MAD DOG AND ANNIE (23 page)

He grinned down the barrel at Maddox's frozen face of surprise. "Thanks, MD. I knew you'd always protect the quarterback."

Maddox died inside. Very quietly, he said, "Get out of the house, Mitchell.
Now."

The boy started.
Moved toward the door.

The rifle jerked in Rob's hand. "Uh-uh. You stay."

"Put down the gun, Rob."

"Oh, I will. Right after I blow a hole in you. And then I can do whatever I want to the two of them. Think about that while you're dying, buddy."

Sweat greased Maddox's grip on his gun. He was going to have to shoot. Despair hollowed his gut. With merciless precision, his mind replayed a slow-motion memory of a child falling in an Atlanta schoolyard.

"You don't want to kill a police officer, Rob. That's the death penalty for sure."

"What have I got to live for? You wrecked my life, you bastard. It'll be a pleasure to take you with me."

He was going to have to shoot
, Ann thought.

The knowledge sank into her, drifting through the layers of pain and dizziness and nausea to strike some buried core of compassion. She didn't want to feel. It hurt too much. Her neck, her jaw, her head burned and throbbed. She wanted to close her eyes again and have it all be over.

But with her cheek pressed to the carpet, she watched Maddox waver in and out of focus through Rob's ankles.
Tanned ankles,
sockless
in Italian shoes.
Two
Maddoxes
, looming dark and perpendicular above her.
He was wearing his granite cop face, but she could see the dreadful weight of decision in his eyes.

He would save them. At a terrible cost. The burden he'd spared Mitchell he would take on himself, shooting his old teammate to protect her.

Her heart tore. She couldn't help him. She couldn't lift her own head. How could she help him?

Rob was speaking, his voice goading. She shut him out, concentrating on dragging her arm in, inch by inch. Under the skirt of the couch, her spread fingers brushed something rough and cool and metallic.
A Droid.
One of Mitchell's Droids, with spear and claws. She closed her hand around it, ignoring the bite in her palm, and rolled her head to rest her brow on the rough carpet. Pain drove a thick spike through her skull. She ignored that, too.
Another inch.
Two.
Hurry.
Help.

She got her elbow under her and levered her weight onto her shoulder. Her stomach lurched into her throat. She could do this. She could.
For Mitchell.
For Maddox.
For herself.

Trembling, she lifted her head. She raised her arm. She drew one shaky breath and drove the pointy metal toy as hard as she could into Rob's hairy, muscled calf.

He howled, and the living room exploded. His heel crashed back. Ann's head flew against the padded base of the couch. She heard a boom—the gun—oh, God, Mitchell … and then something heavy smashed into her legs and rolled away. She tasted blood. Dimly, she saw the two men struggling on the floor. Her ears ringing with the gunshot, she heard Maddox grunt and Mitchell sob and Rob swear. The acrid stink of powder burned her nostrils. The carpet vibrated under her cheek as arms and legs thudded against the floor.

And then warm, hard hands grasped her shoulders, supported her head.

"Annie." Maddox's voice, rough and urgent, called her from the edge of oblivion. Maddox's face, tense and pale, swam in her vision. Sirens wailed at the border of consciousness.

She licked her lips, wincing at the tiny sting. "Mitchell?" His grip tightened reassuringly. "He's fine. Rob's in cuffs."

Her chest eased.
Safe.
Her son and her love, both safe. The room smelled like the Fourth of July.

She smiled into his deep-set eyes. "I got him," she confided. "I stabbed him with the Avenger Droid."

Maddox laughed shakily. "Is that what you did?" She nodded, well pleased with herself, and let the darkness take her.

* * *

Wallace Palmer hung up the phone. "The D.A.'s going for attempted murder, first degree," he announced with grim delight.

Maddox kept typing. God, he hated reports. "So now I should be thankful the gun went off when Annie stuck him in the ankle with a boy toy?"

The chief narrowed his eyes. "Don't get cute, MD. It was clearly stated intent with sufficient time for deliberation."

That was one way of looking at it.
"How long?"

"With his priors, maybe twenty-five years.
If the judge orders consecutive sentences, which
Brailsford
will, Rob Cross will go away for the rest of his natural life."

Maddox allowed himself a moment's bleak satisfaction. He'd failed to stop Rob from hurting Annie, but at least he could protect her with his testimony.

"What about Mitchell?" he asked.

"Your statement satisfied the D.A. that the boy was acting in defense of home."

"In defense of his mother," Maddox said.

"He only found the gun because he was looking for clean pajamas. He didn't want to shoot."

"Well, you persuaded the D.A. No charges against the child or his mother."

Maddox grunted. He didn't want to talk about it. Muddied by emotion, distracted by Annie, focused on Mitchell, he'd screwed up.
Again.
He didn't wait for backup. He didn't secure the weapon. Rob should never have gotten his hands on the gun in the first place.

But the chief, unfortunately, was in a chatty mood. Propping his broad butt on the corner of Maddox's desk, he asked, "How is she?"

Pointless to pretend he didn't know who his father was talking about. Maddox rolled another piece of paper into the typewriter. "Better. I called the hospital. They released her Wednesday."

"You haven't been to see her?"

Maddox gritted his teeth. "I saw her when she was admitted."

"Four days ago? Not since then?"

He fought the knife twist in his gut. "No."

"Why the hell not?"

"I'm giving her
time
." The word was a bad taste in his mouth.

"Time for what, for God's sake?"

Time to heal.
Time to—what had she said?—finally find herself.
Time to figure out if she wanted to spend the rest of her life with a man who'd failed to protect her.

