Brian Freeman - Spilled Blood

‘Johan, no!’

Someone was shooting at them.

Olivia grabbed him around the waist and guided him toward the porch. He staggered, and red drops sprayed into the water. The bullets followed them, erupting in splashes on either side of them, chasing them back inside the house. Another window shattered as they scrambled through the door and slammed it shut behind them.

They were trapped.

The water kept rising.

*

In the steeple of the church, Lenny Watson stood among the litter of cartridge boxes and spent shell casings. From here, the highest ground, he could see the river coming for them. He didn’t know what had happened, and he didn’t care. He’d heard the explosion, and now, minute by minute, he watched the town of St. Croix sink into the water before his eyes.

The streets were eerily deserted. There were no streets now, no pavement, curbs, or corners, just avenue signs jutting out of the rapids. Nearly everyone was gone. He’d let them go, but not Johan Magnus. Not him. Not Olivia, either. He didn’t want to hurt her, but he’d watched them kiss, the two of them pawing each other like animals, and he’d started firing and firing and firing. He wanted to make it stop. He wanted to drive them apart. He wouldn’t be humiliated, watching her with another boy.

This was what Kirk would do. His brother would be proud of him. You’re finally a man, Leno.

He slid the barrel of the rifle through the slats in the steeple again. Each time he fired, the bells made a metallic vibration behind him, like church music. He aimed for another window in Hannah Hawk’s house, and he squeezed the trigger.

52

When Chris was one block from the church in St. Croix, the Lexus floated off the pavement.

The flooded engine died. Dank river water filled the base of the car, and the sedan spun in a lazy circle. Chris pushed open the door and stripped off his seat belt, and he spilled out of the car into a foot of rushing rapids. The current shoved him to his knees. His silver car, driverless, rammed an oak tree and ricocheted away, bouncing downstream through the town like a pinball.

He didn’t have time to grieve for his car. The river popped with an odd splash no more than a foot away from him. Simultaneously, the crack of a rifle shot blasted and reverberated in his ears. Chris rolled right, deeper into the water, and when he looked up at the church steeple, he saw a long gun barrel poking out through the louvers, aimed downward. He scrambled forward on his knees, and another bullet buried itself in the water and mud.

Chris ran, trying to stay on his feet. He reached the wall of the church, where he was out of view from the shooter above him. He was wet, cold, and dirty. His phone was gone, lost somewhere in the water. He reached around to the small of his back and found Marco’s gun still lodged tightly under his belt. He slid it into his hand, but he didn’t know if it would fire, not after the gun had spent time swimming in the swollen Spirit River.

Marco.

He’d had his revenge. Florian was gone. So was Mondamin. So was the heart of Barron. The trouble was that revenge knew no boundaries, and the river didn’t stop its destruction at the city limits. It kept flowing, kept flooding, kept growing, carrying everything away in its path.

Chris stayed under the eaves of the church and followed the wall to the corner. Ahead of him, no more than fifty yards away, he saw Hannah’s house, now an island in the deepening lake. Trees and street signs grew oddly out of the water. Behind one of the corner beams on the porch, he spotted movement, and someone waved frantically and called for him in a high-pitched voice. His heart stuttered. It was Olivia. She was in the last place he wanted her to be. He couldn’t stop her or hold her; instead, he watched in terror as his daughter bolted from her hiding place and splashed down the front steps. She was in the open, coming for him. Another shot tunneled into the rushing river, barely missing her.

‘Olivia!’ he shouted, his choked voice carrying over the flood. ‘Get inside!’

She ducked behind the steps, but he could see her face and the pink flash of her T-shirt. Her hands gripped the iron columns of the railing. The water swirled around her. ‘It’s Lenny!’ she screamed back at him. ‘He shot Johan!’

‘ Get inside! ’

‘I can help. I can talk to him.’

Another rifle shot dissolved in echoes. He didn’t see the ripples of the bullet. As the crack died away, Olivia broke cover again. He held up his hands frantically to stop her.

‘ No! ’

She froze in place. She glanced back at the front door, but she didn’t move.

‘Olivia, get back! Get in the house!’

She looked panicked by the power of the rapids. She was an easy target, a stick figure in water up to her knees. He knew he needed to get to Lenny before he fired again. He waved Olivia back to the house one last time and charged up the church steps out of the water. The river hadn’t risen above the top step, and inside, the foyer of the church was dry and quiet. On his right, a twisting staircase led into the steeple. He ran for the stairs and climbed around the spirals toward the bell chamber, taking the steps two at a time. Marco’s gun was slippery in his hand. There were no windows and no light in the square stairwell; he was blind. Above him, to his horror, he heard the blast of another shot, and in the close confines, the explosion stung his ears. He heard the singing of the bells, rattled by the echoes. He listened for what he feared – a scream from his daughter outside – and was relieved when he heard nothing.

Natural light beamed out of the gloom. The trapdoor in the floor was just above him. It was open. He squatted and climbed another step, high enough to glimpse the claustrophobic interior of the steeple. It was no more than ten feet square, with a low roof and an arched, slatted vent on each of the walls. Light streamed through the louvers and made parallel shadows on the floor. The bronze bells and wheels occupied most of the space. He heard Lenny’s feet shuffling and his panicked breathing. The boy was immediately to the right of the gap where Chris needed to climb.

Chris shoved his torso through the trapdoor. He led with the gun. Lenny stood there, aiming his rifle at Hannah’s house through the louvers. He wasn’t even four feet away.

‘Lenny, stop ,’ Chris called sharply.

The boy reared back in surprise, stumbling against the opposite wall. The rifle clattered to the wooden floor, but Lenny grabbed a pistol from his belt and shoved it in front of him, pointed at Chris. His eyes were wide, almost drugged. His gun arm quaked. ‘Get the hell away from me!’ Lenny screamed. ‘I’ll kill you!’

They pointed guns at each other. Neither would miss.

‘Listen to me, Lenny. Listen. You don’t want to do this.’

‘Shut up!’ the boy shouted, waving the gun. ‘Get out!’

‘I can’t do that,’ Chris told him. ‘My whole family is trapped across the street. I need your help.’

‘Kirk’s dead!’

‘I know he is, but don’t throw your life away over him.’

The teenager shook his head. ‘It’s too late. Don’t you get it? I already killed somebody.’

‘No, you didn’t. The man at the garage isn’t dead. It doesn’t have to end like this.’

Lenny hesitated. ‘I don’t give a shit anymore.’

‘I think you do.’ Chris let his gun hand go limp. Slowly, he laid the revolver on the floor of the bell chamber where Lenny could see it. He raised both hands. ‘I’m coming up, okay? Let’s talk.’

Lenny backed up, flush against the wall. He hadn’t lowered his own gun. Chris climbed into the heart of the tower but didn’t try to draw closer to the boy. Dust hung heavy in the streams of light, and old cobwebs dripped from the ceiling. The wind in the vents made a whistling noise, and the large, brooding bells sang a bass chorus. Lenny’s face was streaked with dirt and blood and split with shadows.