After midnight, p.21
After Midnight, page 21
Cait’s brain vapor-locked. Her mother’s actions were so unexpected, so beyond the realm of normal activity that she simply froze, like a computer getting stuck while trying to boot up.
Virginia struggled against the door, her frail body leaning into it and shoving it open against the tremendous force of the air rushing along the outside of a car traveling at highway speeds.
Cait’s foot reached instinctively for the brake and she tried to swerve right, into the breakdown lane, but she wasn’t next to the breakdown lane, and she nearly sideswiped the same truck they had almost hit just moments ago.
By now, Virginia had managed to open her door maybe two feet. The roar of the big eighteen-wheeler’s engine filled Cait’s little car and the sound of the pavement rushing beneath them was like water rushing over Niagara Falls, loud and insistent and eternal.
Virginia glanced over at Cait for a split second, and that glance told Cait everything. In her mother’s eyes she saw love and regret and sorrow and the unspoken promise that they would meet again someday.
The one thing absent from that hurried glance was fear.
Virginia was unafraid as she looked across the front seat at her only daughter.
Then she shoved the door open fully and tumbled out onto the highway.
47
It all happened so fast Milo had no time to react.
One second he was cackling madly inside his own mind at the effect he was having on Mommy Dearest and The Evil Bitch, forcing them into two near collisions in the span of just a few minutes.
The next second, everything went to shit. Without warning, a blast of tropical air came out of nowhere and highway noise was right there and a truck’s air horn blew almost right into the old biddy’s ear and if Milo had had a physical presence, his body would have been knocked flat on its ass.
The old bitch leaned forward, still staring at the goddamned dashboard, a sight Milo would be happy if he never saw again, and then she looked across the front of the small car at The Evil Bitch, and the moment she did, Milo could feel his hatred begin to build, the unreasoning, unstoppable fury he felt instinctively every time he saw or even thought about Caitlyn Connelly, his despised twin sister.
And then Mommy Dearest looked away and began pushing her ancient body to the right, leaning into the onrushing wind, and then Milo knew what was happening, and he tried to gather his wits and jump into Caitlyn’s head before it was too late, and he knew he had to hurry because he only had a second to react, maybe even less, but he had never jumped so quickly and without warning before—even when he was being suffocated earlier today, he had had a few moments to prepare—and then the old biddy launched herself out the door.
It happened simultaneously in the blink of an eye and in slow motion. Milo watched, horrified, through his mother’s eyes as her body flew out Cait’s car and onto the surface of the highway. She forced her eyes to remain open, and Milo knew it was for his benefit, so he could see everything and understand that he had been beaten.
The pavement rushed up to meet them and Virginia’s head struck the tar and her body tumbled and the last thing Milo saw was a split-second view of the Florida sky, bright and blue and crystal clear.
48
Cait screamed and slammed on the brakes and barely noticed as her car was rear-ended by a dusty black Lincoln Continental. Her disbelieving eyes were glued to the rearview mirror and she knew she would relive this moment in nightmares for the rest of her life.
Virginia’s body struck the pavement and bounced once, limp as a rag doll, somehow avoiding being crushed by the eighteen-wheeler thundering along next to Cait’s car. Then it bounced again and rolled into the adjoining travel lane and disappeared beneath the massive frame of another tractor-trailer that had been roaring along behind the first in a mini-convoy.
The truck driver locked up his brakes and black smoke instantly began billowing from beneath his tires, and his trailer threatened to jackknife but he kept it under control until he was rammed from behind by another motorist.
Then there was chaos.
Squealing tires mixed with crumpling sheet metal, which mixed with shattering safety glass and the sound of steam hissing from damaged radiators, and all of it came together in a discordant symphony that faded away into the background, overwhelmed inside Cait’s head by the sound of her own screams.
She couldn’t stop screaming.
She knew she would never stop screaming again.
49
“You look good,” Cait said quietly, almost shyly, as she gazed through the wire-reinforced glass of the visiting area at Tampa’s Hillsborough County Jail into Kevin Dalton’s face. It was a lie, but not too much of a lie.
He was pale and had lost weight, but Cait supposed that wasn’t surprising under the circumstances. He could make the same observation about her if he chose to, but she knew he would be too kind-hearted to do so.
“I told you to stay away from me,” Kevin said quietly, refusing to meet her gaze. “Anything could happen and I don’t want you to get hurt.” He closed his eyes and rubbed a hand across his haggard face. “I don’t want anyone else to get hurt, but especially not you.”
