GOD, why did you let me kill him?
Abby threw water on her face from the sink in the locker room after she’d finished with the last interview. It was close to 9:30 p.m. She and Bill had been going over the shooting with everyone in the city for a lifetime, it seemed. She was beyond exhausted, moving around in a walking zombie state.
A day that had begun dreamlike and upbeat turned nightmarish and dark as if a coin were flipped.
She kept seeing Clayton fall and then the life leave his eyes as the paramedics worked on his bloody form to no avail. He wasn’t officially pronounced dead until he got to the hospital, but Abby knew there on the lawn that he was gone.
Abby couldn’t help but flash back in her mind to another shooting —the day she’d confronted Gavin Kent about her parents’ murders. Like Clayton, she’d waited a long time for a suspect, a reason for the deaths that ripped her world apart. And like Clayton, she’d had a gun in her hand when she confronted the monster.
She’d wanted to pull the trigger.
She’d wanted to be judge, jury, and executioner just like Clayton wanted to be.
She and Kent had faced each other, guns drawn. But Kent pulled the trigger and killed himself, wrenching the opportunity away from Abby. And today it was excruciatingly obvious to Abby that she could have been Clayton —a millisecond of difference and she would have been Clayton.
But why is the bad guy safe and the good guy in the morgue? Why, God, why?
“You made the hard choice, and you did your job.” Bill said those words to her over and over as if sensing how disturbed she was about what she’d had to do.
Abby listened and tried to take his words to heart, but she wanted to talk to her friend and mentor, Woody. So far she’d managed only a brief conversation with him between interviews. She’d called him as soon as she was able. A retired cop, he understood that she’d be consumed by interviews and investigation for hours, and she wanted him to go to her house and let her dog out.
When they finally were able to talk for a few minutes, he’d tried to quiet her doubts, her self-flagellation.
“Guy points a gun at you, you have to shoot. He could have killed you or your partner. Would you want that?”
Abby leaned against a row of lockers, and the sound of clanging metal reverberated through the empty locker room.
Clayton’s wife was inconsolable.
“How could you take his life protecting that monster?” she’d screamed as uniformed officers held her back from scratching Abby’s eyes out. In between sobs the woman explained that when Clayton saw Bill and Abby pull up, he just knew. She’d tried to stop him, but he was determined to avenge his daughter.
“I told him to leave it to God, but he wouldn’t listen,” Althea cried. “Why didn’t he listen?”
Abby listened. She heard the woman’s pain and felt guilt to the core. She knew exactly what drove Clayton Joiner and realized some of the same emotions drove her as well.
How could I kill him protecting a monster?
Her phone chimed and she saw it was Ethan, her fiancé, and felt guiltier. He’d called earlier and she’d never called him back. The interviews she had to give regarding the shooting had left her voice dry and weak. It wasn’t Ethan’s fault she just didn’t want to talk anymore.
Sighing, she answered the call, knowing he only wanted to help and be supportive.
“Hey,” he said, “I’m worried about you. Are you still at work?”
“On my way out.”
“You sound tired. I can’t imagine how you must be feeling.”
“I’m numb right now.”
“Do you want any company? I can stop by.”
“Ethan, I’m just tired. All I want right now is bed. Thanks for the offer.”
“I understand. I’ll call you in the morning. Can I pray for you?”
“I’d love that.”
“Lord, I lift Abby to you tonight. You know what’s going on in her head and her heart. Heal what needs to be healed. In Jesus’ name, amen.”
Abby thought about Ethan’s prayer as she drove home through quiet, dark streets. “Heal what needs to be healed.”
She didn’t think healing was possible because there was no way to replay the moment and put the bullets back in her gun.