A Garden of Vipers (32 page)

“He's gone. Purselli said when they got there, they announced themselves at the house on the property. It was a blond guy, curly hair, strong-looking, square as an outhouse. A hinky kind of guy, like he didn't want to be seen, and that's why Purselli remembered him.”

Logan stood, holstered his weapon at his side, walked to Nautilus.

“Purselli said Shuttles drove. Dom couldn't remember where the farm was. But he'd walked all over it hunting, and described a rectangle of land with a barn about half a mile from the road, a white house on the far side of a windbreak, two decent-sized ponds toward the back of the place, a creek cutting between the ponds.”

Logan pulled a handcuffs key from inside his jacket. “Guess what happened then, Harry?”

“I couldn't begin to guess, Pace.”

“I remembered Shuttles babbling about this place on the Internet where you saw aerial views of just about anywhere, pictures from a geo-satellite or something. Purselli knew the basic area, low on the delta and east of Chickasaw. I went to the library, got a library lady to help me get on the doggoned Internet, Harry. Me.”

“You found this place from
above
?”

“It was wild, Harry, like I could fly back and forth over the area—go up and down, too—and I just kept looking at all the ponds up there. Then I found a couple ponds with a creek between them, saw the roof of a house and barn a hundred yards apart…”

Nautilus held up his bound wrists. Logan slipped the key into the cuffs, popped them loose.

“You did all this in under three hours, Pace?”

Logan showed a wistful smile and shook his head.

“I'm almost gone and maybe I'm beginning to figure things out, Harry. Jeez, now there's an epitaph, right?”

Each step toward Kincannon's house felt like putting my foot into a canister of hornets. Trees averaged every fifty or so feet along my journey, and I made my way from tree to tree, leaning to catch my breath and wipe rain from my eyes. Lightning turned the Kincannon grounds into a series of spectral snapshots.

With less than a hundred yards to go, I dove to the ground as headlights swept up the drive from the road below, hoping the dark coat kept me invisible on the grass. I watched the lights outline the huge Brahma bull sculpture near the road, continue up the long lane, stop in the circular drive in front of the house.

A white Audi. My heart stopped.

It was Dani.

She hustled out, opening an umbrella, jogging the two dozen steps to the porch. I wanted to yell out her name, scream
Get back in the car, drive away
!

Buck Kincannon walked out the door. He moved to Dani with outstretched arms, tried to hold her umbrella for her. She avoided his touch. There was a minute of conversation before Kincannon gestured toward the house. They walked up the steps to the porch, Dani slow, seeming reluctant.

They went inside.

I limped, fell, crawled. Lightning slammed a tall longleaf pine a hundred feet away, sending a flaming branch spiraling to the ground like a hobbled comet. But I made it. The huge house had a wraparound porch. I climbed to the side and crouched around the corner. The porch was fifteen feet deep, the front side holding several large wicker chairs and wooden rockers, two tables, a bench like a church pew. Oversize carriage lamps bookended the wide front door, throwing light the color of honey and laying deep shadows behind the furniture.

“I'm leaving!”

Dani's voice. The front door banged open. Dani crossed the wide porch, her arms tight to her chest. She wavered on the top step, arms crossed. Kincannon stepped outside.

“Please, baby, come back. I'm sorry I grabbed you. I just want you to stay, discuss your future. Come on, baby, don't hurt me like this.”

Kincannon was pleading, making kissy sounds, like a little kid. Maybe that was the voice he used with Carole Ann Hibney.

“I'm not staying, Buck. And when I say not to touch me, I mean it.”

“Of course you do, DeeDee. I was just hurt by your wanting to leave.”

“I don't think it's working out between us, Buck. That's what I came to say.”

Get out, Dani….

“DeeDee, please, give me a chance. Just stay for dinner.”

“I can't, Buck. Don't keep asking.”

“I have a surprise for you, DeeDee, why I asked you here tonight. I want to give you Houston. Houston! We're buying a station there, making major changes. You'll be lead anchor, start at three hundred grand a year. Houston's one step from New York, L.A. Finally, the big time…”

She took a step forward from the edge of the porch. Kincannon held his distance, but kept the pitch going. He'd moved from pitiful child to wheedling businessman, running his full inventory of games.

“You're thirty-two years old, DeeDee. Middle age in this biz. You don't jump now, you're gonna be chasing two-bit local politicos the rest of your life. You should be on
Washington Week in Review, Meet the Press
. You've got the talent. I can make it happen.”

