Right Behind You Page 5

  A couple of loose bullets, and nothing else.

  Quincy: “How many guns did you say Frank Duvall had again?”

  “Six.”

  Quincy studied the empty space. “I’m going to guess plenty of ammo to go with them.”

  “In other words, I’ve got a seventeen-year-old suspect, heavily armed, with a truck, who’s possibly already shot and killed four people. Quincy, what’s going on here? I mean, a troubled kid shooting his foster parents is one thing, but why the two at the convenience store? What the hell does this kid want?”

  “He raided the gun safe, then shot the Duvalls,” Quincy murmured.

  “Looks that way.”

  “Then got in the truck, and . . .”

  “Decided to keep on shooting?”

  “Spree.” Quincy turned, made sure he had the sheriff’s full attention. “Our suspect’s on a shooting spree. Such incidents generally start with a murder close to home, killing a wife, boss, parent. Instead of that violence being the end of things, however, the shooter suffers a psychotic break, goes on a rampage. The first target was personal. But from here on out . . . The UNSUB will kill anyone, everyone, unfortunate enough to cross his path. You have a highly dangerous offender on the loose, Sheriff Atkins. And he will kill again.”

  Beneath the sheen of sweat, Shelly’s face had grown pale. It made the scars stand out around her neck.

  “All right,” she said tightly. Then repeated, “All right. We’ll need to establish a command center. Issue a BOLO for the missing Chevy. Mobilize SWAT, state reinforcements—hell, anyone and everyone with a badge.”

  “All public places near the EZ Gas should go into lockdown. Libraries, community centers, day cares, etc.” Swim camps, Quincy thought, thankful the Y’s pool was on the other end of town.

  “Got it.”

  “We need to learn about this kid, everything there is to know about him. Friends, associates, hobbies, interests. Where would he go under pressure? And how good are his shooting skills?”

  “Okay.”

  “Time matters. The longer this situation drags on . . .”

  “More dangerous the boy becomes,” Shelly filled in.

  “Not to mention the general public, most of whom around these parts—”

  “Are heavily armed.” Shelly sighed. She nodded, bolstering herself again. She was a good sheriff, Quincy knew, solid under pressure. But like most county sheriffs, more of her time was spent on the war on drugs and domestic cases than crimes of this nature. The next twenty-four hours would be taxing for them all.

  Now Shelly unclipped her radio again, contacted dispatch.

  “I need a BOLO out on a seventeen-year-old male. Brown hair, brown eyes, last seen wearing a black hoodie and believed to be driving a blue Chevy pickup, license plate . . .” Shelly rattled off the sequence. “He is considered heavily armed and should be approached with extreme caution. I need all neighboring towns notified as well as state police. Also, forest rangers, Fish and Game, local campgrounds. You know the drill. Boy’s name is Telly Ray Nash.”

  Quincy stopped. Felt the blood drain out of his face. “What?”

  “Telly Ray Nash,” Shelly repeated.

  But Quincy wasn’t listening anymore. He was charging up the stairs, looking for Rainie.

  Chapter 6

  YOU DON’T TRUST ME,” the man said. Frank. Call me Frank, he’d told me that first afternoon. Then shook my hand. Actually shook it, while his wife—Sandra—had hovered beside him, clasping and unclasping her fingers. No doubt the hugging type, trying to rein herself in.

  “It’s okay,” he continued now, looking straight at me. “To be honest, I don’t trust you, either. Too early for that. We’re still getting to know one another.”

  I didn’t say anything. What was there to say? We were standing in a clearing in the middle of the forest. In front of us, tacked to a beat-up wooden pallet, was a brand-new shooting target, provided by Frank. Around our feet, a litter of spent shells, bottle caps, and cigarette butts. All the locals came out here, Frank had told me as we drove over. A regular redneck shooting range.

  I’d been living with the Duvalls for about four weeks. In some fosters, you got, say, a cookie, or even a cake, to mark the one-month anniversary. In the Duvalls’ house, apparently you went shooting.

