David Handler - The Blood Red Indian Summer

“Which is what?” Rondell demanded, blinking at her.

“That I’m not Daddy’s little girl anymore,” Jamella said bitterly. “I’m Tyrone’s. Huge with his child. But Kinitra’s still young and sweet and innocent. So he went after her.” She glowered at her father accusingly. “You forced yourself on my baby sister. You’ve been forcing yourself on her ever since Tyrone was kind enough to give you a nice home with us. And this is how you repay him-by trying to make him out to be a murderer a-and rapist. I’m the fool here. I kept telling myself you’d turned over a new leaf. That you weren’t the same awful scum Mama said you were. I should have known better.”

“I should have known better, too,” Des said, glancing over at the Deacon. “You said something to me earlier today that should have set off alarm bells in my head. Only it didn’t-not until we were sitting down to dinner.”

The Deacon frowned at her. “What did I say?”

“That men don’t change. That they are who they are.” She looked back at Calvin. “You are a low-life street hustler who only looks out for himself-even when you’re living large in a waterfront mansion. You have no moral code and zero conscience. You helped yourself to your own daughter because you felt like it. And when things started to go south, you tried to push the blame off on the son-in-law who took you in. You’re sly and you’re devious, Calvin. But you’re not smart. The state can’t bring Tyrone to trial on the rape charge unless Kinitra swears out a criminal complaint against him. And she’d be compelled to give up a sample of her baby’s DNA-which would prove that you are the father, not Tyrone. There was no way in hell you were ever going to get away with this. Don’t you see?”

“Wasn’t thinking that far into the future,” Calvin grumbled. “I was strictly thinking survival. Get the other cat before he gets you. I’ve spent half my life in a cage. I live by the code that I learned there, thanks to y’all. You’re the ones put me in there. You made me the man I am today.”

“So these murders are our fault,” the Deacon said to him.

“Absolutely.”

Rondell’s finger tightened on the trigger. “And what about Kinitra?” he cried out, trembling with rage. “Whose fault is that?”

“I got me a likeness for the young girls. I ain’t proud about it. But it is what it is. And I take what I want. That’s what a man does. He don’t ask for permission. He takes.”

“She’s your own daughter, you filthy bastard!”

“Kinitra is one fine-looking young girl. And once my blood gets to boiling, there ain’t much I can do to stop myself. The good Lord knows that. He’s always testing me. Sometimes I fail.”

“You will die for this!” Rondell snarled.

“We all die,” Calvin said with a shrug.

“And we all know the truth now,” Des said. “You’ve forced it out of him, Rondell. Good job. Why don’t you let us take it from here? Just put that gun down. It’s over now.”

“It’s not over,” Rondell said with chilling certainty.

“You folks don’t have to worry yourselves none,” Calvin said, sneering at Rondell. “He don’t have the balls to pull that trigger. I can tell from a man’s eyes if he’s got ’em. This one’s just a little bitch.”

“You shut up!” Rondell screamed at him.

“Don’t do it, little brother,” Tyrone said pleadingly. “You’ll mess up your whole life.”

“I-I have no life,” Rondell sputtered at him. “Don’t you get it? I loved her. And he destroyed her. She’s gone!”

“She’s not gone, Rondell,” Jamella spoke up. “She’ll be home from the hospital tomorrow. And she’ll need you now more than ever.”

“Son, I want you to listen to me,” the Deacon said. “I’ve been around a lot longer than you and I know a few things. I know that right now you can’t see how you will ever deal with your pain. But you will deal with it, I promise you-provided that you act like the responsible man you are and put down your gun. You did what needed doing just now for the girl who you love. Now let us prosecute Calvin through the proper channels. Believe me, he will pay.”

Rondell kept the Glock pressed to Calvin’s head. “Yes, he will. He will pay right now. On your feet, Calvin.”

Calvin’s eyes widened. “Why, what are you-?”

“On your feet!” Rondell ordered him.

Calvin got slowly to his feet. Rondell used the Glock to prod him over to the edge of the sofa so that he could get right behind him, his left forearm wrapped around Calvin’s throat. He was using the bigger man as a shield.

“He will pay right now,” Rondell repeated, backing the two of them toward the rain-spattered French doors that Mitch and Winston had come through. “He will pay.” When they reached the doors, Rondell groped around with his left hand for the wall switch, flicking off the outdoor floodlights. He and Calvin were no longer backlit. There was only darkness behind them. “He will pay.”

Rondell paused there for a brief moment now with his Glock against Calvin’s head, the two men lit from above by the beams of the ceiling track lights. There was an incredible intensity to that light. An incredible intensity to that moment. Neither man moved. Not one person in the whole room moved. Time seemed to stop. Everyone was frozen there in place, their eyes gleaming, faces drawn tight, bodies poised for action. For an eerie instant, Des felt as if they were all living inside “The Night Watch” by Rembrandt.

But this was no painting.

And Rondell’s finger on the Glock’s trigger began to move now. Not at normal speed. In slow motion. It all seemed to go down in slow motion… The shift in Calvin’s posture as he waited for the fatal shot, expecting it, resigned to it. His eyes closing one last time as Rondell fired off the round that blew away the side of Calvin’s head. Calvin sagging to the gleaming hardwood floor, a lifeless sack of meat and bone… Until suddenly everything returned to normal speed and Rondell was dropping the gun and running out of the French doors and into the pouring rain, Monique shrieking in horror from the sofa.

Toni was the first one out the door after him, flicking on the floodlights as she ran by, her SIG drawn. Rondell was splashing his way across the lawn down toward the beach.

“No, don’t hurt him!” Tyrone barked as he went sprinting right past Toni, leaving her far behind. Tyrone Grantham possessed extraordinary speed for his size.

Clarence, the former Clemson small forward, raced right past her, too. Toni dropped to one knee on the wet grass, aiming to take Rondell down with a leg shot. But she had no shot. Not with those two very large men between her and Rondell.

“Come back, little man!” Tyrone hollered after him. “Come baaaack!”

Jamella stood in the doorway weeping over the body of her father as he bled out onto the floor. Chantal led Monique out of the room, her hand over the traumatized girl’s eyes so she wouldn’t look at him anymore.

The rest of them hurried across the lawn in the chilly, wind-driven rain-Yolie and Des in the lead, Mitch, the Deacon and Winston bringing up the rear.

Rondell had made it down to the dock. He cast off the lines and jumped aboard Da Beast, which no one had bothered to cover against the rain. But Rondell didn’t care if its seats were wet. And with a varrroooooom he had its mammoth 1200-horsepower Cobra supercharged engines roaring. He was just starting to pull away when Tyrone came hurtling down the dock toward him. Tyrone didn’t stop running. He dove right off the end of the dock-only he was a fraction of a second too late. Instead of touching down aboard Da Beast with his fleeing brother, he ended up in the river with a tremendous splash.