UNAWARE: A Suspense Novel

by Susan P. Baker

  Dena backed away from the door as she looked at the ugly expression of hatred in his eyes. She watched, spellbound, as he threw his body against the door, trying to break it open, his eyes never leaving hers. The door groaned and crackled when he threw himself against it.

  As if in a trance, her eyes locked with his for several seconds before she snapped. The doorknob twisted and turned. When she looked back at his face, his eyes bored into hers as again he threw himself against the door like a mad dog, penned-in. When the doorframe cracked, Dena bolted and ran for her gun. She knew it would be only moments before the frame gave way.

  Running into the bedroom, she rounded the bed to her night table, pulling on the drawer. It wouldn’t open. Damn. Zack had put that lock in it. The wood splintered in the kitchen.

  She hurried to her jewelry box and dug inside for the key. She couldn’t put her fingers on it. She locked the bedroom door and went back to the jewelry box. Oh God, oh God. She dumped out the contents. She shook all over. Her hands scrabbled through the jewelry. The key wasn’t there. It really wasn’t there. The kitchen door cracked again and burst open, banging into the side of the cabinet.

  CHAPTER FIFTY-SEVEN

  MARTIN

  Martin and Joe cruised down the rain-splattered seawall toward downtown Galveston, both of them quiet. Comfortable with each other, Martin thought, just like the old days.

  “Something’s nagging at me,” Martin said. “Something’s not quite right. It’s like a little voice inside my head keeps talking to me.”

  “Stress,” Joe said.

  “No. It’s more than that. I keep replaying the day in my mind, like viewing a movie. Calling Ginny’s cell phone. Calling her friend. Calling the clinic. The whole day keeps passing before me, like I’m on my deathbed.”

  “I’m telling you, it’s just nerves. You had a bad scare there for a while,” Joe said. He put a piece of chewing gum in his mouth and smacked noisily.

  “Did you notice anything weird at Dena Armstrong’s, Joe?”

  “Nada. We checked it out. There was nothing.”

  “What about Marlo’s, when we were looking for Sellers?” Martin stroked his chin, scratching at the stubble.

  “Just people drinking and dancing and having a good time.” Joe turned up the radio. They listened to a call, but it wasn’t for them.

  Martin shook his head to get rid of the feeling, but it wouldn’t go away. After a while he said, “I have this gut feeling. I keep going over it, from the beginning. Ginny’s moving in with that creep. The time she and Sellers lived with Mary. The phone calls in the middle of the night. The breakup. Then when we went down to pick up her stuff. Later when I went with her to Dena’s office and saw Sellers pull up afterwards in that big, white Cadillac that used to belong to his father. After all the hell he gave her about the money she took, and he was driving that Cadillac. We thought he’d sold it for the money after his father died.”

  “What?” Joe shouted. “There was a white Cadillac parked across from the entrance to Mrs. Armstrong’s subdivision tonight. Didn’t you see it?”

  Martin banged his fist on the dashboard. “I can’t believe I missed it.”

  Joe slammed his foot on the brakes and did a sliding U-turn. “Hit the lights and the siren.”

  Martin held on as Joe got control of their cruiser and sped back toward the west end of the island.

  “He must have been there all along. I don’t know where, but he must have been there.” Martin felt like he’d just been shot in the stomach with a large caliber bullet. “I hope we’re not too late.” He grabbed his cell and punched in Dena’s number.

  CHAPTER FIFTY-EIGHT

  DENA

  When Dena heard the kitchen door burst open, she dragged a chair to the door and put it under the doorknob like she’d seen in a movie. Sellers hit the other side and twisted the doorknob. She turned her back to the door, digging in with her heels, her eyes sweeping the room for a weapon. There was nothing.

  There was no time to call the police or Bob or Martin. She could run into the bathroom and lock the door, but he could get in. He could break in. If the deadbolt on the kitchen door didn’t hold him, the other doors wouldn’t either. Her only chance was escape. Her eyes lit on the window. She’d have to climb out. But what about the kids? Would he harm them if he couldn’t get to her? She didn’t think so. He wanted her. And climbing out the window would lead him away from them.

  She could hear his rapid breathing on the other side of the door as he pushed up against it. For a brief moment she had a fleeting thought that she should yell to him through the door, try to talk to him, tell him of their relationship. “Listen to me,” she called out. “Mr. Sellers ... Alan ... you don’t know what you’re doing.” She felt him throw his weight against the door again. It held for the moment.

