Maggie pulled the Kia up to the curb in front of the ugly blue house in Brighton Park. Marcus felt that he had gotten a great deal on the place, but in her opinion, the owner should have burned the little blue barn to the ground a long time ago. At least she didn’t have to sleep there. It made her skin crawl just having to step inside, and she felt even more sorry for the Schofield family that they were stuck in such horrid accommodations.
She had considered blindfolding O’Malley as he had suggested but decided against it. The sidewalks and stairs would be slick, and the last thing she wanted was to cause the old Irishman to fall and have to take another trip to the hospital.
The snow beat down on her as she made her way up the bright red steps onto the safe house’s porch. O’Malley’s coat had a hood, but Maggie suspected that the little projectiles of snow would still slip underneath. The pinpricks of cold had to be torture against his inflamed skin. She slipped on the walkway a few times and nearly went down. But O’Malley was surprisingly sure-footed and had no such problems.
She knocked, and within a moment, Andrew appeared at the door. He gave her a strange look and said, “Who’s your friend?” But the look in his eyes said something more like Who’s the mummy?
“This is Mr. O’Malley. He’s the neighbor that Harrison Schofield attacked. I stopped in to visit him at the hospital, and we felt that it would be good for the kids to see a familiar face.” As she spoke the words, she realized that her choice of phrasing was odd since O’Malley’s familiar face was actually disfigured and covered with bandages.
“Does Marcus know about this?”
“I let him know. Can we come in now? It’s freezing out here.”
“Sure. Sorry about that.”
Andrew stepped back from the door, and Maggie followed him in. The smell assaulted her immediately, and she suppressed a shiver at the thought of the germs teeming over every surface. There was a kitchen table in the middle of the living room. It had been ripped from the 1970s with its light faux-wood top, along with four green chairs the color of pond scum. She stripped off her coat and reluctantly laid it over the back of one of the chairs.
“Are the Schofields here?” O’Malley said.
Andrew nodded. “They’re in the back bedroom. I’ll go get them.”
But O’Malley just smiled and said, “Allow me.”
Then, before Maggie even realized what was happening, O’Malley’s arm shot out and grabbed her sidearm from its place on her hip. He moved with startling speed and precision. In one smooth motion, the gun was in his hand, and he was bringing it up and against the side of her skull. Hard.
She saw it happen, but her mind still couldn’t comprehend the images passing in front of her eyes.
The pain lanced down the side of her face, and she stumbled back against the retro table.
When she looked back at her attacker, she saw Andrew reaching for his own gun. And then she saw Mr. O’Malley use her Glock to fire three 9mm bullets directly into Andrew’s chest.