Hush Hush by Erik Carter (best short novels of all time .TXT) 📗

to Stokes’ speech at the police headquarters, to Ray Beasley’s townhouse, to the shootout at the slum—Silence had known Carlton Stokes was a creep, felt it in his bones, known that somehow Amber’s death was related to Carlton’s involvement with C11.

But the thought that Stokes would have his own daughter murdered hadn’t materialized. Not for a second.

Silence tried to visualize the moment—a man sitting down, at his desk, or maybe the kitchen table, weighing his options, making a choice, picking up a phone and ordering a hit on his daughter.

The vision was so dark that it was lost in fog, unimaginable.

And it was only then that Silence realized what a twisted adversary he was facing.

“That’s right, Mr. Shadow,” Stokes continued. “I wasn’t going to let my daughter bring an end to the Well. And I’m not going to let you either. I’m leaving now, and you’re going to stay. Because if the rumors are true, if you’re as valiant they say, I know what you’ll do next.”

He shoved Kim hard.

A scream.

And she fell off the balcony.

Chapter Forty-Two

Silence was already bounding to the staircase before Kim’s descent completed.

Her body snapped into position, twanging the crude noose tight.

But her neck didn’t break.

People often associated hanging with strangulation, but another common outcome—one that was often the desired outcome, in fact—was a broken neck.

As Silence ran over to her, he glimpsed Stokes darting past, down the stairs and out the door to the garage.

The bastard was going to get away—for now—but at least Stokes would find the curly-haired present Silence had left for him splayed on the concrete floor of his garage.

Silence put his hands beneath Kim’s boots, lifted, took the pressure off.

Kim gasped. Heaving breaths.

Silence gave her a moment to catch her breath then turned around, spinning to face the staircase, juggling her feet between his hands.

“Grab the railing,” he said.

She did, and Silence eased his hands off her feet until she was dangling from the balusters under her own power. Her fingers screeched against the varnish.

“I can’t hold on!” she screamed.

Silence bolted up the stairs, three steps at a time.

“I’m slipping!”

As he reached the halfway point, he heard cracking wood.

The balusters.

To the landing. Silence dropped to the carpet, reached through the balusters, one of which had snapped. He grabbed Kim’s wrist.

A glance to the knot a couple feet above his head.

With the railing between them, with her dangling from his grip, and with a rope connecting her neck to the handrail, there was only one way to get her free.

The handrail had to come down.

Silence reared back and drove his shoulder into it. A stab of pain. And a cracking sound from the balusters.

“What are you doing??” Kim screamed.

Silence shifted his weight back, thrust forward again. A shock of pain from the irritated spot on his trapezius where one of the paint cans had struck him.

The whole handrail wobbled. A few feet away, a crack lightning-bolted into the sheetrock where the rail met the wall.

Kim slipped. Her sweaty palms screeched down his forearm. He had her by the fingers now.

Only by the fingers.

One more slip, and he’d lose her.

They’d been lucky once already that she hadn’t broken her neck.

Silence wasn’t one to test his luck.

So he gritted his teeth, pulled his torso back as far as he could, and channeled all of his energy into his shoulder.

Crack!

The railing gave.

Pieces of the handrail and balusters flew into the open air, twisted in descent, then clattered on the floor below. And with one swift motion, Silence pulled Kim onto the landing.

They sat for a moment. Gathering themselves. Pain buzzed in Silence’s shoulder. His chest heaved. He was more out of breath than he’d realized.

“I know where he’s going,” Kim said. “Amber kept me up to date with her investigation. She found out that Carlton had a contingency plan. If there was ever a catastrophe with the Well, he was going to destroy the record room where everything about C11 is stored. It’s at the Northwest Community Police Station. Some of the records are paper, but a lot of them are on servers. He’d have to…” Her eyes widened. “Blow it up!”

A connection crackled in Silence’s mind. Carlton Stokes’ post-police-retirement line of work. He said it out loud. “Demolition.”

Kim nodded, her eyes still panic-wide. “That office is staffed all day, every day. People will die!”

“You can get us there?” Silence said.

She nodded quickly.

Silence jumped up, grabbed her forearm, and yanked her to her feet.

“Let’s go,” he said, already streaking down the stairs.

Chapter Forty-Three

Jonah grunted as he readjusted his hold on Gavin. It was amazing how heavy a human form could be when it was completely limp. Alive. But completely limp.

Jonah wasn’t the strongest of men, but he’d still assumed that moving his former uncle-in-law to the mangled Grand Cherokee would be easier than this.

Although Gavin was still breathing, his eyes were barely open, barely registering the things Jonah said to him. And he wasn’t moving. At all. Dead weight.

There was so much of the man’s blood on Jonah’s hands it was even more difficult to get a grip.

Gavin’s face had gone horribly pale. And his eyes were closing, his head rolling to the side.

“Got to keep you talking, buddy,” Jonah said, as much to himself as to Gavin.

He needed to keep Gavin cogent. As physically weak as Jonah knew himself to be, he was even less skilled in medicine. But he assumed that if Gavin stopped talking, he might stop living.

Keep him talking.

He gave him a smile. “Who knew you were such a gunslinger, huh?”

No reply from Gavin.

Jonah checked.

Still breathing.

Just very, very pale.

Jonah repositioned his grip, grabbing lower, under Gavin’s ribs, a better handle. The patches of Gavin’s blood grew cold, sticky.

Headlights from the other end of the drive. By the house. An engine fired up, and a vehicle came down the driveway in their direction, quickly. When it was halfway down the drive, Jonah recognized the Honda Accord.

The guy who’d been following him and Brett all day.

Shit!

What could he do now?

Jonah’s heart