  Dena darted to the window, yanked the blinds up, and unlatched it. She grabbed the aluminum window rim with both hands and tugged on it. It wouldn’t budge. She heard his body hit the bedroom door again. The wood around the lock cracked. Oh God, oh God, why wouldn’t the window open?

  After tugging on the window rim again, Dena finally checked the lock. The dowel. Her hands shook as she reached for the little piece of wood that blocked the track. She pulled it out, grasped the rim with both hands, and pulled with all her might. The window opened. The door cracked, louder this time.

  She beat at the screen with the flat of both hands. As it fell outward, Dena put one bare foot up on her night table, grabbed hold of the windowsill, and hoisted her body into the opening just as Sellers broke through the door.

  “I’m your sister,” she screamed as she twisted around and dropped to the ground. Before she could let go of the sill, he lashed out with his knife and punctured the back of her left hand right in front of her wrist, ripping through her skin toward her fingers as she released her hold on the ledge and pulled her hand away. The pain was at first sharp and then dull.

  She slipped on the wet ground and fell against the brick veneer, then pulled herself up, her feet catching for a moment in the length of her nightgown. She ran sideways like a crab toward the darkest part of the yard. She looked back over her shoulder and, in the dim light of her bedside lamp, she could see Sellers’ silhouette as he climbed through the window.

  Pressing her sliced hand against her chest with her other one, she tried to stop the sticky blood flowing freely between her fingers. She searched for a means of escape. Sellers was between her and the gate, near her bedroom window. She had to get out of the light, out of Sellers’ sight, run farther into the darkness of the yard, then try to escape.

  CHAPTER FIFTY-NINE

  MARTIN

  Dena’s number rang and rang as Joe urged the police car faster and faster down the center lane of the wet pavement. Martin laid the phone down on the seat, still ringing, and sent a radio message for backup. It was almost time for shift change. Backup, if any, would probably be slow in coming. Thank God he and Joe hadn’t received any calls to another location, or they wouldn’t have had a straight shot down the seawall.

  “Geez, I hope we’re right,” Joe said after Martin got off the radio. “If we’re wrong, we’re going to look like a couple of fools.”

  “I’m right. I’m right. I wish I wasn’t. I knew something was wrong.” He slammed his fist on the dashboard again and wished he were behind the wheel so he could make their unit go faster. “I can’t believe I let that Caddy slip by me. I looked right at it and didn’t see it.”

  “Take it easy, Man. It’s not your fault. You weren’t thinking about anything but Ginny.”

  “Hell, Joe, don’t you see? If I’d seen it, I mean if I’d really seen it earlier, we could have stopped him right then. It might be too late now. That poor lady…those kids ...”

  “She’s got a gun though, remember?”

  “But she was going to bed. She was going to sleep. And she’s totally unaware that he’s
after her.”

  “Yeah, you told me.”

  “Damn. Can’t you make this thing go any faster?” Martin glared at Joe. He could see Joe’s fingers were white knuckled, but it didn’t matter. The only thing that mattered was they get there in time. They passed Gaido’s restaurant with its giant crab out front, and Martin realized they were still thirty blocks away. “Damn.” he said again.

  “Calm down, Martin. If I kill us, we’ll never get there.”

  “I can’t. I’m afraid of what he’ll do to her. You don’t know him. He’s crazy.”

  CHAPTER SIXTY

  DENA

  Dena ran for the garden shed. Behind her, there was a splat that she assumed was Sellers hitting the ground when he jumped from the window. Then another splat—he must have fallen—and then the slapping of footsteps in the wet grass. Her cell phone rang—or was that just a ringing in her ears?

  He hit the ground again. She hoped the fall had knocked the breath out of him.

  She reached the shed and felt her way around it. Yanking open the door, she stepped inside and pulled it closed as quietly as she could. With her uninjured hand, she reached into the darkness. She kept her left hand up against her chest, hoping in the back of her mind that it would slow the bleeding. She stepped forward and stubbed her toe on something hard. Pain shot up her leg, but she could only tough it out. Crouching down, she touched the thing. It was the base of the lawnmower. She put a bare foot on it, got her balance, and then stepped up. She eased her way around, until she touched the back wall.

