Blood of Cain (Sean O'Brien (Mystery/Thrillers)) (51 page)

“What do you want, Dillon?”

“Want? Nothing from you … or her. I do want the property in South Carolina and Ireland. I’m thinking of taking my extended family to the coast of Ireland. We’ll live life as it was intended. But to do that, I have to eliminate you two. I’d then be the sole heir to dear mother’s estate.”

I noticed movement over his shoulder, under the tree where I’d found the ax. I didn’t know if it was one of Dillon’s followers, one of Senator Logan’s hired guns, or somebody else. I had to keep Dillon distracted, keep him talking. I said, “It seems odd that you’re actually holding a weapon. You’re good at getting others to kill for you. You must have really wanted Courtney dead to use hypnosis to have her murdered by a deranged Army veteran with PTS.” I glanced at the gold torc bracelet he wore on the wrist of the hand that held the .44 magnum. “Is it because you wanted to keep the torc you stole from our mother, or the fact that there’s no statute of limitations for statutory rape and murder in South Carolina?”

“You flatter me. Do you really think I could hypnotize someone, to get him to kill, if it’s against his nature?” Lightning streaked through the sky and his eyes burned with hate. “Of course I did it. Why? Let me enlighten you, Brother. It’s the nature of us all. I just know how to dig deep enough to connect the tap root from the heart to the mind. The key to kill lies within us. I just help them unlock the hidden desire.”

Courtney said, “You … you sick bastard, you put me in that coffin and tried to drown me. I know who and what you really are, you narcissistic, evil little man.”

“Quiet! Brother, Sean, as the first born son, one who never was in favor with your father, one who was hated by his own mother, it’s time I took you aside. We’ll go into the woods, as Cain took Abel, and there we will split the brotherhood.” He raised the pistol.

“No!” shouted Courtney.

“Follow me, Brother, or I’ll shoot her in the face in three seconds. One … two … thr—”

The rifle round tore through Dillon’s neck. He collapsed backwards onto the coffin. I looked over to the old oak tree. Beneath the tree, holding my rifle, was the man in the red baseball cap, the man I’d saved earlier. He stood and nodded, moving his hands in the military tactical “all clear,” signal.

Courtney looked down at Dillon. “Is he dead?”

“Yeah, he’s dead.”

“Sean, please take the torc off his wrist.”

At that moment we heard a loud noise—a noise that was growing louder. It sounded like a waterfall somewhere in the canyon. I turned to Courtney. “Run! Flashflood. It’ll drown us.”

“My grandmother’s torc!”

She bent down to remove it from Dillon’s wrist. I saw his left hand move, in and out of his pocket in a second. He gripped an ice pick. I shoved Courtney aside and grabbed his wrist. He was strong, pushing the ice pick closer to my neck. My hand and arm shook as I slowly overpowered him, turning the ice pick toward his chest. Two seconds later, I plunged the length of the pick into his heart.

He smiled and looked at me. It was the same sardonic grin I’d seen on his father’s face before he committed suicide. Dillon said, “It won’t end here. Not now … not ever … I am the son of Cain.” He stopped breathing, a trickle of blood coming from the left corner of his mouth.

I looked up. The water was rushing down the canyon. Moving like a freight train. Less than five hundred feet from us. I pushed Courtney and yelled, “Go to high ground! Climb the big oak! Now!”

Her eyes were hot, enraged. “Don’t let them bury him with my grandmother’s … your mother’s torc. Your father gave it to her!”

I turned around and tried to pull the torc from his wrist. It was similar to a near wrap-around bracelet. I wasn’t sure how he got it on his wrist. There was less than a two-inch space between each end. I tried again. It wasn’t coming off unless it was cut off. Dillon’s body lay on its back, the arm with the torc supported against the coffin.

I looked up. The wall of water was rushing toward us, pushing trees, logs, and debris. I grabbed the ax, swinging it high above my head, slamming the blade hard through the wrist, directly behind the torc. It was a clean cut, severing the arm from the hand. I lifted up the torc, grabbed Courtney by the arm, and ran through waist-deep water to the other side of the ravine.

We scrambled up a steep hill, the sound of the rushing water like an approaching tornado. There was an outcropping of rock, a cliff just above us. “Up there!” I yelled to Courtney. “Climb!”

