Sunday’s fingers traveled toward my wife’s throat as if he might choke her or hold her down when he sent the bullet into her brain.
“Soooweee!” I called to him in a high, thin tone. “Isn’t that how they taunted you, Thierry? Soooweee! Here, piggy, piggy, piggy that smells like shit!”
Sunday flushed purple and began softly smearing his free hand over Bree’s face as he hissed, “You keep it up now, Cross. Just makes my job easier.”
“And your mom? Did she abandon you because of your stench?”
Sunday laughed acidly. “That traitorous bitch sure knew who she was when she died. She went out squealing and choking.”
“And Alice Monahan?”
“And all their young’ns,” he said. “Same way before they got the knife.”
Then his nostrils flared in deep amusement. He studied me while twiddling three of his fingers just above Bree’s slack jaw and open mouth.
“Listen for it, you hear, Cross?” Sunday said. “Even out cold, this sow of yours is gonna squeal ’fore she dies.”
CHAPTER
96
A LOW, THROBBING NOISE grew outside the container car.
Sunday looked to the roof in alarm.
And then the sonofabitch let loose with an absolutely bloodcurdling scream.
Sunday struggled and screeched trying to get his fingers out of Bree’s mouth. But she’d bitten into him hard and she held on like a crazed terrier until he pistol-whipped the side of her head.
He staggered back against Damon’s bunk, staring in shock at his wounds. The pinkie and ring fingers were almost completely severed above the second knuckle. His middle finger was spurting blood and was bent grotesquely.
For me, the next few moments unfolded in slow motion. I just couldn’t get there fast enough, but I saw every second of it with a weird clarity.
As I lurched to my feet, Sunday’s pain and disbelief turned to rage. He screamed something incomprehensible at Bree, who was dazed and smiling weakly, his blood trickling from her mouth.
He aimed the gun at her point-blank and screeched, “Die, you fucking—”
Damon’s elbow smashed the back of Sunday’s neck and unbalanced him. He lurched to his left. Damon’s second swing at him just missed.
“Get him, Dad!” Ali yelled as I barreled past with my hands still duct-taped behind my head.
Sunday seemed not to hear me coming; he shook off Damon’s blow and made a bizarre clacking sound with his teeth before trying to aim at Bree again.
Out of his peripheral vision, he caught me charging and tried to swing the gun my way. But I dropped my shoulder under his line of fire, exploded from my knees, and smashed all my weight and momentum into his rib cage.
The impact knocked Sunday off his feet.
He hit the container floor so hard, the .357 flew from his hand, ricocheted off the rear wall, and went skittering under Nana Mama’s bunk.
The force knocked me down at an odd, twisting angle, and I hit the container floor hard, face-first and then left shoulder. I saw stars and felt bones break.
“Kill him, Dad!” Ali yelled. “Kill him!”
Pain pulsed like fire and radiated in my shoulder and face. But the hit must also have triggered some kind of full-on adrenaline response, because instead of lying there in shock, I went insane with fury.
Sunday’s back was to me. He was hurt but trying to get to his feet.
I kicked him high in the hamstring, just below his ass cheeks. He stumbled and hit his head against the container wall. Ignoring the agony of my blown shoulder and fractured face, I squirmed forward and lashed out with my foot, trying to kick him in the back of his knee, his calf, his ankle, anything.