing around the trigger. It seemed she’d reached the end of the script.

He closed his eyes and waited for the end to come.

Megan surveyed the tableau in the space of a heartbeat. She might not understand all the details, but she certainly comprehended the main event. Bonnie was pointing a gun at Carl, tensing up to shoot.

Megan didn’t stop to ask questions. She flung herself against Bonnie, tackling her like a tight end sacking a quarterback. They both crashed to the ground, but Bonnie was on the bottom and she took the worst of it. Megan heard a loud exhalation in her ear and knew that she’d at least knocked the wind out of the woman.

Unfortunately, Bonnie was down but not out. She reached up with her gun hand and clubbed Megan on the top of her head. The hard metal dug into her scalp, cutting a jagged dent in the left side. Megan could feel blood rising to the surface.

Megan gritted her teeth and pushed Bonnie’s arm away. Her brain was racing. What should she do next? Somehow, hand-to-hand combat had never been covered back at seminary. She had to try whatever first came to mind, whatever was available.

Bonnie’s head was just beyond Megan’s knees. She grabbed Bonnie’s head and slammed it back against the ground.

That seemed to take the woman for a loop. Her eyes rolled back and the lids fluttered.

Megan moved fast while she had some slight advantage. She lifted one leg back and drove her knee into the woman’s solar plexus.

Bonnie let out an “oof!” and all at once the fight went out of her body. Unfortunately, she was still holding the gun. Megan crawled across Bonnie’s body and clamped down on her arm, just below the wrist. She raised it up and down, pounding it against the hard wet grass. After several poundings, the gun spilled out of her hand.

Carl rushed forward, kicking the gun away. “Thank God you arrived. Another second and she would’ve—”

“Yeah, I saw.” Megan rolled Bonnie over and pinned her arms behind her back. She was beginning to stir; Megan wanted to make sure she was in no condition to struggle. “Lucky timing.”

“Lucky?” Carl shook his head. “More like a miracle.”

Miracle? Megan looked up at him, but at that moment, she heard the sirens of police cars wailing up the residential street. “Let me talk to them,” Megan said. “I don’t understand this mess perfectly, but I probably understand it better than you.”

“No contest.”

Megan glanced down at the bundle of flesh she was sitting on. “Make sure your ex-wife doesn’t go anywhere, okay?”

Carl grabbed Bonnie’s wrists. “It’ll be a pleasure.”

After what seemed like an eternity, Megan returned to Carl. The police had taken Bonnie out of his custody; he was sitting on the front porch steps now, waiting to hear what lay in his future. If he had a future.

“Well, I think I got that straightened out for the time being, anyway,” Megan said. She sat beside him on the porch step.

“You mean they believed you?”

Megan nodded. “I made them call their ballistics expert.” She gestured toward the police officers, now returning to their cars with Bonnie. “And the coroner—the man who examined your arm wound. Both of them had evidence that backed up my story and made the police realize what Bonnie and Frank were doing.”

“Then I’m off the hook?”

“Well, let’s not go overboard. There’s still the matter of the neighbor you injured. The house breaking. The escape from custody. But there are also some keenly mitigating circumstances. It’ll be a while before the cops have finished their investigation. I promised you wouldn’t leave town.”

“Sure, no problem.”

“But the most important thing is—you won’t be spending Christmas behind bars.”

Carl’s lips parted, but he didn’t speak. His eyes became wide and watery.

“Which is good, because Tommy isn’t going to have anyone else to stay with.”

There was a catch in Carl’s throat. “You mean, I’m going to spend Christmas with—” He suddenly let out a gasp. “Look out!”

Megan whirled around to see a man she knew must be Frank flying toward her, fists first. She screamed.

Carl grabbed her by the arm and yanked her out of Frank’s path, barely a second before he landed. Where had he come from? Megan puzzled. In the space of a heartbeat, she realized he must’ve hidden in a back bedroom, then dropped out of a window as soon as the police left the house.

“You’ve ruined everything,” Frank growled. His eyes were blazing; the expression on his face said he could kill anyone and anything that came into his grasp. Then he lunged.

Carl shoved Megan out of the way. Frank hit Carl front and center, knocking him down onto the porch—hard. A moment later, Frank scrabbled to his feet and took off.

Carl pushed himself up from the pavement slowly. Blood was trickling from the side of his mouth.

Megan laid a restraining hand on his shoulder. “Let the police catch him.”

“Like hell.” Carl started after Frank. Megan followed. She realized she must be seeing Carl’s police training in action. It rose to the surface even when Carl wasn’t consciously thinking about it. He was fast, too. In no time at all, he’d left her far behind.

Carl caught Frank just before he crossed the neighbor’s yard. He wrapped himself around Frank’s legs, knocking him to the ground. Before the man could recover, he rolled Frank onto his back and sat on him, pinning his arms back. “Go ahead,” Carl said. “Resist. Please.” Frank’s teeth were clenched; his face was smeared with dirt and grass stains. He drank in the cold hard look in Carl’s eyes—and did not resist.

A phone call later, two police officers came running to the scene. “Nice work,” one of them said to Carl as he snapped the cuffs around Frank’s wrists. “Thanks for the assist.”

“Anytime.”

Carl pushed off Frank’s prostrate body, then walked over to Megan. “Well, that was fun. Maybe I’m not totally washed up after all.”

Megan smiled. “I’m certain of it.”

“Did you mean what you said before? About me spending Christmas with—” All at once, his face darkened. “Tommy!”