  From the back of his truck, Frank removed a folding table. I set it up. Then Frank got out two pairs of safety glasses, a package of earplugs, and boxes of ammo. Finally, from behind the driver’s seat, he pulled out a locked black box slightly larger than a lunchbox. The gun. Guns?

  I still wasn’t sure what I was doing here. I guess it beat taking a kid with my history to a batting cage.

  Frank typed a combo into the locked carrying case. He didn’t try to hide the screen, so I didn’t try not to watch. I don’t talk much, my probation officer would tell you. But I’m observant. Again, kid with my history, hard not to be.

  Frank raised the lid. Box was lined with black foam, shaped like an egg carton, or maybe the sound buffers they put up in recording studios. Nestled in the middle, black on black, sat the handgun. Smaller than I would’ve thought. And . . . frightening.

  I’d never shot a gun before, assuming video games don’t count.

  I stuck my hands in my pockets. Cool October morning. My feet and hands were wet with morning dew. Again, what the hell was I doing here?

  Frank lifted out the piece. “Ruger SR twenty-two,” he declared proudly. “Ten plus one, meaning ten rounds in the magazine, one in the chamber. Now, first things first. A gun’s a tool. And a tool must be treated with respect.”

  He stared at me expectantly. Finally, I nodded, having to look up to meet his eyes. Frank was a big guy. Six four. Solidly built, though more basketballer than footballer. A science teacher at the local high school, he’d grown up in these parts. Local boy, through and through. When he was my age, he’d been working his parents’ dairy farm every morning and afternoon, while tearing up the boards as a varsity star, and spending most Saturday nights chugging beer and chasing trouble. He understood being a teenage boy, he’d told me my first night in their home. He understood trouble.

  He and his wife, they’d taken me in eyes wide-open. They knew what I’d done. They knew what I was still capable of doing.

  They also knew this was it. Seventeen-year-old boy, due to age out of the system in another year. The Duvalls were my last chance to ever be part of something. Not an adopted kid. I’d already entered the system too old for those kinds of pipe dreams. But play my cards right, extend a little trust, hell, clean up my act, and I could at least have a forever foster family. A place to go every Christmas, Thanksgiving. Better yet, as my probation officer explained to me, guidance for all the Big Changes coming my way—getting a job, setting up my own place, paying my own bills. Real world straight ahead. A couple of supportive parental figures in my corner would be a huge help. Or so my probation officer told me.

  I didn’t have the heart to confide in her, or big, confident, I Know Trouble Frank and cookie-baking, Please Just Let Me Give You a Hug Sandra, that I didn’t do family.

  Not anymore.

  “When it comes to handling firearms,” Frank said now, still holding the twenty-two, “safety first. Never point the gun at anything you don’t want to shoot. Not even when you think it’s unloaded.”

  He stared at me.

  “Never point the gun at anything you don’t want to shoot,” I repeated belatedly.

  “Some guys, they pretend there’s a laser extending out the end of the gun. Anything the laser hits, it slices through. Looking at the Ruger right now, what am I hitting?”

  “Um, that tree.”

  “Can we afford for that tree to be cut in half?”

  “Guess so. Sure.”

  “And now?”

  “Just lost your big toe.”

 
“Exactly. And I need my big toe, so I’m not going to dangle the gun like an idiot and risk shooting off my own foot.”

  “Okay.”

  “Second cardinal rule: Never assume the gun is unloaded. Even if I hand it to you and say it’s clear, you check it for yourself. Always. End of story.”

  He looked very serious. Even grim. Once again, I nodded.

  Frank set the gun on the table, still pointed away from us, at the tree. Tree was a big one. Thick trunk covered in lighter patches of sage-green moss. Or maybe it was lichen. I confused the two. Frank would know the answer. If, of course, I asked him.

  “Clearing a gun involves two steps. First, eject the magazine.” Frank lifted the Ruger, massive hand wrapped around the grip. “Come here. Take it. Gun won’t bite. And if you can’t handle it unloaded, then you’re certainly not ready for target practice.”

