Dead In Red (30 page)

“Back off!” Myron shouted.

I raised my empty hands in surrender, took a
step down, ran into Richard.

Gene’s legs were bound at the ankles, his
hands tied behind his back; his wide eyes were nearly black with
fear. A panty hose gag tied around his mouth kept him from
screaming.

“You don’t want to do this,” I told Myron
and heard Richard swallow behind me.

“Oh yeah?” He jerked the gun’s barrel,
shoving Gene’s head back farther. Panicked, strangled whimpers
escaped the gag.

Richard backed down two steps, with me
following suit, hands still held out in submission.

“That’s it. Nice and easy and nobody gets
hurt,” Myron said, and laughed.

Richard retreated another couple of
steps.

Gene’s cries weren’t clear enough to
understand, but the look in his eyes pleaded,
Don’t leave me!

Myron stepped back, pulling Gene along with
him farther down the hall until we could no longer see them. A door
slammed shut.

“Now what?” Richard breathed.

“Unless he intends to jump, there’s nowhere
he can go.”

The sounds of a struggle broke the quiet. I
closed my eyes, my stomach turning as the vision of the bloody
hands flashed through my mind.

Then came the second gunshot.

I bounded up the four or five steps,
thundered down the hallway and kicked open the door.

Two bodies lay on the floor. Blood and globs
of flesh peppered the pale pink walls of what looked like a little
girl’s bedroom. I turned away, closed my eyes.

Dear Jesus, not again.

Shelley had been killed execution style,
though she’d been cleaned up before I saw her that last time. I’d
seen another body with a bullet through the brain that had taken
off the top of the skull.

The shotgun blast had obliterated most of
Myron’s head.

Richard pushed past me, paused, taking in
the scene—his breaths ragged.

I held a hand up to block my peripheral
vision, could just make out Richard pulling a blood spattered
chenille spread from the bed, tossing it over Myron’s body before
he knelt beside Gene.

My hand sank another inch. I could see Gene
beyond Richard, took in what was left of his face—bloody, hanging
flesh, the white of bone and a few shattered teeth.

“Holy Christ,” Richard muttered and sank
back on his heels. “He’s still alive.”

“Oh, God, no!” I turned away, quickly
stepped into the hall.

“Jeff, get some towels from the bathroom.
And call 911!”

I escaped and ran down the hall. The linen
closet held neatly folded towels and washcloths. I yanked them all
off the shelf and barreled back to the bedroom, tossing them at
Richard. He balled up several washcloths and tried to staunch the
bleeding.

My chest was heaving, the smell of blood was
thick, sickening. I tried not to look, but like a rubbernecker at a
car crash, my eyes were drawn to my brother.

To the glistening, scarlet blood that
covered his hands.

The fear inside me twisted into downright
horror.

“Holy Christ, Rich, you don’t have
gloves!”

Richard didn’t bother to look up. “Did you
call 911?”

“Rich, what if he’s HIV positive?”

“Goddamn it! Call 911!” he shouted.

My feet foundered under me and I staggered
away from the stench of death, found a phone in the next bedroom,
punched in the numbers.

“
I’m calling to report an attempted
murder-suicide. He blew half his head off with a shotgun—the other
guy’s still alive.”

Who was the person speaking so calmly? It
couldn’t have been me. Shock was catching up with me. My legs felt
rubbery. I sank onto the edge of the bed. The phone grew heavy. I
wasn’t sure I could hold it up for long.

I’m pretty sure I gave the address, told
them a doctor was attempting first aid. I don’t remember much else
about that conversation.

Over and over again, the vision of Richard’s
bloody hands kept replaying in my head.

Gene was gay—possibly HIV positive.

You don’t know that! You
don’t know that!
my mind screamed.

Exposure to HIV days before Richard was to
marry was just not fucking fair. And once again it was All. My.
Goddamn. Fault.

By dragging him into this, I’d risked
Richard’s life again. Contracting a fatal disease was not as quick
a death, but surely was as lethal as a gunshot.

“Sir? Sir?” the voice on the telephone
implored.