Don't listen to him, Dani,
my head screamed.
Get away.

Instead, she turned to face Kincannon.

“Houston?”

He held up his hands. “It's over between us as a couple. I accept that. It'll be easier, because you'll be in Houston. But we can still be friends, right? Amigos. Even apart we can work together to make Clarity Broadcasting number one in the country.”

“I…guess we could do that, Buck.”

He stood in the door and swept his hand toward the interior of the house, a thousand-watt smile on his face. “Come in and we'll seal the Houston deal over dinner.”

She took a step toward Kincannon. Closed her eyes, shook her head. Stepped back.

“I'll call tomorrow, Buck. We can talk then.”

She turned and started toward her car in the circled drive. I let my breath out. When Dani was safe I could slip to the road and flag down help.

It wasn't to be.

Kincannon strode to Dani, grabbed her arm, swung her into the house like she was a rag doll. The door slammed. I heard Dani screaming. A crash of falling furniture. A sound of thunder, like a body driven to the floor.

Another scream, cut off by a slap. Then all I heard was the beating of my heart and the pounding of the rain. My mind raced through possibilities, found
diversion
. I wadded up the raincoat, then slid the cane across the porch, a rattling sound.

“Who's there?” Kincannon called from inside the house. “Crandell?”

Footsteps behind the door, tentative. I heard the door open and I edged an eye from behind the chair. Kincannon bent to retrieve the cane, confusion in his eyes.

“Daddy?” he said, the child's voice back as his eyes searched the dark beyond the porch. “Daddy, is that you?”

I leapt from behind the chair and flung the balled raincoat at his face. He flung up his hands, tearing it away just as I dove into his body, howling and raking at his eyes. He shrieked and pushed my face away, kicking. A kick hit my ankle. I howled and my hands fell loose. He stumbled into the house and I tumbled to the floor.

I crawled through the door on hands and knees. There was no sign of Kincannon, but Dani was on the far side of the room, pushing herself from the floor, blood streaming from her nose and mouth. She saw me. Her hand came to her mouth.

“Carson?”

“Come on, Dani! We've got to get out of here.”

I heard Kincannon in another room, raging to himself, cursing and yelling nonsense. It sounded like he was upending furniture. Dani wobbled to her feet, pushing hair from her face, came to me. She bent and I pulled myself to standing, arm encircling her neck.

“He's insane, Carson. It's like something in his head broke.”

“It's been bending for years. Let's get to your car.”

We were nearly to the door when the shade of a Tiffany floor lamp behind our heads exploded in a thousand pieces. I clutched at Dani and we fell hard.

Buck Kincannon strode into the room with a shotgun in his hands, racking the slide.

“It's PARTY TIME,” he screamed. “No one is going ANYWHERE!” He fired another blast and a curio cabinet beside us dissolved. We scrabbled backward on the floor, Kincannon sweeping the muzzle of the weapon across us, his eyes no longer human.

Dani and I slithered toward a large desk in the corner of the room. Buck Kincannon fired a shot up the wide staircase, turning a chandelier into a shower of glass.

“I NEED A PARTY!” he screamed, following it with a ragged peal of laughter.

Kincannon went to the open front door and looked outside, as if inspired by the lightning raging through the treetops. He took a deep breath, madness and fear and triumph all tumbled together in his face. He shook his head as though something jogged in his memory and his eyes refocused on Dani and me, a dozen feet away on the floor.

I could smell his insanity.

Buck smiled and trained the weapon on my eyes. The world turned to slow-moving shapes on a shadowed stage: Buck laughing with no sound coming from his mouth, the weapon raising, a single crystal from the ruined chandelier falling like a teardrop, the muzzle of the shotgun a dark and sudden eye set to wink…

The wicker chair exploding through the vast front window, skidding across the polished floor past Dani and me, glass shards tumbling in its wake.

“Down, boy,” Buck said to my eyes, the shotgun not wavering an inch, like a chair through a window was as common in his life as lunch. “That you, Race?” Buck yelled at the glass-toothed hole in the wall. “Or is it Nelson? Come on in, guys, we're having a
party
.”

