Blood Will Tell by Jean Lorrah Read Free Book Online Page A

shouted, “Look what you made me do!” just as the uniformed officers ran into the house, the detectives on their heels, all with guns drawn.
    A woman lay in front of the couch, half covering a little girl no more than three. The child wore a cast on her left wrist, and the red welt on her left cheek showed that she had been hit before being shot in the head. The woman also bore wounds in the back of her head and neck.
    A boy, perhaps ten, lay in the kitchen doorway, a butcher knife clutched in his hand. He had apparently been cut down coming to rescue his mother and sister. Blood welled from a wound in his chest, and another in his neck. He had the remnants of a black eye, several days old.
    In the sudden silence, the boy's labored breathing grated loudly.
    The man who had created the carnage faced the police.
    “Drop the gun!” Church ordered.
    Faster than thought, the man put the barrel of his .35 into his mouth and pulled the trigger.
    Jimmy Paschall gave a yelp as if of pain.
    The other cop, Charlie Rand, said, “Call an ambulance—hurry!” and knelt beside the boy who still clung to life.
    Brandy looked at Church. His dark skin had turned a greenish hue. He moved to the woman and little girl, seeking signs of life.
    That left Brandy to check the murderer. He was dead, empty eyes staring at the ceiling. She could not close them; the coroner would have to examine untouched bodies.
    Just another murder/suicide. Open and shut case—with four cops as witnesses.
    Behind Brandy, Rand muttered to the fallen boy, “Just hold on, Son. The medics'll be here in a minute.” But before the wail of the ambulance sounded in the distance, the labored breathing shuddered to a stop. Brandy heard the beefy cop whisper, “Take him home, Jesus. Welcome him, Lord, with his mamma and his sister. And please—help me to understand why You take young kids like this."
    Brandy's father had moved their family from Ohio to Kentucky when she was twelve. The fundamentalists here had driven her nearly crazy trying to drag her into their churches. Over the years she had perceived them as deluded or hypocritical, or perhaps just plain stupid—but she had also gotten to know many of them as friends.
    Charlie Rand had his beliefs to comfort him in the midst of senseless slaughter. Brandy had nothing.
    Neither had Churchill Jones. His eyes met hers, and she knew that he, too, had overheard Rand's spontaneous prayer. Church was a lapsed Baptist, while Brandy was a never-was-anything. Police work did little to inspire belief in a benevolent force guiding the universe.
    Neighbors gathered outside the house. It didn't take long to piece together the story. The husband, Matt Perkins, was laid off when the Western Electric plant closed three years ago. He found a few jobs, but never kept them long. Like almost everyone in this dry county he drank, but under the stress of unemployment he got drunk on a regular basis. Then he beat his wife and kids—and the next day he would be all apologies and promises to lay off the booze.
    And so it happened again, a family stressed beyond their capacity to cope, a woman beaten trying to protect her children, and a man brimming over with violence he had no other outlet for. Brandy remembered Carrie's case, the woman who had returned to her husband after he beat their three-year-old girl, broke her wrist—
    “Oh, my God,” Brandy whispered, realizing that this was the same family. A rope tightened about her skull.
    There was no need to send anything from the Perkins house to the crime lab. Doc Sanford made out the death certificates, and the case was closed. All they had to do was notify the closest relatives: the parents of the husband and wife, grandparents of the two dead children.
    But Brandy would have to break it to Carrie.
    At the station they faced the wrath of Chief Harvey Benton. “Four citizens dead—after my officers arrive! What kind of police protection do you call that?"
    No one had an answer.