“Can you give me a hand back here,” Richard
hollered.

The tinny-sounding voice kept calling me,
but I dropped the receiver as the sound of running footsteps came
from the stairwell. I dipped into the hall in time to capture a
breathless Cyn. “What happened? What happened?” she cried, frantic
to escape me.

“Myron’s dead—but Gene’s been badly
hurt.”

Her struggles intensified.

“Believe me—you don’t want to see him right
now.”

More footsteps pounded up the stairs. Cops,
firemen, EMTs. The house had suddenly exploded with people. I
pulled Cyn into the bedroom, where the voice on the phone still
bleated.

“Oh god,” one of the cops wailed from down
the hall.

Cyn sagged in my arms, her wrenching sobs
robbing her of any strength she might’ve had left. I pulled her
close, this woman who had directed her hatred at me for the past
two weeks, had threatened me, and I let her cry, her tears soaking
into my shirt.

She faced the death of a loved one.

I wondered if I was in the same
position.

# # #

CHAPTER 25

The water ran hot. Steam curled into the air,
vapor clinging to the cabinet mirror overhead. I watched as the
last of the rusty water went down the drain, unable to take my eyes
off the soapy brush in Richard’s right hand. He worked at his
fingernails, scrubbing, scrubbing, adding more soap, scouring hands
that were already lobster red.

A uniformed cop stood in the hall outside
the bathroom, watching, listening to us. We hadn’t yet given a
statement. They didn’t want us talking about what we’d seen,
comparing notes—contaminating each other’s potential testimony. I
didn’t give a shit about their procedures. I had more important
matters on my mind.

I cleared my throat, afraid to voice the
fear that had been torturing me for the past twenty-seven—and
longest—minutes of my life. “They can test Gene’s blood. You could
probably know tomorrow if he’s HIV positive. Right?”

Richard avoided my gaze. “It’s not as
clear-cut as you might think.”

“What does that mean for you?”

“It means I’ll have to get tested for the
next six months to see if I develop antibodies.”

“And then?”

“And then we’ll know.”

He sounded so goddamned calm.

“But . . . you’re supposed to
start a new job at the clinic in a few weeks.”

“They’ll restrict me to noninvasive
procedures.”

“You were going to get married day after
tomorrow.”

He looked up sharply at me. “If Brenda still
wants me—I will get married.”

“Yeah, but, now—”

“Brenda and I are medical professionals.
Risk of infection is something we and every other doctor, nurse,
and EMT deals with every day. Granted, this isn’t something I
would’ve wanted to happen, but I wasn’t going to stand by and just
let Gene die.”

“Oh, come on. He hasn’t got a chance.”

“Yeah, and where did you get your medical
degree?” He turned his attention back to the brush in his
hands.

I settled my weight against the wall,
grateful the bathroom wasn’t closet-sized. Richard squirted on more
soap, began working on his other hand again.

“What about your honeymoon?”

“What about it?”

“The whole idea of a honeymoon is to—”

“Brenda and I have been together seven
years. Besides, there’s more to intimacy than just intercourse.”
His words had an edge, but I guessed they were directed more at the
situation than at me.

The din of voices continued down the hall.
Thanks to Richard’s actions, the EMTs had been able to stabilize
Gene and he’d been whisked away in an ambulance that would meet a
Mercy Flight helicopter once they got clear of the hills. He was on
his way to a trauma facility in Buffalo where he’d either live or
die. And if he lived, his disfigurement would probably make him
wish he’d died.

Some future.

We might never know if Myron meant to take
himself out or if Gene’s struggles to get away had caused Myron to
pull the trigger. Myron . . . Veronica . . .
was going to miss her opening night at Big Brother’s. Margarita
Ville would have to step back into the star’s limelight. Somehow I
didn’t think she’d mind. Life at the drag club would go on, just as
it had gone on at The Whole Nine Yards without Walt.

Some epitaph.

Richard set the nail brush aside and turned
off the water. I straightened, handed him a clean towel from the
chrome wall rack. “I’m sorry.”

He wiped his hands. “What for?”

