Chapter 43

 

You could have knocked me over with a finch feather.

It certainly wasn’t Officer Mike. It was Mayor Scotty Mink.

“Surprised?” he said, a grotesquely goofy, psychotic grin on his face.

But Amy was trying to catch my eye. She was trying desperately to tell me something. Something about my feet?

“Scotty Mink! Wow! How’d you do that?” I was trying to kill more time.

Keep distracting him.

What the hell was Amy trying to tell me anyway? She kept frantically eyeing my feet. Was she trying one last time to get me to make a run for it?

Scotty Mink ran his gloved hand through his hideous pile of oily hair. “You know, before I kill you girls, I think I’ll just show you what a real man I am.”

He moved the knife to the front of Amy’s shirt and started to slice it down the middle. Desperately, futilely, Amy tried to squirm away.

 

Adrenaline spoke louder than logic. I sprang to my feet and started to go for him, but just as I did, I felt the heel of my shoe hit something at the edge of my chair. Then it hit me. Quickly, I reached down and grabbed for Amy’s purse. There it was. I’d been practically sitting on it all along.

“Hey,” Scotty said, pointing the knife my way. “Sit tight over there.”

But it was too late. I’d already worked the gun out of the purse. I let the handbag fall to the floor.

“Drop the knife, Scotty. Let her go,” but he just grinned at me like a full-tilt maniac.

“Afraid not.” He put the knife back to Amy’s throat. “You drop the gun or say good-bye.”

It was now or never. Like Amy had said, you pull the trigger.

I did.

 

I’d never done much target shooting, so I wasn’t sure if I was any good at it, but I knew that I’d hit Scotty Mink and I’d missed Amy, and that was good enough for me. The bullet ripped into his shoulder, knocking him backwards. The butcher knife went spinning and skidding across the hardwood floor. Scotty grabbed for his nasty wound and howled with pain. I figured his right shoulder now looked like an unattractive cut of beef. Amy scrambled out of his reach and dove for the knife. He cursed and made a lunge for her, spilling the coffee table and sending our drink glasses flying. I fired again, but missed and hit the coffee table instead.

“I got you now!” He had Amy by the leg and was dragging her back to him. She screamed and turned, swiping at him with the knife. He screeched like an animal, but he didn’t let go.

“Goddamn you!” he cried, eyeing the deep, bloody stripe Amy had left across his arm.

I took my chances and fired again. I didn’t know exactly where, but I’d hit him. Scotty Mink’s body jerked suddenly, then he dropped flat on his belly. Amy pulled her leg free and scrabbled to her feet. He rolled over onto his back and rocked in pain.

“Had enough, Scotty?” 

Finally, he managed to hold up a hand. “Enough.”

He was losing blood, a lot of it, all over Amy’s living room floor, but I didn’t care if every last drop of it leaked out. I just didn’t want to watch.

“You move a hair,” Amy said, “and Miss Cutie Puss here will cut your balls off.” He looked up at her, blinked woozily and moaned.

“The phone’s behind you, on the end table.”

Without taking the gun off Scotty, I reached back for the cordless. I snatched it up and punched 9-1-1.