Tami Hoag - A Thin Dark Line

The car went into a sudden, screeching skid as Doll jammed on the brakes. Annie flew into the dash, her head bouncing off the windshield, her shoulder slamming into the dashboard. The noise, the motion, the pain, the vertigo tumbled through her in an avalanche. She tried to push herself up from the floor as the car jolted onto the shoulder and stopped. She tried to get hold of something for support and orientation, tried to focus her eyes on something out in front of her-the barrel of a gun.

Her gun. In Doll Renard's hand. Three inches from her face.

Swinging wildly, she knocked the gun sideways, and the Sig went off with a deafening pop!, shattering a window somewhere in the car.

"Bitch!" Doll shrieked.

She grabbed Annie by the hair with her left hand and brought the gun down hard, slamming it against her temple and cheekbone once, twice.

Starbursts of color shot through Annie's head like a meteor shower. Surrendering for the moment, she dropped to the floor, crumpled and limp, blood trickling in thin fingers down across her cheek. She could feel consciousness sliding away. She thought she could feel the world sliding beneath her, but it was only the car. They were moving again, off the main road. She could hear the soft swish of grass brushing against the sides of the Cadillac, the popping sound of tires crunching over rock.

She lay still on the floor, energy spent, knowing she had to find more, had to scrape together another burst or die. Weapons. The thought was a dim light in her mind. Doll has the Sig. Doll has the Sig. Doll has the Sig. She knew there had to be something more, another answer, stupid simple, but she couldn't think.

So tired.

Her limbs were as heavy as the branches of a live oak. Her hands felt the size of catcher's mitts. She tried to swallow around a tongue as thick as a copperhead. Maybe the red snake she had seen come out of Doll's mouth had gone into her own to choke her. A taste as bitter as acid filled her mouth.

Acid. That would be a weapon, she thought. She imagined throwing it in Doll Renard's face, imagined the face burning down to the skull bones while the rest of her body danced a mad jig of death.

Add.

The car rolled to a stop. Doll popped the lock on the trunk, got out of the car, and slammed the door. Annie reached slowly down her right side to her duty belt, feeling back from her empty holster to the slim nylon case just behind it. She pried up the Velcro tab and slipped the small cylinder free with clumsy fingers.

Behind her, the car door opened. Annie's head snapped back as Doll grabbed her by the hair and pulled her backward.

"Get up! Get up!"

Annie fell onto the ground, wincing as Doll kicked her in the back and cursed her. Curling into a ball, she tried to protect her head. The fingers of her right hand wrapped tightly around the cylinder in her palm.

The door of the Cadillac swung shut, just missing Annie's head, then Doll had her by the hair again, dragging her into a sitting position. Annie opened her eyes, reaching out to steady herself against the side of the car as the dizziness spun her brain around and around. The car's headlights provided the only illumination, but it was enough. Tipping and spinning in front of her vision was a house, run-down, with broken windows gaping like toothless spots in an old crone's smile.

They were on Pony Bayou. This was the house where Pam Bichon had had her life cut out of her.

"I didn't kill Pam," Marcus said softly.

Hunter Davidson's broad face twisted with disgust. "Don't stand there and lie to me. There's no judge here but God. There's no technicalities, no loopholes for you and your damn lawyer to jump through."

"I loved her," Marcus whispered, tears coming again to stream down his cheeks.

"Loved her?" Davidson's big body quivered with rage. Sweat ringed the underarms of his shirt. His thin hair was dark and shiny-wet. "You don't know what love is. I made her! My wife bore her! She was our child! You don't know a damn thing about that kind of love. She was our baby, and you took her away from us!"

The irony, Marcus thought, was that he knew all about that kind of love. He had been caught in a sick mutation of it his whole life. Tonight he would have ended it. Now Pam's father would end it for him.

"You can't know how many times I've killed you," Davidson said softly, moving forward. His eyes were glassy with the fever of hate. "I dreamed of nailing you down and putting you through the hell my baby went through."

"No," Marcus whispered, crying harder now with fear. Spittle bubbled between his lips and dribbled down his chin. Against his will, his gaze darted to the big wooden table where his utility and X-Acto knives were laid out like surgical instruments. He shook his head. "Please, no."

"I wanted to hear you beg me for your life, the way Pam must have begged. Did she call for me when she was dying?" Davidson asked in a tortured voice. Tears as big as raindrops spilled down his ruddy cheeks. "Did she call for her mama?"

"I don't know," Marcus murmured.

"I hear her. Every night. I hear her calling for us, calling for me to save her, and there's not a damn thing I can do! She's gone. She's gone forever!"

He stood no more than two feet away now. The hand that held the gun was as big as a bear's paw, white-knuckled, trembling.

"You should die like that," he whispered bitterly. "But I didn't come here for revenge. I came for justice."

The gun barked twice. Marcus's eyes widened in surprise as the force of the bullets knocked him backward. He felt nothing. Even as he fell into his drawing table, then to the floor, the back of his head bouncing off the hardwood, he felt nothing. His body jumped again and again as Davidson fired into him. Marcus felt as if he were watching the scene on a movie screen.

He was dying. Another irony. He would have taken his own life tonight. He would have ended his mother's quiet, twisted tyranny. He would have spared Victor a future without protection. Instead, he would die here on the floor, killed for a crime he didn't commit, a failure even in death.

"They'll think Mmmmarrcus did it," Annie said.

"No, they won't," Doll corrected her. "They'll know exactly who did it: you. Get up."

Bracing herself against the Cadillac, Annie rose slowly, awkwardly.

Think. Try to think. Need a plan.

Thinking was as tiring and difficult as swimming upstream against a strong current. Thinking and walking simultaneously was nearly impossible. The ground rose and fell erratically beneath her feet. The house shimmered like a mirage in the glare of the headlights. Her breathing was becoming labored. She could feel her heartbeat slowing like the ticking of a clock winding down to a stop. It would be only a matter of time before the drugs pulled her under entirely, then Doll would stick the Sig in her mouth and pull the trigger. Suicide.

Her career had been in trouble. She'd been having difficulties with her co-workers. A number of people had reported she had recently developed a drinking problem. Would it be a stretch to believe she'd gone out to the house where she had found Pam Bichon's mutilated remains, taken a handful of downers, and blown her brains out with her service weapon?

"But hooow did I… get here?" she asked, pausing at the foot of the porch steps.

"Shut up!" Doll snapped, jabbing her in the back with the Sig. "Get inside."

The vehicle was just a minor snag, Annie supposed, as she staggered up the steps onto the porch. Doll Renard was an old hand at murder. She'd gotten away with it twice already.

The door stood open, as if someone had been expecting them. Annie stepped into the entry, her footfalls echoing in the empty hall. The beam of a portable lantern cut through the gloom, lighting the way to her death. The floor was thick with dust. Cobwebs festooned the doorways. The nose of the Sig jabbed into her back. Annie moved down the hall, her left hand against the wall, feeling her way like a blind person.