Simple Genius (Sean King & Michelle Maxwell 3)

“You bitch!” he screamed.

“You drug dealer!” she screamed back in mock fury and then laughed. “So let me guess, they busted your partner this morning and he ratted on you.”

“You bitch!” he roared again.

She motioned with her hands. “Come and get me, Barry, baby. You know you want to. And after you kick my ass you can have yourself a real good time with me.”

He sprang forward, the pipe held high for the killing blow.

He flew backward just as fast when her foot collided with his face. She didn’t wait for him to recover. Her fist crashed into his gut and then she whirled around and delivered a crushing kick to his jaw driving him backward and over Cheryl’s bed. He struggled up, stunned by the strength of her blows. He threw the pipe at her, missing her head by an inch as she ducked. Then he picked up a chair and hurled that too, but Michelle was too nimble. He bounded over the bed and lunged for her, and caught nothing except air and a massive side-kick to his kidneys that seemed to drive all the fight out of him.

He dropped to his knees groaning as she stood over him and for good measure drove an elbow into the back of his head. That sent him flat to the floor.

“I’m waiting, Barry. If you want to finish this, you better hurry; the cops will be here soon.”

“You bitch!”he moaned weakly.

“Yeah, you said that already. Can’t you think of something new?”

He tried to get up and she tensed to deliver a knockout blow when two Fairfax cops peered through the doorway, guns drawn.

She pointed at Barry. “He’s the one you want. I’m Michelle Maxwell, the one who tipped off Detective Richards yesterday.”

One of the cops, eyeing the destroyed room, said, “You okay, ma’am?”

Barry groaned from the floor, “You idiot! I’m the one who’s hurt. I need a doctor. She attacked me.”

“This is my room. He came in with the lead pipe over there, his prints are all over it,” Michelle said. “He tried to pay me back for crashing the little drug op he had going with the pharmacist here. My guess is they were fudging the computer records on the drug inventories so the theft wouldn’t show up and old Barry here was shipping them out to his street team under the cover of patients in the locked ward here sending out packages.” She glanced down at the beaten man. “As you can see, things didn’t work out exactly as he’d planned.”

The cops hauled Barry up, despite his protests of devastating injury, cuffed him and read him his rights.

“We’ll need your statement, ma’am,” one of the cops said.

“Oh, and I’m just dying to give it.”

They’d holstered their weapons and were leading Barry out when everyone froze. In the doorway was Sandy in her wheelchair. However, everyone was fixated not on the woman but on the gun she was holding.

CHAPTER

34

ONE COP’S HAND FLEW to his sidearm, but Sandy yelled, “Don’t!” She gripped the gun with both hands. “Don’t,” she said again. “I don’t want to hurt you, just him,” she added, motioning with the pistol to Barry.

She settled her gaze back on him and said, “Don’t recognize me, do you? No reason you should. You didn’t come there that day to kill me; you came to murder the best man. But you missed and got the groom instead. My husband!”

Barry sucked in a breath and Sandy smiled even more broadly. “Oh, now it’s coming back to you.” She shook her head. “What a bad shot you were. Killed my husband, left me a cripple and missed your target. Your mob bosses must’ve been real pissed off at you for that.”

Now Michelle stepped forward and the pistol moved around to point at her.

Sandy said, “Michelle, don’t act the hero here. I really don’t want to hurt you. But I will if you try and stop me from giving this piece of trash what he should’ve gotten a long time ago.”

“Sandy, you don’t have to do this. Barry’s being arrested for drug-dealing. He’s going to go away for a long time.”

“No, he won’t, Michelle.”

“Sandy, we have the evidence, he’s busted.”

“He’s in Witness Protection. They’re going to cover it up just like they’ve done in the past.”