  I forced my hands out of my pockets. Willed myself to take a step forward. Which was ironic, really, because all Foster Frank had to do was tell me never to touch his firearms, and I would’ve had my hands on the entire collection in a matter of seconds.

  Which, having read my file, most likely he knew. Warn a kid with oppositional defiant disorder not to do something, and you’ve pretty much guaranteed the crime. Whereas this, granting me permission, offering actual training on how to shoot . . . Now I didn’t even want the stupid twenty-two.

  Mostly I wished the gun and bullets and moss/lichen-covered trees would go away.

  Frank placed the Ruger in my right hand.

  It felt heavier than I expected. That was my first thought. But also . . . comfortable. The rubbery grip felt the right size for my palm. The gun was solid but not large.

  Certainly it felt easier to wield than a baseball bat.

  “’Kay, finger off the trigger. Never touch it till you’re ready to shoot. Just a good habit to have. Instead, I recommend placing your finger above the trigger guard. Feel how the grip is rubbery in your palm? That’s actually removable—you can slide it on and off. The real gun is matte metal. That’s what you’re feeling with your trigger finger. It’s good to be aware of these things. It will help make the placement of the gun in your hand, the proper position of your trigger finger, more and more automatic. You’ll do things based on feel. That’s when you’ll know you’re a good shooter.”

  I didn’t say anything. But he was right. I could feel the different textures, rubber against my palm, matte metal against my index finger. It felt . . . real.

  “Now, keeping your finger off the trigger and the gun pointed away, you need to clear your weapon. First step is to eject the magazine. Look on the left side of the grip, right behind the trigger guard; see that small black button? With your thumb, push it.”

  I did, and immediately the magazine popped out from the bottom of the handle. Not all the way out, but enough that I could slide it out with my left hand. It felt surprisingly light.

  “This magazine can hold ten shots. How many bullets do you see?” Frank asked me.

  I frowned. “Nothing. It’s empty.”

  “So your gun is cleared?”

  I glanced at him. Just because I’d never shot before didn’t mean I didn’t know when I was being played. “You said first step, meaning there’s at least one more.”

  “Good job. Remember what else I told you about the Ruger? When I first described it?”

  “Ten plus one,” I recalled slowly. “The chamber. Ten in the magazine, which I just ejected. But that leaves one in the chamber.”

  “Excellent. Gun is never cleared until you’ve checked the chamber. So first eject the magazine, then rack back the slide to check the chamber. With the magazine ejected, place your left hand on top of the gun. Smooth metal slide. Again, feel the different texture.”

  “Yeah.”

  “Rubber grip. Matte metal body. Smooth metal slide. Yes?”

  “Yes.”

  “Holding the gun out straight-armed, use your left hand to rack back the top slide. Use a little muscle, it’s okay.”

  I tried harder. Abruptly, the slide shot back. I startled, let go, and it slammed forward again.

  Frank chuckled. “Easy, buddy. Good way to pinch your hand and lose some skin. You want a smooth motion. Slide it back easily, don’t let go.”

  I fumbled two more times before finally getting it.

  “Look in the chamber,” he instructed me.

  “Clear.”

  “Now you can ease the slide forward, or, if you want, left side of the gun, above the trigger guard in front of the safety, see that black button? Click it up, and it will hold the slide in the open position.”

  I found the button, awkwardly got it up.

  Frank took the gun from me, placed it on the folding table. “Protocol, you and me. Always present a firearm exactly like this. Magazine out, chamber exposed. That way we both can see, everyone can see, the weapon is clear. Got it?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Okay, now time to get serious. But before we load and start talking shooting, we first must establish your dominant eye.”

  Turned out my right eye was dominant. And no squeezing one eye shut when pulling the trigger. Instead, concentrate on gazing down the gun sight, homing in on the target, using your dominant eye.

  Frank went first. Emptied the magazine. A tight cluster, most in the bull’s-eye. Showing off for the foster kid, I thought. But he didn’t puff up his chest. More like nodded to himself. Fulfilled his own expectations.

