Twisted Desire (The Twisted Series) (34 page)

Her hysteria has the entire crowd stirring in their seats,
mumbling their disapproval to each other.  When the bailiff seizes her,
she starts to kick and scratch at him.

“Get her out of here,” the judge insists, as the bailiff
takes her forcefully by the elbow and escorts her to the door in a very
unfriendly manner.

When Harley grimaces, Aliah squeezes onto his arm.  He
presses his forehead against hers.  “At least we know she’s in pre-trial
detention.  She’s in the custody of the court now.  That alone should
have you rest better at night.”

“Next on the docket is Brandee Hawkins.”

The bailiff continues to speak, but Harley drowns it out
with his thoughts.  Aliah can’t take her eyes off of Joshua Bailey, who
stands and takes his place at the table next to his scumbag client.

“I still can’t believe he’s taken this case,” Harley
grumbles, while scowling at Aliah’s ass-hole boss.  “Bailey deserves to be
shot.”

Harley scrubs his hand over his five o’clock shadow, knowing
the police weren’t able to get a confession out of her.  The prosecution
relies on Aliah’s testimony, but he knows Bailey will tear that apart. 
Wesley Carver, an old co-worker of Aliah’s, had told them in preparation that
her word alone is hardly enough when her boss is sitting on the other side of
the table rooting for the Defendant.

After the prosecutor reads out the allegations, defence
counsel responds.  Before long, the judge is perusing the documents before
him.  Every one sits very quietly awaiting his decision.  Aliah seems
to be fidgeting a little more than the rest.

“Miss Hawkins.  You shall not associate or communicate
directly or indirectly with Miss Aliah Brooklin or Mr. David H. Gates. 
You shall abstain from possessing a firearm until a decision has been
rendered.  The restraining order stands.  You shall report to an
officer at the specified times.  If you violate the terms, you will be
right back in here so fast it will make your head spin.  Do you
understand, Ms. Hawkins?”

Brandee nods her head repeatedly, putting on a good show.

“Bail is set at sixty-five thousand dollars.”

“I object,” Wesley shouts.

“You cannot object to my ruling, Mr. Carver. 
Sixty-five thousand dollars it is.”

Harley feels like he’s frozen in place, waiting for the Order
to issue.  When the gavel drops, so does his heart.  Aliah crashes
into his chest and his daughter’s tears finally break free.  With an arm
around each of his girls, he glares in the the direction of the accused and her
counsel.  Both of them turn to glance at Harley at the same time.

Harley snarls and shoots them the finger, not caring if the
local paper plasters it among its front page highlights.  Brandee’s
composure slips for a mere second, but he recognizes the depraved smirk well.

The evil woman walks, but there is no way he’s going to let
her harm the ones he loves.

It’s a month before there’s even a semblance of normalcy in
the Gates house.  Jillian is set up for definite jail time and Brandee
isn’t about to walk away unscathed.  Together with Wesley Carver, he will
ensure that Brandee pays for her crime.

With Jillian locked away, Harley has had to pick up the
slack at the office.  Aliah helps out where she can, but he doesn’t want
her working her life away.  Despite Aliah’s insistence that he hire an
assistant, he doesn’t have the nerve to hire a new one.  He has other
plans anyway.

Aliah manages to go back and work for that prick, Joshua
Bailey, even after he backstabs her like he did.  A conflict of interest
has her taken off the case, to the point where Bailey can’t even meet with his
client at the office.  That’s just the way Harley likes it.

It’s true, he’s been so busy, he hasn’t had a chance to tell
Aliah a few things that have been weighing heavily on his mind lately. 
He’s now ready to make that his priority.

With Hannah’s permission, Harley takes Aliah out for a ride
on his motorcycle.  It’s their first ride on his new Harley since the
insurance claim has processed, and it’ll be their last ride before the snow
flies.  He wants to celebrate their clean bills of health.  They
could use a reason to celebrate.

“Are you ready?” Harley asks Aliah, handing her a helmet.

She smiles and nods and then follows him outside.