“They were your hands I kept seeing. I
didn’t know that. I could’ve warned you. I could’ve—”

Richard grimaced. “You’re not going to start
with that guilt crap again, are you?”

I winced at the rebuke. “Well, I kinda
thought I might.”

“Give it a rest.” He tossed the towel into
the sink. “One of these days you’re going to learn that shit
happens. Today it happened for Veronica and it happened for Gene.
But guess what, of the three of us, I’m the only one walking out
the door and I’m damned grateful for it. I’m going to celebrate.
I’m going home, kiss my fiancée, and in two days I’m going to get
married. Then I’m going to Paris, drink the best-damned champagne
and have the time of my life. And when I get back home, I’ll start
my new job and a new phase in my life. Just like you did.”

“Me?”

“Hey, you could’ve just given up after you
lost your job, had your head smashed in, and lost almost everything
you had. But you didn’t. And you know why? Because despite all the
garbage in our pasts, we survived. We’re alike. We’re
brothers.”

Yeah. We were.

* * *

Read on for more about the author and her
books, plus a SNEAK PREVIEW of

CHAPTER 1

My long-dead father came back to life on a
mild afternoon in early November. He’d never been dead it turned
out, but I didn’t know that at the time. It’s funny how one
incident can snowball and change your life forever.

Take me. Eight months ago, I was mugged; had
my arm broken and my skull fractured. That’s when things changed.
The way I see things changed. Feelings come to me, and sometimes
fragments of information. Stuff that makes me interested in other
stuff.

Stuff that gets me into trouble.

And then there are times when I’m still
blindsided by life.

On that balmy November afternoon two weeks
before Thanksgiving, I was playing one-on-one basketball with my
half brother, Dr. Richard Alpert. He’s twelve years older than me,
and rich as sin, but he still cheats at one-on-one. He’d just
tripped me—definitely against the Marquis of Queensbury rules,
should they ever be applied to basketball—and I ended up face down
on the dusty driveway, panting for breath. He helped me up.

“
That’s enough for me,” I
said.

“
Come on, Jeff. You’re not
hurt.”

I brushed off my sweatpants. “Maybe I should
go to a decent quack and find out.”

“
Sticks and stones,” he countered,
dribbling the ball.

“
You’ve got a height
advantage.”

Richard looked down at me. “What’s six
inches?”

“
And forty pounds on me.”

“
So eat more,” he said, making a sweet
lay-up shot.

I captured the ball and dodged him. “But I’m
an orphan.”

He skirted round me.
“
I’m
the orphan. Your father’s
still alive.”

I stopped dead, thinking I’d heard wrong. He
snatched the ball, sent it arcing for another two points—and
missed.

My fatigue vanished as adrenalin coursed
through me. “What did you say?”

The amusement left his face. “Your father’s
alive.”

My eyes narrowed. “He’s dead. He died when I
was a kid.”

“
Who told you that?”

I didn’t know. All I knew was that the
bastard left us and never looked back, and that he was dead.

That I
believed
he was dead.

Richard bounced the ball, caught it, and
hitched it under his arm. “I saw him at the clinic yesterday. He’s
a patient.” Richard doesn’t need to work, but he volunteers his
time a couple days a week at the low-income clinic associated with
the University at Buffalo’s School of Medicine located at one of
the local hospitals.

“
What’s wrong with him?”

“
Emphysema. He’s in pretty bad shape.
On oxygen twenty-four hours a day.”

The ground rolled beneath me. I got a flash
of something—too quick to register—more an impression. Of
death.

And hadn’t Richard broken some kind of
privacy laws by mentioning it?

“
Why tell me now? I don’t care about
him.”

“
That’s what I figured you’d
say.”

“
I don’t!” I said, the statement
negated by the emotion behind it.

“
Then why are you so
upset?”

“
For thirty-two years I thought the
guy was dead. Finding out he isn’t threw me, that’s all. Come on,
let’s go for another game.”

He shrugged, bounced the ball, faked a
throw, Nikes squeaking on the drive as he pivoted then threw for
real. Rim shot.