“What about him?” Carl slapped himself on the side of the head. “I’m such an idiot. In all the confusion, I lost track of him. He was so terrified when his mother was pointing that gun at us. Then he ran inside and—” His eyes darted to one side, and then his voice disappeared.

Megan laid her hand on his shoulder. Carl? What is it?”

His hand rose, trembling, and pointed to the place on the grass where Bonnie had been tackled. “The gun,” he said, barely getting the word out. “I kicked it over by the hedge.”

“Yeah. So?”

“It’s gone.” He turned to face Megan, his eyes wide with fear. “And so is Tommy.”

M
EGAN TIPTOED CAREFULLY UP
the stairs of the house. Tommy’s room was at the top and the door was closed.

She stepped carefully toward his door. She stood to one side and knocked gently. “Tommy?”

“Don’t come in!” he shouted from inside. The words seemed to pour out of him, like water from a fountain. “I’ve got a gun! I’ll shoot!”

Well, that solved that mystery. Tommy had the gun. And he was holed up in his room, thinking heaven only knew what, trying to keep the monsters at bay.

“Tommy, listen to me. I’m your friend.”

“You’re my mother’s friend!” the boy shouted through the door. “You helped her take me away from my dad!”

She pressed her hand against her forehead. This was going to be harder than she imagined. Carl was searching downstairs; she thought about getting him, making him do this. But the truth was, whoever turned that doorknob was putting his or her life in danger. And more than anything else, Tommy needed to have a father, alive, not in the hospital and not in jail, when Christmas Day rolled around.

She touched the doorknob. “Tommy, I’m just going to step inside. And you’re not going to fire that pistol.”

“I will!” There was a desperate urgency in his voice, a pronounced note of panic. She didn’t doubt for a minute that he was capable of pulling that trigger. “I’ll shoot anyone who comes through the door!”

“Tommy, listen to me. There’s no reason to be angry. I know there are people who’ve hurt you. But the police have taken the bad people away.”

“I’m tellin’ you—don’t open that door!” Tommy’s voice trembled as he spoke. “If you do, I’ll shoot!”

Megan felt for the boy so strongly her heart ached. He was frightened to death. And who could blame him? He was only seven years old, after all. He’d seen his father acting like a crazy man, his mother pointing a gun at him, her boyfriend beating him within an inch of his life. Who wouldn’t be scared? And confused. And ready to do anything to prevent it from starting all over again.

“Tommy, listen to me.”

“I won’t! I’ll shoot! Don’t think I don’t know how to fire this gun. I do!”

Megan crouched down on the floor and peered through the crack between the door and the jamb. It was just wide enough for her to see a tiny sliver of the room inside.

She gasped, then pressed her hand against her throat. Tommy was holding the gun backwards, so the barrel pointed at himself. If he pulled the trigger, he’d blow a hole in his chest the size of a canyon.

“Tommy, listen to me! You can’t fire that gun. You might hurt yourself. Or even—”

“I will! I’ll fire if you turn that doorknob!”

“Tommy,
no!”
Megan could feel her own panic rising. She had to beat it down, keep her wits about her. “Tommy, please listen to what I have to say. There’s no reason to be scared. Frank is in custody and he’ll never be able to lay a hand on you again. You’re absolutely safe. I’m a lawyer, Tommy. Trust me. The law will protect you.”

“That’s what they all say!” Tommy replied. He was screaming now; he sounded as if he was about to lose control altogether. “I won’t believe
you. I won’t!”

Megan took a deep breath and slowly released it. Her palms were sweating, but somehow, she had to remain calm. If she was going to talk him out of this, it clearly wasn’t going to be as a lawyer. There had to be another way.

“Tommy, please relax. I’m not coming in. I’m not even near the door.” She waited for a moment, didn’t hear anything. With any luck, he was calming a bit. “Tommy, I’m not just a lawyer. I’m also a priest. Do you know what a priest is?”

There was a long pause before he answered. “Like—sort of a preacher?”

“That’s exactly right, Tommy. Now listen to me—you know what day today is, don’t you?”

“’Course I do. I’m not stupid. It’s Christmas Eve.”

“That’s exactly right.” Megan glanced at her watch. Only a few minutes till the big day itself. “Now, Tommy, do you know what Christmas is? Do you know why we celebrate this day?”

“I know what they say. S’posed to be when Jesus was born. ’Cept it prob’ly isn’t.”

“Well, you’re right, Tommy. It probably isn’t. But that’s not the point. The point is that we have a special day when we remember who Jesus is. What he did.” She paused, then crept a bit closer to the door. “Have you heard any stories about Jesus?”

His voice was totally noncommittal. “Yeah. Some.”

“Well, then, you’ve probably heard the stories about when Jesus was a baby. He had a tough Christmas Eve, too, you know. His parents had to go on a big trip. No one would give them a place to stay. He was born in a barn and had to sleep in a pig trough.” She paused. “I bet he was scared, too.”

Tommy’s voice seemed quieter. “Yeah. Maybe so.”

“But he didn’t let it get to him, Tommy. He tried to be brave about it. And when he grew up, he did many wonderful things.” She didn’t know where she was going with this. She was babbling like some insipid Sunday-school teacher, trying unsuccessfully to make a point. A point she couldn’t really make—because she didn’t believe it herself.

She heard a clock chiming somewhere downstairs. It was midnight. Christmas Day had arrived.