As Harley pulls out of Aliah’s driveway, he notices an
unfamiliar van parked on the street a few houses down.  He watches the
suspicious driver from the corner of his eye.  The female driver crouches
down to hide from them, but no amount of headdress and makeup can disguise
Brandee Hawkins from David H. Gates.

At the next street, Harley makes a right turn.  She
doesn’t appear to be following them.  He pulls his bike over on the side
of the residential road and turns it off.  Before he can even think to
grab his cell phone, he notices how Aliah already has her phone to her ear.

“Did you see that?” he asks.

“ADNL 971,” she quotes.  “The license plate.”

Harley smiles as she is connected with the lead detective on
the case.  She asks Spencer Caldwell to run the plates.  Sure enough,
they belong to Brandee, but under another alias the cops have been trying to
pin on her.

“Spencer insists that he and his team are maybe five minutes
away from making the arrest,” Aliah tells him, with a saucy smile.

Harley lifts his brow in question.  “What do you say we
pay Ms. Hawkins a visit in the meantime?”

Aliah seems just as eager to confront the psycho. 
“Let’s go.”

They hustle through the neighborhood on foot, sneaking down
driveways, cutting through backyards and hopping a fence.  Harley glances
over his shoulder at Aliah and presses a finger to his lips.  He bends
down and pulls a .357 Bulldog from his pant leg.  Then he hands it to
Aliah, as he pulls out his Glock.

When he peers in the mirror of the van, he can see Brandee
staring at the phone in her hand, oblivious to the pair of them coming up next
to her.  Harley kicks the passenger mirror right of its mount, then bangs
on the door with the butt of his Glock.

“Open up, Hawkins.  You have company.”

When he nods at Aliah to take cover behind him, she does as
he silently asks.  Psycho bitch does the unbelievable.  Brandee propels
herself from the driver’s side door and whips out an oversized handgun. 
Aliah runs for cover behind her neighbor’s car.  Harley stays plastered to
the side of the van.  A shot is fired.  Harley instantly glances to
where Aliah has run.

“I’m okay,” Aliah hollers out.

A depraved laugh rings from Brandee’s throat.  “You
make this too easy.  I was only doing a bit of recon, but if this is how
you want it to go down, then so be it.”

“We don’t want any trouble,” Harley shouts at her.  “We
just want you to fuck off already.”

“Really.  Is that it?  And let this bitch get away
with everything?” she chants.

Harley watches Aliah peer over the roof of the car.  He
hears Brandee tisk tisking, using her own gun as a dramatic prop, waving it
side to side like an inverted pendulum.

“It’s bad enough that my dear friend Jillian has to do jail
time.  And for what, David?  Loving you?  That’s hardly a
crime.  She was only trying to help out a friend.  Unfortunately, my
girl is a little cuckoo,” she admits, making her gun revolve in circles next to
her head.

Who is the cuckoo one?

“Drop the act,” Aliah hollers.  “I know it was Jillian
calling the shots.  It was her all along, wasn’t it?  Just like in
high school,
Lori
.”

“Aliah, what are you doing?” Harley shouts, not liking where
she’s taking this.  Egging on the psycho holding a gun is never smart.

Aliah had explained to him how Brandee looked strikingly
similar to Jillian’s best friend in high school.  But they weren’t able to
find any hard evidence to make the connection, until Spencer ran the van
plates.  Facial reconstructive surgery and a little hair dye can go a long
way.  Harley had never once doubted Aliah’s hunch.  Fact: Brandee
Hawkins and Lori Eagleton are one and the same person.

“No!” Brandee shouts.  “It was me.  It was all
me.  I had planned everything myself.  I even had to take things into
my own hands, but that bitch didn’t drown,” she screams toward Harley. 
Then she glances back at Aliah and blurts her threat, pointing her gun right at
her.  “You were lucky then.  You won’t be so lucky this time.”

“Bull shit!” Aliah hollers, trying Harley’s patience. 
“You don’t have what it takes to take me out.”

