Chapter 28

I don't speed. I regularly gripe at those who do – not that they hear it, for I'm in my vehicle and they're in theirs. But that day I drove as fast as any Albuquerque driver, for I was indeed not close. I had to get from Hoffmantown all the way over to the Singing Arrow neighborhood. It's not far on a map, but you don't drive it in five minutes.

I pushed the Blazer's engine – the gearing is set up for power, not speed – and it roared at me down Wyoming, onto Lomas all the way east, south off of Lomas onto Tramway, and fighting the traffic down to Central. I made a right turn in front of traffic onto Central, which normally I'd never do, and probably scared everyone on Central as I bore down the hill toward Dorado, where I screeched the tires turning left. The tires squealed again when I hung the right where Dorado and Wenonah separate. I jammed the Blazer left into the driveway, punched the buttons to open the gate, and came near swearing while it creaked slowly open.

I didn't drive all the way back to Cinda's apartment, but parked there in front. I jerked my gun from under the seat, clipped the holster to my belt, and drew the weapon to work the slide and get a round up into the chamber. I jammed it back into the holster, slammed the Blazer's door, and ran toward the back of the complex, where Cinda lived.

I came out from between two buildings and found that it could have been worse, but not by much. Jacob Bestwick was standing in the center of the parking lot, holding an aluminum baseball bat in his right hand, which he was gently knocking on the pavement. Beth was behind the open door of what I assumed was her car – a beat up baby blue Toyota, I saw peripherally – with her weapon in both hands pointed right at Bestwick. It was a big revolver – it looked like a 38., though she had the wrists to shoot .357 ammo through it – and it was absolutely steady. I was out of the line of fire, in an excellent position to get Bestwick in a crossfire without endangering Beth. I didn't, though, draw my gun right away. Instead I took a few steps to my left, which put me next to a tree and at the same time put my line of sight to Bestwick even further from Beth, and from Cinda's apartment. I hoped it didn't come to shooting – there were apartments all around, and houses just across Singing Arrow.

With cover a single step to my left, though as far as I could tell Bestwick didn't have a gun, I called out. "Beth, is Cinda okay?" I wasn't sure she would hear me – by now she'd be so focused on Bestwick that she'd have tunnel vision – but I had to try.

She did hear me – perhaps 30 years of listening to a radio had taught her to hear through the intense concentration on her target. "Ms. Barelas is fine – scared to death, but he only hit her once and it was just a slap."

I focused on Bestwick again. He was still gently tapping the end of the bat on the pavement, and I could hear it – a steady thin tinking sound. I examined him more carefully now. He had on khaki pants with cargo pockets, and running shoes, and a dark colored windbreaker. I couldn't see his shirt, though he seemed to have the windbreaker unzipped; my angle wasn't right. He didn't have a hat on, and the rain had washed his hair down into his face, out of its usual carefully gelled style. I'd seen that Beth's hair was soaked too, though it was pulled back into what looked like a french braid. Contrary to popular opinion the eyes don't give much away – it's the facial expression which conveys so much information. Bestwick's face was blank – it contained neither fear nor anger nor hatred nor any other passion. That scared me. Someone who's in the grip of strong emotion will, if you delay him long enough, eventually come down and relax. But if Bestwick was cold and unemotional, he wasn't going to come down.

I concluded in that moment that we were probably dealing with a sociopath. I'd had occasion the year before to do a bit of reading on the subject, and while I'm no expert and don't want to be – it's a scary subject – I know that sociopaths are unemotional, conscienceless, concerned only with their own pleasures and desires. Usually this just makes them ruthless office politicians, but occasionally they go beyond that, and decide that to get what they want they've got to take more drastic measures to get someone out of the way. And they'll blame the other person for their troubles – as indeed Bestwick had done when I'd tried to persuade him to leave Cinda alone.

With that decision I made another one, and drew my gun, holding it still uncocked beside my leg. Bestwick wasn't going to listen to reason or appeals to conscience, but he just might yield to superior force. I raised my voice, giving it the cop command tone, and said, "Bestwick! Put the bat down!"

He didn't look at me, but just shook his head slightly.

"Put it down, Bestwick! Put it down!"

Again he ignored me, not even shaking his head this time. This wasn't good. I didn't know whether he was going to advance, thinking we wouldn't shoot, or was nerving himself up to commit "suicide by cop," but I knew that he wasn't concerned with our guns. If he didn't back down, eventually either we'd have to shoot him, or we'd have to try to tackle him without shooting. And that meant that one or both of us would probably get hurt – a baseball bat is not a trivial weapon. It could hurt us badly ... it could kill us.

I was trying to think of some way to break the stalemate when Cinda did it for me. I'd told her to stay out of sight, but she was an amateur, and did an amateur thing. I didn't see her door open, but suddenly she was there in my peripheral vision – I hadn't yet gotten so concentrated that I only saw the target – and she cried out, "Jake, please don't!"

But that was just the wrong thing, though no one could have known it beforehand. Bestwick lifted the bat, and took a step, and then he was running. Beth had no choice. If it had been just her she might have tried to grapple with him, but Cinda was there, and before I could react her gun bucked twice and Bestwick was down. Even as it happened I noted that while I saw the muzzle flash and the recoil of the gun, and knew that there had to be sound, I didn't hear anything. When Bestwick attacked I'd concentrated on my sight to the point that my hearing had faded out.

I turned my head and bellowed, "Cinda, get back inside now!" I jerked my head back toward Bestwick. He was still down, on his back, and I could see a darker stain on his chest, darker than the rain on what I now saw was a white polo shirt. It was a red stain – not large, but spreading. One leg was bent back under his buttocks, and the right hand, the one that had held the bat, was outflung, while the bat itself lay two or three feet away. I hadn't heard the clatter of it falling. His eyes were open, and unblinking even as the rain came down.

I walked carefully over and checked the pulse in Bestwick's throat. There was none. I looked up and over at Beth, who was to my left now. She was still poised, her weapon still in both hands, her arms still stiff. I got up, holstering my gun as I did so. I'd never flipped the safety off, and now I fastened the strap across the hammer. I circled around to my left to stay out of Beth's line of fire, and came up beside her. She was right handed, and I was on her left, with the car to her right. She was staring at Bestwick, but I wasn't sure she saw him. I reached around her back, my arm brushing her shoulder, and took hold of the gun. I got my thumb beneath the hammer, and my middle finger behind the trigger; if she tried to fire the gun I'd have some painful digits, but it wouldn't go off.

I leaned close and said softly into her ear, "It's over, Beth. Let go of the weapon."

And that was all it took. She let go of the gun and slowly collapsed, sitting down on the wet oily pavement with her back against the sill of the car's doorway. I uncocked her weapon and moved the cylinder to put a discharged round under the hammer, and laid the pistol on the roof of her car. Only then did I kneel down beside her and put my arms around her and hold her tight while she cried as though her heart was breaking.

After a bit I felt a touch on my shoulder, and looked up to see a uniformed APD officer. "Sir, are you and the lady all right?"

"Yeah ... sort of. She had to shoot the guy over there." I tilted my head in Bestwick's direction, though he was on the other side of the hood. "She's pretty shook up."