I should have known she was the one more likely to actually shoot someone. This time, however, Kendra missed, and now Hallings was really mad.
“You tried to shoot me!” he said, barreling down on Kendra. She might have gotten another shot off, but didn’t react quickly enough, and he tackled her to the floor in the roasting room. The two struggled and I followed, yelling at them to stop before one of them did something stupid and irreparable.
“Freeze! Both of you.”
The two of them continued fighting on the floor, both of their guns going off, shots pinging off the sides of metal vats. They continued struggling, however, so I didn’t think either was hurt too badly, though I heard Hallings grunt as if he might have been winged. Hallings dropped his own gun and grabbed onto Kendra’s, while Kendra slapped, pinched, and clawed at him like a wild animal with her free hand. Despite her diminutive size, my money might have been on Kendra, even if she was in a family way.
Just then, the back door flung open and Karl Turner threw himself into the room, breaking up Hallings and Kendra. The three of them rolled away from one another. Karl picked up Hallings’s gun and pointed it back and forth between Kendra and Hallings. Hallings, in his struggle to get free of the line of fire, ploughed into me, sending me onto my butt in a bone-jarring thump. Managing to hold on to my own weapon, I pushed the big man off me and threw myself sideways, out of the line of fire. I looked around for Chava, and saw she’d gotten herself safely tucked up behind the heavy wooden desk.
Crawling to the edge of the doorway I peered out into the other room.
Karl stood over Kendra, Hallings’s gun trained on her with a surprisingly steady hand given the gunshot wound he’d received earlier.
“You should have come with me, Kendra,” he said. “You had a chance to fix this. When we were in the car. You and I could have been on the way to Canada right now. But no, you had to come in here. For what, a little revenge? Didn’t I teach you anything? Revenge is pointless.”
“Really?” Kendra asked him, aiming her own gun at him for yet another standoff. “Then why are you here? Why didn’t you run when I gave you the chance?”
Karl looked up and saw me in the doorway. He brought Hallings’s gun up to point at me again. I guess he thought I was more of a danger than Kendra; after all, she hadn’t done much damage so far.
So I shot Karl.
Karl looked surprised and dropped like a stone. I rushed over and took Hallings’s gun out of his hand.
“Enough is enough,” I said, surveying the damage, a nice clean through and through of his right arm above the elbow. Not a bad shot considering he was moving at the time.
“You’ll live,” I said, turning to check on Hallings and Kendra, only to find Kendra standing with her gun trained on me.
“You’ve gotta be kidding me, Kendra. Put the gun down.”
“No, Eddie. I’ve done my good deed for the day, I helped you find your mother, but you are going to let me walk out of here, right now.”
“Why on earth did you let Turner out of my car?”
“I didn’t want you turning him over to the police. I didn’t want him talking. I thought he’d run.”
Strike two for Kendra.
“It’s all over, Kendra,” I said. “Put the gun down. Haven’t we had enough shooting for one night?”
“I’m shot, Kendra,” Hallings said. “You don’t want me to die. I need help.”
“You,” Kendra said looking down at her husband. “You were supposed to be my white knight. You were supposed to save me, and look at the mess you’ve made.”
I really wanted to tell Kendra she was part of the mess-making, but now didn’t seem to be the time. Kendra was raising her gun again and pointing it toward Hallings.
“I should shoot you again for cheating on me.”
“Kendra, you are not going to shoot anyone,” I said from my place in the doorway. Unfortunately this had the effect of her turning her gun on me.
The sound of the gunshot startled us all, but no one more than Kendra; she looked stunned as the spot of blood appeared through her shirt. I swiveled around and saw my mother standing behind me, Turner’s gun in her hands.
“You?” Kendra said before she crumpled to the ground next to Hallings.
“Baby!” Hallings said, pulling Kendra to him. “Are you all right?”
“That hurt!” Kendra said as I went to her.
“Let me see,” I said, tearing her shirt open.
“The bullet just nicked you, Kendra. You’re going to be fine. Here,” I said, tearing a strip of cloth from Kendra’s now tattered shirt. “Hold pressure on her.” I handed the cloth to Hallings. “Unless you’re hurt too badly.” I had almost forgotten Kendra’s wild shot had struck him first.
“I’ll be okay,” Hallings said, ministering to his wife. “You really cared enough that I slept with Deirdre to want to shoot me?” He looked deep into his wife’s eyes. “I didn’t know you loved me that much.”
“I do, baby,” Kendra crooned, wincing as he pushed on her wound. “It tore me up inside.”
Oh, brother. This couldn’t be happening.
“Are you done shooting people?” I asked her. She nodded and I took the gun from her hand.
“Eddie?” I heard my mother’s voice from where she’d slumped down in the doorway.
“Coming, Chava,” I said. “That was a hell of a shot. But it’s over. Everything is going to be all right.”
“I’m not so sure of that,” Chava said. “I think I’ve been shot too.”