The man with the red cap leaned over the edge and shouted, “Give me your hand!”

Courtney clutched his hand and he pulled her up and over the cliff. I knew I was too big, too much dead weight for him. I squatted and jumped as high as I could, my hands grappling the edge of the rock. There were two-inch fissures in the boulders, and I had a good handhold. I pulled myself up, and swung my legs over the cliff as a deluge of churning white water slammed into the side of the canyon wall just below me.

I lay on my back for a second, breathing hard. I looked up in the sky, the dark storm clouds parting, and the light of a full moon illuminating the Blue Ridge Mountains in an ethereal midnight splendor.

Three days after returning to Florida, there was a news media feeding frenzy on the steps of the Volusia County Courthouse. Courtney and I watched it live on television at my river cabin, where we’d been staying in relative seclusion pending the release of the DNA testing.

Over a long dinner, I managed to get her to tell me what she’d endured the last few weeks before I found her held prisoner at Dillon’s compound. And now we stared at the television, at the live news conference, which was tantamount to looking at her future.

Detective Dan Grant, Volusia County Sheriff, Robert Nelson, members of the DA’s office, and a half dozen other law enforcement personnel stood with the courthouse in the background and began their news conference. A wide angle shot showed dozens of satellite news trucks and a small army of reporters.

Sheriff Nelson, a broad-shouldered man with an American flag button pinned on his lapel stepped up to the podium and read from a prepared statement. “Today the investigation into what has been termed the carnival killings has officially ended with regard to Courtney Burke. There has been an arrest made, and the individual, Samuel Edward Nolan, has confessed to the murders of three carnival workers, one here in the county, two others elsewhere. Prior to their deaths, all of the workers had been employed by Bandini Brothers Amusements. Another man, said to be the mastermind behind the killings, Dillon Flanagan, has been killed. Previous to Mr. Flanagan’s death, he admitted his involvement using hypnosis or mind-control to manipulate Mr. Nolan, who was, at the time, being treated for post traumatic syndrome as an out-patient at Veterans Hospital in Orlando.

“As far as Miss Burke is concerned, DNA testing is complete and the tests confirm that Miss Burke is not—I repeat—not, the daughter of Andrea Logan, the wife of Senator Lloyd Logan. Also, Miss Burke is not the daughter of the other person alleged to be her father, Sean O’Brien. From this point, all pending criminal charges against Miss Burke have been dropped and she is free to go. Before District Attorney Henry Carlsberg speaks from his perspective, I’ll take a few minutes for questions.”

A CNN reporter asked, “If Andrea Logan and Sean O’Brien aren’t Courtney Burke’s biological parents, can you tell us who is and where they are now?”

Sheriff Nolan said, “It is my understanding that her parents are deceased. She was raised by her grandmother, who recently passed away as well.”

A Fox News reporter asked, “Has this information been revealed to the Logan campaign?”

Sheriff Nolan nodded. “A brief summary was sent to them just prior to the start of this news conference.”

A CBS news reporter said, “Murder by hypnosis, or mind control, sounds like something covert intelligence agencies might try. Can you tell us for certain that the person who confessed to the killings, Mr. Nolan, was really killing by a post-hypnotic order, or is this part of an insanity plea?”

The district attorney stepped forward, cleared his throat and said, “Mr. Nolan told us that he was recruited, brainwashed—if you will at Mr. Flanagan’s Virginia compound, and then sent in to murder the men. And as Sheriff Nolan said, Mr. Flanagan admitted to being complicit in theses killings.”

A throng of hands went up in the air, reporters talking over each other, shouting questions to the officials behind the podium.

I stood up and shut off the television, turned to Courtney and smiled. “It’s behind you now.”

She feigned a smile and said, “For the last couple of nights I’ve been having nightmares about what happened. I still see Dillon’s face, the smirk, as he was about to shoot me in the head. I can feel the cold and darkness of that coffin he buried me in, and smell black mud and sawdust. Maybe I’ll always be like that poor man Dillon hypnotized … maybe I’ll have PTS too.”