“You son of a bitch,” Nelson ranted, thundering through the foyer into the living room, face bright with anger, finger jabbing at Buck's eyes. “You teamed up with Lucas, right? Or was it you and Racine? Guess who reads your faxes and phone messages, asshole? It ain't gonna hap—”

Nelson was fully in the house now, nose smelling cordite. His eyes took in the shattered lamp, broken furniture, destroyed chandelier. The shotgun in his brother's hands. Nelson's eyes found Dani and me cowering beneath the table. He froze, only his eyes moving.

“Uh, what's going on, Buck?”

“A night of love, Nelse.”

“Love?” Nelson whispered.

“I get her,” Buck said, jabbing a finger at Dani. “You can have him. It's fun, Nelson. They never love you more than when you own their souls. They scream their love.”

Nelson stared at Buck for a few seconds, seemed to understand. Then Nelson regarded Dani and me with accusatory eyes, like he'd become a participant in a nightmare, and it was our fault.

Nelson,
Dani mouthed.
Help us.

My hand crept forward on the floor, picked up a jagged shard of glass, a razor-sharp triangle no larger than a postcard. I slid it beneath me.

“Here you go, brother,” Buck said, handing Nelson the shotgun. “Let the party begin.”

Nelson Kincannon held the weapon away from his body, as if it might bite him. Sweat beaded on his forehead. He shot glances toward the door.

“Just blow off his foot or something, Nelson,” Buck suggested. “Then we can take time with things. The night's still young.”

Nelson looked from my face, to Dani's, back to mine. Buck leaned against the wall and crossed his arms.

“What's the matter, Nelson?”

Nelson Kincannon made a point of pulling up his cuff to check his watch. He sighed, shook his head, handed his brother back the shotgun.

“I've got an early meeting, Buck.”

Nelson Kincannon turned away and walked out the door like he was leaving a conference room, already scheduling his alibi for the evening. The shotgun turned back to us and the mad fire rekindled in Buck Kincannon's eyes.

“More cake for me,” he said. “Yummy.”

I knew what he wanted. I looked at him and started crying. Sobbing. It wasn't hard.

“Don't, Buck. Please don't hurt me. I'm begging you, Buck…”

“Oh yessss,” Buck Kincannon whispered.

“Please, Buck. I don't want to die. Let's just be friends, can we do that? Please, Buck…”

“Louder,” he said, taking a step closer.

“I'll work for you, Buck, be your eyes and ears on the police force. You'll own me. Whatever you want, Buck, it's yours, just let…me…”

I put my face on the floor and began blubbering. I heard his footsteps creep closer, one step, two steps.

“LOUDER!” he railed.

“Don't kill me, don't kill me…,” I begged, tucking the glass into my palm, feeling it razor into my flesh. Buck stepped forward. I felt the muzzle of the shotgun against my temple.

“I OWN YOU. I COMMAND YOU TO LIFT YOUR FACE AND SPEAK!”

“Buck, pleeeease…,” I wailed, bringing my hands to my face as if in terror. Then I lunged forward, upward, knocking the gun aside with my forearm, putting everything into my bad leg, rising, slashing at his hands on the gun, feeling the glass sever gristle and tendon. He howled like an animal as I tumbled over him, dredging the glass through his face, across his eyes. I kept slashing, as if trying to slice my way into his brain, shut it off forever.

And then Dani was pulling at my back, and we were up and running through smoke-thick air as Buck Kincannon writhed on the floor, hands pressing into the blinded ruination of his face, one cheek flapping loose like a thick red washcloth.

“Crandell,” he moaned. “Help me, Crandell.”

Dani and I stumbled out the door as Nelson Kincannon's headlights reached the end of the long driveway, screeched away down the road, escaping. Dani dragged me to her car.

Halfway down the lane, she screamed, “Oh God,” pointing to a car careering from the main road onto the drive, swerving, accelerating at us. She whipped the wheel, skidding sideways on the wet pavement. We were slammed in the side, spun. Her car broke through the fence lining the lane, white slats banging off the windshield. The engine stalled. I jumped out, held myself up on the open door. The other car stopped two dozen feet distant, headlamps shining through rain and steam from a busted radiator.

“Lucas?” the driver bawled. “Is that you, Lucas?”

Racine Kincannon lurched from his car. Lucas Kincannon and I were the same basic height and build. Racine squinted through swirling steam, his drunken voice shrill and desperate.

“Lucas. It's you and me, brother. I fired Crandell. Fuck Nelson and Buck. It's us, a team. That's what you meant, right? RIGHT?”