“It’s all over. No one’s going to get hurt ever again, at least not by Milo.”
Now he did look at her. He did it hesitantly, like he had to work up the courage, but he did it. And when he finally looked into her eyes, he didn’t look away. “What do you mean? What happened? Is everyone all right?”
Cait wasn’t sure where to start, so she just began talking. She held the plastic telephone handset up to her face and told Kevin everything, and when she got to the part about Virginia sacrificing herself to save Caitlyn, she was proud that she made it halfway through the narrative before breaking down in tears.
Kevin listened without speaking, his face at first impassive but then becoming more and more emotional, until he was crying freely on the other side of the glass, tears rolling down his face in what Cait assumed was probably a mirror image of her own.
When she had finished the story, visiting hours were almost over. All the other visitors had departed and it was just Cait and Kevin and a bored-looking middle-aged guard, standing off by himself in the corner of the room. For a long time no one spoke, and then Kevin said, “How can you be sure he’s gone? I mean, really and truly sure?”
Cait shrugged. She had given this question plenty of thought herself over the past two weeks. “I suppose there’s no way to be one hundred percent positive, but Milo never demonstrated the ability to jump into anyone’s head besides my mother’s or mine. I wondered from the moment I picked her up in Sarasota why she was acting so strangely and now I know it’s because she was desperate not to tip Milo off to what she was planning and give him the chance to jump into my head. The sensation of pressure never came, so I can only assume she succeeded.”
Kevin sat back in an ancient wooden chair and wrinkled his forehead in concentration. “So it’s really all over, except it’s not over. Milo still wins. I attacked you, and then I attacked an innocent man—my own attorney, no less—in front of a judge in open court. No one’s going to believe I wasn’t in control of my actions, and even if they did, all that would happen is I’d be committed to a pscyh ward indefinitely. Who knows how long I’m going to be locked up for?”
“I’m going to get you the best representation. I have some money saved up, for a down payment on a house, and now I don’t care about a house. I’m going to use every last penny of it to defend you if need be.”
Kevin was shaking his head. “No,” he said. “Forget me and move on. You’re young, accomplished and beautiful. I’ll likely be old and beaten-down by the time I get out of here, and then when I do, I’ll have no job and no prospects. I certainly can’t be a cop anymore. You deserve better. Find someone who can make you happy and settle down.”
“I already did,” she said quietly.
They stared at each other through the dirty glass, each lost in their own thoughts. After a while, the lights blinked off and on, and the bored, middle-aged guard ambled over. “It’s time to go,” he said.
Cait nodded and turned back to Kevin. “I’ll be back tomorrow, and the day after, and the day after that. We’re going to get through this, you’ll see.”
She placed the handset down in its cradle without waiting for a response. She stood and smiled at Kevin, alone on the other side of the glass. He was still seated in his chair, not in any hurry to leave. There was no reason to hurry because there was nowhere to go.
Cait waited for him to return her smile and after a moment he did. It was hesitant and tremulous, but it was a smile all the same.
It was a start.
Then she turned and walked away.
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About the author
Allan Leverone is the New York Times and USA Today bestselling author of nearly twenty novels, as well as a 2012 Derringer Award winner for excellence in short mystery fiction and a 2011 Pushcart Prize nominee. He lives in Londonderry, New Hampshire with his wife Sue, and has three grown children and two beautiful grandchildren. He loves to hear from readers and other authors; connect on Facebook, Twitter @AllanLeverone, and at AllanLeverone.com.
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Also by Allan Leverone
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The Lupin Project
Paskagankee
Revenant
Wellspring
Grimoire
Covenant
Linger: Mark of the Beast (Co-written with Edward Fallon)
Thrillers
The Lonely Mile
Final Vector
Parallax View: A Tracie Tanner Thriller
All Enemies: A Tracie Tanner Thriller
The Omega Connection: A Tracie Tanner Thriller
The Hitler Deception: A Tracie Tanner Thriller
The Kremlyov Infection: A Tracie Tanner Thriller
The Bashkir Extraction: A Tracie Tanner Thriller
The Soviet Assassin: A Tracie Tanner Thriller
The Organization: A Jack Sheridan Pulp Thriller
Trigger Warning: A Jack Sheridan Pulp Thriller
Death Perception: A Jack Sheridan Pulp Thriller
Novellas
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Flight 12: A Kristin Cunningham Thriller
Story Collections
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The Tracie Tanner Collection: Three Complete Thriller Novels
Allan Leverone, After Midnight
