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“The fuck do you care if I kill myself?” she shot back, waving her hand outward. “You don’t know me.”
“We know you a little. You’re Mary Hill. You used to work at the school.”
“Until those fuckers suggested I retire.” She didn’t retire, though. She was on unemployment. “And when I wouldn’t, they fucking laid me off. Downsizing, my ass! They hired three new night crew staff after I left.”
“Well, if they couldn’t appreciate you, Mary, it was good you left,” Smith tried, his voice a little more patient than mine.
“Don’t you try to butter me up, you fucking J.Crew looking sonovabitch.”
Lovely.
Also completely out of touch if she thought Smith could model for J.Crew. He was more of an Outdoor Living kind of guy.
“Christ,” Smith hissed under his breath, and I had to hold back a smile.
“Look, Mary,” I tried. “We just want–”
“Stop saying my name like we’re friends. We ain’t friends. Never seen your ugly mugs in my life. Get the fuck out of my house before I put holes in both yous.”
“I’m afraid we can’t leave when it seems like you’re going to kill yourself,” I said, going for blunt since that seemed more her speed.
“None of your business if I do or not. It’s my life to live or to end. And what the fuck do I have left? Huh? Huh! No job. No friends. My brother is missing. And that stupid cunt’s dog…”
“Keep it together,” Smith mumbled under his breath at me.
“You really should have that leg looked at,” I said, teeth gritted.
Really, what were we doing here?
She wasn’t exactly wrong.
It was her life.
“Fuck my leg,” she shrieked. “And fuck you. Get the fuck out of my house before I call the cops!”
“What are we doing here, Boss?” Smith asked as Mary advanced at us, gun raised, eyes wild, everything about her saying she was completely capable of shooting us right that moment.
“Mary,” I tried one last time, hissing out my breath when a bullet whooshed past my ear, lodging in the doorjamb with a solid thunk.
“I said go!”
And, really, there wasn’t too much choice in the matter once they started shooting, unless we planned to shoot her ourselves.
Which was never in the plan.
“Alright, we’re going,” I agreed, whacking Smith in the chest so he would go out first, then moving outside with him, watching as Mary slammed the door, glaring at us through the window.
“Holy fuck, she’s unhinged.”
“We’re going to have to call it in anonymously,” I agreed as we moved down the street.
She was completely bent.
She needed a forty-eight-hour hold to be evaluated before she hurt someone. With her level of anger toward them, the school didn’t seem like they were altogether safe with her cracked, and running around with a gun.
Smith reached for the spare burner he kept on him, punching in the first two digit of 9-1-1, planning to give an anonymous tip about a crazy woman shooting off her gun.
But even as he moved his finger to hit dial, a shot rang out, deafening in the still night air, making both of us jolt slightly, turning back, dread filling our stomachs.
There was nothing else.
No other sounds.
Smith moved first, turning on his heel, and heading back at a dead run to the back of the house. “Shit,” he hissed, exhaling.
“Should we have an ambulance sent?” I asked, reaching for my phone. A good percent of people who took a gun to themselves didn’t end up meeting their graves. They simply had chunks taken out of their faces or heads, and, usually, a newfound appreciation of life.
“She swallowed it,” Smith said, tucking his phone away. “Her fucking brain was all over the doll heads,” he added, making me cringe at the visual as we quickly made our way out of the side street, not wanting anyone who heard the bullets to be able to name us.
“How did it… oh, man,” Kai greeted, waiting beside Jules’s desk for us even though I asked him to keep Aven occupied for a few hours.
“She took herself out of the equation,” I informed him, exhaling hard. What a fucking week. Two people dead. One woman having to live with the weight of that, even though none of it was her fault.
This did mean, though, that it was over for her.
In the permanent way.
She could go back to her life, no fears of any consequences, nothing that could lead back to her.
The cops would find the body.
A clear-cut suicide, there would be no digging around, no need for us to worry about some rogue diary entry about the girl her brother was stalking.
It was done.
Her problem was fixed.
“You gotta go tell her,” Kai said, watching me. “She knew something was up and wasn’t happy about being handled with kid gloves.”
“Go on,” Smith said, nodding. “I’ll fill in everyone. And get Jules on the file clean-up when she gets back first thing in the morning.”