“You wanna bet?  Remember Casey Jacob’s trial last
year?  You should; you worked the case with Bailey.  Even he couldn’t
get his guy off.  And he’s supposed to be the best.  That’s how good
I am.  The dumb ass cops can’t seem to pin anything on me.  I don’t
know how anyone in Rose Arbour can sleep at night, when killers like me can get
away with murder time and time again.”

Aliah lets out a sigh of relief.  “It’s over now,
Brandee.  Drop your weapon.  We’ve got all the evidence we need to
drop you in that cell right next to your
dear friend
.”

Brandee laughs again, a long hearty laugh that has her
exposing her chest to the sky.  “In your dreams, lady.  There’s no
way they’re going to trace any of that shit to me.  You think I haven’t
thought this through?  There are no links to me to be found.  The
guns have been disposed of.  And I’ve
taken care of
those useless
doofuses who couldn’t get the job done.  There’s no one left to testify
against me.  Except for you.”

She points her gun at Aliah.

Aliah stays crouched behind the car with her gun aimed at
Brandee’s heart.

“Put the gun down, Brandee,” Harley threatens.  “Or I
will shoot you.”

“I dare you to try,” Brandee states.

“Do it,” Aliah hollers, heating Harley’s blood to a boiling
point.

“Why should I surrender to you?” Brandee screams.  “So
you can have me arrested?  So you can go back to my Mitchell and fuck him
some more behind my back?”

“You don’t really believe that,” Harley says, trying to
regain her attention and redirect it from Aliah.

“I sure as fuck do.  Just because she’s screwing around
with you, doesn’t mean she isn’t playing my man too,” she barks, growing more
agitated the closer Harley gets to her.

She backs away, until she’s standing in the middle of the
street, scratching her head with her revolver.  “She’s an evil
seductress.  She must be stopped.”  Brandee laughs again, aiming her
firearm at Aliah.  “I might not have succeeded before, but that won’t stop
me from finishing the job now.”

She fires the gun at Aliah.  She shoots to kill. 
Harley takes a shot of his own.  Time seems to stand still as the bullets
sail through air.

The first shot shatters the windshield of the car and lodges
in the passenger door, only inches from Aliah’s chest.  Harley’s aim isn’t
quite as unpracticed.  It catches Brandee in the left shoulder, tearing
into her flesh and knocking the gun from her hand.  She cries out in pain,
as three police cars, two marked ones, one dressed in black, come racing up the
street behind her.

“You fucking shot me,” she screams in disbelief, as blood
begins to drain from her gunshot wound.  She clutches the injury with her
other hand, the injured arm gone limp.

Aliah steps out from behind the car, with a gun raised to
Brandee’s face.  She walks straight toward her with a steely glint in her
eye.  The police have now exited their vehicles and are hollering at
Brandee to get down on her knees.  But Aliah knows her loaded gun is right
there on the ground.

Brandee’s eyes grow wide when she realizes that she is in
danger, but Aliah moves quickly.

She kicks at the gun and it scatters toward the
police.  “Nice try, Brandee, but your luck has run out.”

Aliah points her gun at Brandee’s face, positioning the
muzzle some three inches from her forehead.

“Don’t do it, Ally.  She’s not worth it,” Harley rasps.

The bitch smiles, believing that the cops will save her from
Aliah.  No one speaks, except Brandee.  “I dare you to shoot me.”

Aliah presses the revolver against Brandee’s skin and cocks
it.  She can now see the fear in her eyes.

“That,” Aliah states, showing Brandee exactly how it feels.

Harley too fears what is going to happen next, seeing the
determined look in Aliah’s eyes.  Aliah pauses, lowers her hands, and then
whips out her pistol.  It slaps across the girl’s face, knocking her to
the ground.  Aliah promptly drops the gun and puts her hands up over her
head.

“That was worth it,” she announces to Brandee’s bloody face,
then waits for the police to cuff her.

To Harley’s surprise, they push her aside and collect the
woman off the ground, reading Brandee her rights as the ambulance tend to her
life threatening wounds.  It takes a moment for it to sink in, but
eventually Aliah puts her hands down, once she realizes she’s off the
hook.  She turns to face Harley.  He hands his gun to a police
officer and holds his arms out to her.