  Then it was my turn. Safety glasses. Earplugs. Chasing rolling brass all over the folding table as I struggled to load three bullets into the magazine—just enough to get me started.

  Frank positioned me three yards from the target. So close I could’ve spit on it.

  Then, showtime.

  The trigger pull was longer than I expected. Then the recoil totally unexpected. The gun jumped up in my hand. I startled. And the tree to the right of the target was now down some moss/lichen.

  Frank didn’t seem surprised at all. “Concentrate on the trigger pull,” he advised. “First pull is long, then the rest of the shots are short. Get used to how it feels. Then we’ll work on aim.”

  Lining up the shot, exhaling all the breath from my lungs, easing back the trigger. By the end of the morning, I at least had control. Standing at five yards, even if I didn’t nail the red zone, my shots now showed some semblance of grouping.

  “Consistency,” Frank acknowledged. “A good start.”

  He didn’t shoot as much as he worked with me. But then, at the end, no doubt to blow off a little steam, he showed off: He turned the paper target sideways, till it faced the trees and we were staring at only its impossibly thin edge. Single shot, he hit the hairsbreadth target, neatly severing the paper in half.

  “You been shooting a long time,” I said finally, closest I could come to praise.

  “Most of my life,” he said as he took the gun, cleared the magazine and chamber, and returned it to its padded box. “At home, I’ll teach you fieldstripping. Shooting’s only half the fun—then you gotta take care of your weapon.”

  We worked together to pack up the earplugs, safety glasses, boxes of bullets, folding table. I grabbed the remnants of the target. He closed up the back of the truck.

  Then he was staring at me again, eyes serious. Face grim.

  “You know why we took you in, Telly?”

  I didn’t say anything.

  “We believe in you. We read your file. What happened with your family. Do you remember that night, Telly?”

  No need to ask which night he was talking about. My whole life came down to only one evening.

  “Not much.” I didn’t look at him. Went back to studying moss on trees.

  “Do you think what you did was right?”

  I shook my head.

  Frank stilled, studied me
for a bit.

  “Family counselor thinks you should consider therapy again,” he said at last. “We’ll take you. We’ll do our part, if you think it’ll help.”

  “No thank you.”

  “Telly, what happened to you, to your whole family, that was a terrible thing. And sometimes, you keep something that terrible inside, it festers, becomes even worse than it was the first time around.”

  “I don’t remember,” I heard myself say.

  “You don’t remember.”

  “No. My mom screaming, yeah. And my dad . . . But after the baseball bat. Once I got my hands on the bat . . . I don’t remember much after that.”

  “A man does what a man has to do to protect his family,” Frank said.

  I finally looked at him. I had no idea what he was talking about.

  “Your sister defended your actions. Said you saved her, you saved both of you, from your father. That’s important, Telly. Means no matter what other people say, you did right that night. You need to hold on to that. It says something about the boy you were, and the man you can become. That’s why Sandra and I took you in. Maybe you think what you did was wrong. But Sandra and I . . . We see a boy who did what he had to do. And that boy deserves a better shot at life.”

  “I hurt my baby sister.”

  “You broke her arm. She recovered. Surely, if your dad had gotten to her first, it would’ve been worse.”

  I didn’t have a response to that. I hadn’t been lying before: I didn’t remember too much from that night. Red haze of battle, maybe even a blackout, the first shrink had tried explaining to me, brought on by terror and trauma and years of abuse. What I did remember was the sound of bone snapping.

  And my baby sister’s scream. A long, high, thin scream that went on and on and on.

  Till eight years later, it was still locked inside my head.

  “I don’t want to see a shrink,” I told Frank.

  “All right. But we’re gonna talk about it, Telly, because you need to talk about it. Your life is changing. One year from now, you’ll be eighteen, ready to head out on your own. Sandra and I, our job is to prepare you for that. Think you’re ready to be all alone in the big world?”