Page 123 of The Midnight Lock (Lincoln Rhyme 14)

Joanna was struggling to stand. She spat blood.

Martin asked, “Honey, are you okay?”

“What a stupid fucking question. Kill him.”

Stopping six feet from Kemp, Whittaker said, “Martin, you can save yourself. It’s not too late. Call nine one one.”

The man debated a moment. Whittaker thought he might actually do so. But no. He’d never disobey Mama.

Holding the knife forward, he lunged, his face an odd mix of determination, anger and utter fear.

Whittaker stepped aside and swung the cane, forcing him back a few feet. Then looked past him and with wide eyes called, “Alicia, you’re alive!”

Kemp gasped and, before he caught himself, he turned to where the body lay.

Joanna shouted, “No, you idiot!”

It was only a half-second distraction but it was all that Whittaker needed. He swung the cane like a baseball bat and connected with the hand that held the knife. Kemp screamed—an actual high-pitched wail—and the blade fell to the floor, as Martin dropped to his knees, cradling his shattered fingers. Whittaker tossed away the cane and picked up the knife.

He turned to face his niece, who was scanning the entryway. She was looking at the floor.

Whittaker spotted the gun before she did, a small black pistol.

Joanna staggered toward the weapon. There was no chance that Whittaker could beat her to it. He did the only thing he could, slipped the knife into his pocket and stepped to Kitt, then pushed the wheelchair into the closest room, a library. He slammed the door and locked it.

He heard a crash as one of the two, Martin probably, kicked the wood hard.

Would she shoot her way in? That would hardly play, according to the fiction she’d created, but she was desperate.

The kicking stopped. He heard Joanna say, “Good idea.”

Whittaker looked around and spotted the landline phone. He lifted it and heard: “At the tone the time will be …”

Martin Kemp had apparently done something right.

Whittaker hung up, jammed a chair under the knob. He moved his son out of the line of fire in case Joanna did decide to shoot.

The kicking began again. One of the panels cracked.

Averell Whittaker withdrew the knife from his pocket.

65

My computer beeps.

I’ve been summoned by a ViewNow algorithm, so I put on my content moderator hat. I scoot the laptop closer and maximize the screen.

It’s a VNLive post. Tammybird335 is streaming in real time. She’s a pretty woman around twenty, I’d guess. Her long brown hair is flyaway and some strands are pasted to her face from tears. She wears a bulky sweatshirt with a high school crest on it—from a better place and time in her life.

Either she or somebody in the comments have used the word “suicide,” which the algorithm spotted.

Tammy’s at her desk. Behind her is an unmade bed. Pictures of some tropical locations are on the wall. A ragged stuffed dog sits on the floor. Weeping, she says, “My mother’s out with her boyfriend all the time, like she doesn’t give a shit about me. And he tries to hug me all the time … And at school, the kids’re so mean … I’m shy. Ican’t help it. It’s too fucking much! Nobody cares. I mean, nobody! I think I should just do it. I don’t know …”

The comments are rolling in.

OMG, get help now!

Do it live!

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