Nora Roberts - High Noon

"I can't think."

"It's all right. Will you bring your family out, please?"

" I… I can't keep my hands up and talk on the phone."

Phoebe closed her eyes, took a breath. "That's fine. Why don't you give the phone to Kate now? And you can all come outside together."

"All right. Kate? You need to take this call."

"God. God." The woman's voice wrenched out the words. "We're coming out. He doesn't have a gun. Please, please, don't shoot. Don't hurt him. Don't hurt him."

"No one's going to hurt him. No one's going to get hurt today." When they came out, what struck Phoebe right to the bone was the sound of the little girl crying for her daddy.

In what had become his workroom, he drank cold, sweet tea with a small sprig of fresh mint and watched the media coverage of the crisis in Gordonston.

He hoped they'd all die.

He didn't care about the Brinkers-they meant nothing to him one way or the other. But if that whining college guy put bullets in his family, then himself, Phoebe would take a hell of a hit.

That would be worth the airtime.

Then again, if she took too hard a hit, he might not get the chance to pay her back, his way.

Bitch would probably slide out of it anyway, even if she fucked up and the idiot put a bullet in the brain of the fat-cheeked toddler whose picture they'd shown on screen half a dozen times already.

She wouldn't take the blame for it, no matter how much she'd earned it.

With the tea, he sat down at his workbench. He'd heard the call come through on his police scanner while he was finishing up breakfast. It had given him a hell of a lift. Guy, wife, three kids. A bloodbath like that would get lots of attention.

He'd been right, and on his workroom TV, he watched while the local station preempted the Today show with live at-the-scene coverage.

And he'd seen Phoebe stride by the cameras, ignoring reporters in that superior, I'm-so-fucking-important way of hers.

He'd thought about putting a bullet in her brain. Oh, he'd thought about it, even dreamed about it, just the way he figured Mr. College Professor was thinking about putting one into his whole stupid family. But that was too easy. That was too quick. Bang! And it's over.

He had a much better plan.

He kept the TV on while he worked. Usually, he had the spare scanner on down here, and maybe the radio. Television was too distracting when he was working. But he considered this an exception.

His lips thinned as the reporter on screen announced the Brinker family had come out, safe and sound, that the asshole surrendered peacefully.

"Pulled that one off, didn't you?" he muttered to himself as he turned screws. "Yeah, that one was easy. Didn't have to break a sweat, did you? Nice family, nice neighborhood. Just some stupid shit looking for some attention. You got them out just fine, didn't you? Phoebe. " He had to stop, put his tools down, because the anger, the rage, made his hands shake. He wanted a cigarette. Actually yearned for one. But he'd made himself quit. It was a matter of willpower, and practicality. He didn't need crutches. He couldn't afford to need crutches. He couldn't even afford the rage. Cold blood, he reminded himself. Cool head. When payback came, he'd need those, and a strong body, a clear purpose.

So he closed his eyes and willed everything inside him to slow, to still.

It was her voice that had his eyes opening again, had them burning toward the TV.

"Stuart Brinker surrendered peacefully. His wife and their children weren't harmed."

"Lieutenant MacNamara, as hostage negotiator, how did you convince Professor Brinker to surrender to the police?"

"I listened."

The glass flew across the room, shattered against the set before he realized it had left his hand. Amber rain dripped down over Phoebe's face.

Have to work on that, he told himself. Have to work on that control. Won't get the job done flying off the handle. No sir. But he smiled as the rivulets of tea slid down Phoebe's face. He imagined them red, long thin rivers of blood.

Because it pleased him, he was able to pick up his tools again with a steady hand.

He went back to work on the timer.

"It got to me. Some of them do, more than others."

After shift, Phoebe sat with Liz over a couple of glasses of wine in Swifty's. It was too early for music, so the booth was a quiet corner, an island to sink into and unwind.

"How so?"

Phoebe started to speak, then shook her head. "I didn't mean to talk shop. We should talk shoes or something."

"I bought this pair a couple weeks ago? Pumps, leopard-skin design.

I don't know what I was thinking. Where am I going to wear leopardskin pumps? Anyway, we'll get to that. Tell me about the incident. I know how it is," Liz went on. "I talk to a lot of rape victims, to a lot of kids who've been sexually abused. And sometimes it gets to you more than others. You get it out, or it roots. So?"

"The kids. You have to try not to think about them as kids. Just hostages. But…"

"They're kids."

"Yeah. And in this case, part of the key to talking him down. He loved them. You could hear it."

"And the question is, how do you hold what you love at gunpoint?"

"Because you're broken. Something was broken inside him. He wasn't mad, there wasn't any rage in him. It wasn't payback or punishment. It can be more volatile when it's not about payback. Maybe that's part of what got to me, too. I hear this guy, I hear him standing on the edge of an abyss. And he doesn't believe he can come back from it-that he deserves to."

"Why take the family, too?"

"He's nothing without them. They're essential to who he is. He doesn't want to die without them. So…" She lifted her wine. "Altogether now." She drank, blew out a breath. "He's been depressed for more than a year, and things have been slipping away from him. Career, marriage, both on pretty shaky ground. Wife wants a bigger house, oldest daughter wants a car of her own, he gets thumbs-down on the full professorship. Stuff you handle or fight about. But he just sank down, and kept sinking. The wife's so busy taking care of the kids and the house because he's barely able to get out of bed. She gets fed up, kicks him out. 'Things fall apart; the center cannot hold.' He couldn't hold it."

"You gave them a chance to try again."

"Yeah. Well. Nobody died. You listen good."

"Part of what we both do is listen." Liz tapped her glass to Phoebe's. "And we'd better be good."

"Did you always want to be a cop?"

"I wanted to be a rock-and-roll star."

"Who didn't?"

Liz laughed. "I was actually in a band for a couple of years when I was in college."

"No kidding? What did you do?"

"I got pipes, sister." Liz wagged her thumb at her throat. "And I was crazy in love with the lead guitar. We had plans. The kind you make at twenty and aren't ever going anywhere. Big, splashy plans. Which we made when we weren't screwing like bunnies."

"College." Phoebe sighed. "Those were the days. What happened to Lead Guitar?"

"He dumped me. No, that's not fair, or accurate. He backed away, rapidly. I got raped."

"I'm sorry."

"My turn to make the beer run. There was a place just a couple blocks from where we were living. Party time, all the time. You know?"

"Yeah, I know."

"I was in the parking lot when they jumped me. Two of them, laughing like loons. Seriously high. They dragged me into the back of a van, took turns with me while a third one drove. Then they switched off so he could have a go. I don't know how many times, because I zoned out after the first round. Then they just tossed me out on the side of the road. Cruiser picked me up. I was just stumbling along, clothes torn and bloody, in shock, hysterical. The whole ball. And the cops spotted me." She drank to wet her throat. "Well. They got them, all three of them. I paid attention, until I had to go under. I paid attention. I had descriptions, and I made all three of those motherfuckers in lineup. Hardest thing I ever did, to stand there and look at them through that glass. And Lead Guitar? He couldn't handle it. Couldn't look at me, couldn't touch me, couldn't be with me. Too much for his head, he said. I didn't want to be a rock-and-roll star anymore."