I won't be rushed into making another mistake.

Maddox reached for the cigarettes on his desk.
"Time to recover.
She's just been through a major trauma, Dad."

His father regarded him with exasperation.
"All the more reason for you to be with her.
Anyway, how much time do you think you have? You're going back to
Atlanta
in another week."

"I'm not going back to
Atlanta
. I've resigned from the department."

The chief was visibly shaken. "Look, MD, if this is about that shooting incident—"

Sudden affection for the old man swamped him. "No, I'm okay with that." And he was, he realized with gratitude. Annie and Mitchell had helped him to face and defeat that particular demon. "I just want to stay in Cutler."

"And do what?"

Maddox gave his father a level look. "There's an opening in the sheriff's department."

The chief bridled. "You called George Wilkerson?"

Maddox allowed himself a thin smile. The chief had always protected his jurisdiction fiercely. "He called me."

"Well, hell, boy, I know what the county pays. You might as well work for me."

Maddox raised his eyebrows. "Is that a job offer?"

"Yes, it is. You're a damn fine officer, MD."

Despite his worries over Annie, Maddox felt something ease inside him. "It's a good department."

"Then what do you say?"

"Yes. I say yes."

He stuck out his hand. His father gripped it tightly. Their hands clasped and tugged, sealing their awkward, strong connection.

The chief cleared his throat uncomfortably. "Good. Glad to have that settled. I'm not getting any younger, you know."

"Bull. You'll probably outlive us all."

"Still, the department can use somebody with your experience. And so can that nice woman."

Jeez. "I don't think so, Dad."

"Why don't you let her decide?"

"Damn it, that's what I'm trying to do."

Crystal
stuck her beauty-queen mane through the door.
"Somebody here to see you, Mad Dog."

"Tell 'em I went home," he growled.

But then he saw who trailed the dispatcher into the office, and from somewhere he dragged his best Officer Friendly smile and pasted it on.

"Hey, sport," he said.

But Mitchell wasn't won over so easily. Fixing Maddox with accusing green eyes, he said, "I need to talk with you."

Hell. Everybody was chatty today. But this was Mitchell.
Annie's boy.
Maddox couldn't turn him away.

He stabbed out his cigarette in his overflowing ashtray. "Shoot."

Mitchell's gaze flickered to the chief. "It's kind of private."

Wallace Palmer coughed. "I'll be in my office if you, um—"

"Thanks, Dad," Maddox said dryly.

He waited until the door had closed behind the chief before he pushed out the chair opposite his with the sole of his shoe, silently inviting the boy to sit.

"Okay," he said. "Let's have it."

Mitchell sat, a thin, intense boy with his mother's courage and his mother's eyes. Maddox's chest squeezed with sudden longing for all the things he couldn't lay claim to. Time, he reminded himself. Annie needed time.

"Are you mad at me?" Mitchell asked.

Maddox straightened, making his inadequate desk chair creak under him.
"Hell, no."

"Because I know what I did was wrong. If I didn't get, you know, the rifle, then—"

"Hey." Maddox stopped him with one broad hand. "You were trying to protect your mother. That wasn't a bad thing. It's just there are better ways to do it. You don't pick up a gun. You—"

"—call a policeman." Mitchell's head bobbed. "Mom told me."

His chagrined tone suggested Annie had told him more than once in the past few days. Maddox cleared his throat. "That's right."

"I'm just trying to look out for her."

"Sometimes that's not so easy."

The boy scowled. "You said you wouldn't hurt her."

Maddox thought he couldn't feel any worse. He was wrong. "I know," he said painfully. "I'm sorry. I should have been there. I should have reacted faster."

But Mitchell only shook his head, fierce and unforgiving. "You said you wouldn't hurt her, but you don't come see us anymore. If you're not mad at me, why don't you come see us?"

Hell. Maddox stared at the boy.

"She cried last night," Mitchell confided.

That did it. Maddox's chair shrieked as he pushed back from his desk.
"Chief!"

His father appeared in the door. "What is it?"

Maddox peeled a couple of dollars out of his pocket and tossed them on top of the pile of reports. "Mitchell's going to stay with you awhile. Buy him candy, buy him Coke, but don't take him home for at least an hour, okay?"

"Where are you going?"

"I've got something to take care of."

"About time," the chief said with satisfaction.

Maddox couldn't have agreed with him more.

But when he pulled to the curb in front of Annie's house, he turned off the engine and sat for a moment observing the quiet, sunlit street. In the tree above him, a bird with more feathers than brains was chirping its little heart out.

He would have felt more at ease going into a crack house without backup.

He got out of the car.

The gate to the backyard stood open. Through the chain link fence, he could see Annie stooping in front of a bed of pink and yellow flowers. He paused on the walk to admire the graceful set of her shoulders, the delicate line of her neck, her pretty hair pulled back in some sort of clasp thingy…

He frowned. Didn't she know better than to work in this heat without a hat? She had a concussion, for God's sake.

He reached the gate in three quick strides. She looked up at the sound of his footsteps, and the wary expression in her eyes, the sight of her jaw gone from purple to yellow and the stitches in her bottom lip, made something inside him twist and bleed.

"Hello, Annie," he said quietly.

* * *

Dear Lord, he'd come back.

Ann sat back on her heels, with the grass tickling her knees and the sun in her eyes, and stared up at Maddox. He looked good, tall and broad against the light, with a cellophane-wrapped pot in his hands and a hooded, hungry look that did funny things to her stomach.