I shook my head in disagreement. “Maybe not. Maybe you’ll move on with your life and have more good times than bad, more laughter than tears. Maybe have a family of your own one day. You have strength, Courtney … more than you realize right now. You’ll never completely forget all the things Dillon did to you, but never … never let them define or dictate who you are or who you will become. If you let the ghost of his evil continue to eat at your heart like a cancer, your spirit dies, and Dillon wins. The way you defeat him the rest of your life is to forgive yourself. None of this, from the time you were a young girl through today, was ever your fault. He was mentally ill—a sick man who was patently evil. Those people prey on the virtuous, the good. You were a victim, and you were searching for a way to bring closure for you and for your grandmother.”

“And somehow I found you in all of this. With seven billion people in the world, somehow I found you. What are the odds? I don’t believe it just happened. I believe I was somehow guided here. And now you are the only family I have left.” She grinned, dimples popping. “So you’d better not go anywhere.”

“How about if we both go for ice cream? When was the last time you had ice cream?”

She smiled, wrinkling her brow and nose. “I can’t remember. It’s been a long time.”

“I know a place that makes it by hand. What do you say we go there?”

“Sounds good to me.”

“Let me make a quick phone call and we’re on our way.”

“Okay, I’ll hang with Max outside ‘till you’re ready.”

She called Max, both bolting outside, running down to the dock.

I called Kim Davis and said, “I’m spending a little more time with Courtney. She’s healing, best she can considering what happened to her.”

“Take the time you both need. From what you told me, she went through hell on earth … and so did you. I’m just so grateful that you both survived, that you’re here. You’re all the family she has left. Be there for her, and I’ll be here for you if you need me, Sean.”

I said nothing for a moment. “Thank you, Kim.”

“Bye …” I heard her exhale deeply and she disconnected.

I stood on the screen porch, watching Max and Courtney sitting together on the bench seat at the end of the dock. She was chatting with Max like she was her new best friend. Courtney pointed as a great blue heron sailed over the surface of the river. I glanced down at the framed picture of my wife, Sherri, wishing she could have known Courtney. Sherri would have been such a good influence—such a great role model for Courtney. It was what Courtney needed.

What did I need? I had no idea anymore. My entire life—my identity, had been changed, and changed for the rest of my life. But right now I watched my niece heal, watched her rebuild and restore.

And that was enough.

Courtney stayed with Max and me at the river cabin for a week. We grilled fish on the dock, watched baby alligators crawl from their nests, eyes the shade of a lemon peel, and plop into the river for the first time. I took her out in the thirteen-foot Boston Whaler and in the canoe. We explored the St Johns and all its mystery and majesty. We tagged along with a whiskered elderly fisherman in a johnboat as he worked his trotline, catching and releasing freshwater stingrays, keeping the yellow-bellied catfish.

He told her about how the tides from the Atlantic have an effect on the river and its wildlife, how crabs were found thriving two-hundred miles inland from the mouth of the river. He told her about the unique history of the river—about the Indians who used to live along its banks until the Spanish arrived. Courtney asked questions and hung on to every word the old man uttered.

I took her to an oxbow in the river where a pair of eagles had built a nest the size of a small car in a large cypress tree next to the water. We sat in the canoe, Courtney in the bow, Max in the middle, and me in the stern, watching the eagles catch and bring fish to their young. We drifted up the tea-colored water of the quiet creeks that feed the river, creeks that smelled of honeysuckles and were tunneled with arching tree branches, white and yellow butterflies erupting from the leaves and wildflowers with the flurry of a snow-globe.

She stood in the boat, next to Max, letting the butterflies hover between her outstretched arms, touching the pewter beards of Spanish moss hanging as far as the eye could see. I watched her laugh as Max barked at a fat raccoon sitting back on its hind legs and using its front paws to pry open a mollusk. It was good to hear her laugh, to watch her spirit rebuild, to nurture her the best I could. I knew that somewhere out there I had a daughter, a young woman who was about Courtney’s age. I hoped my daughter was well and content with her life. But right now I had my niece. I had Courtney.

And she had me.

She turned back to me, a wide smile on her face, and said, “This is a cool place. It’s like nowhere I’ve ever been, maybe this is God’s little river. I can imagine a dinosaur around the bend.”

“We can’t go too far around the bend. It gets shallow.”

She smiled. “Well, Uncle Sean, I have a feeling you could get us out if we got stuck.”