  The rain pattered on the shed roof. She leaned against the rear wall, catching her breath, faced the door, and braced herself. With her legs spread apart, one bare foot against the base of the lawnmower, she began scratching around, searching for something, anything she could use to defend herself should Sellers find her.

  She felt a wooden handle, a thick wooden handle. She tried to lift it, but it was too heavy. Her fingers groped around some more. She found another, smaller, wooden handle. She pulled up on it. It weighed a lot less. Squatting, Dena ran her hand down the length of the handle until she reached the blade, the shovel. It would have to do. She stood again and picked it up. With her throbbing left hand, she clasped the handle the best she could and tried to ignore the pain. Her hand was weak, but it could support the other one. She maneuvered the shovel around until she had the blade up, the backside out, and the handle down. Gripping it with both hands, she stood ready to strike if the door opened.

  She tried to hold her breath, so she could hear better. Nothing but rain. Thunder. Lightning. What if he went back inside? He must know she had kids. He’d come in from the garage.

  Oh God, please don’t let him hurt her babies. Poor little Melissa wouldn’t stand a chance. She’d be crying for her, and Dena wouldn’t be there to help. Five years old was still a baby. Would he hurt a baby? Paul was only a year older. What would he do to him?

  Her rapid breath was loud in her ears. She shivered, but with fear, not cold. Why didn’t he come? Did he know the shed was there? He’d had time to find out by now. What was he doing? What was he planning? Dena stood tensed to strike the second she heard him at the door.

  ‘He’s crazy,’ they’d said. ‘Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde.’ How crazy was crazy? Crazy enough to come into her house to kill her. Oh, Lord, please don’t let him do it.

  “Zack, Zack,” she whispered. “Please come home now, Zack.” She touched the pulse beating in her throat. Her mouth was as dry as desert sand. Her knees quivered. Tears streamed down her face.

  Should she leave the safety of the shed and go back to the house to see about the children? She had to protect her children. Would he leave them alone if he got her? Anger built inside her at the thought of his hurting her kids. She couldn’t let him hurt her kids.

  The door flew open. Intense, bright light blinded Dena. “No,” she cried, striking out with the shovel in the direction of the light. She felt and heard the shovel make contact.

  Sellers’ flashlight flew to the ground. He howled and raged like a wild animal.

  Dena worked the shovel up for another strike. At the same time, she hollered, “I’m your sister. You’re my brother.”

  “I’ll kill you,” he screamed, his voice sounding high-pitched like the cry of a banshee. He lashed out with his knife, slicing the back of her right forearm.

  Dena gasped at the pressure of the tear in her arm and moments later, the searing pain, but she forced herself to concentrate on positioning the shovel for another blow. It was her only chance. “Please, Alan, don’t you feel it?” She stumbled over tools on her way to the opposite corner of the shed. The fallen flashlight cast enough light that she could see the tools’ long shadows. If he would only stop long enough to hear her out. She didn’t want to hit him. Why wouldn’t he listen? “Your mother was my mother.”

  “My mother’s dead. You’re trying to fool me.” But he hesitated, the knife in hand, ready to lunge at her.

  “No,” she yelled. “Rebecca Lowell was my mother’s maiden name. Your mother’s name was Rebecca Lowell Sellers.”

  With all her might, she smashed his head with the shovel, but she didn’t have much strength left. It wouldn’t have much effect.

  He stumbled backward out of the doorway and into the yard. Dena lifted the shovel again. Blood flew from her open wounds. She could barely make him out as she scrambled from the shed toward him.

  He cursed and screamed obscenities and jumped up off the ground. He turned his head away from her, his attention on something else in the yard. She started to swing the shovel until she realized what he saw. It was Zack. Thank God. It was Zack.

  CHAPTER SIXTY-ONE

  ALAN SELLERS

  Sellers’ head swam with confusion. The lawyer. His sister? Their mother? It couldn’t be. His mother was dead. His father had told him, ever since he was little. First, she had abandoned him; then she had died. But why would Dena Armstrong tell him that? She had yelled something about feeling it. Had that been what he’d felt the first time he saw her in court?

  Was that why he’d had such a hard time letting go of that picture in her den? That woman in it had seemed so familiar. He’d had a picture of his mother once. He’d found it and kept it hidden from his father. One day when he got home from school, his father was sitting on Alan’s bed and held the picture in his hands and tore it into little bits right in Alan’s face and then whipped him until he couldn’t sleep, he hurt so much. He tried to remember, was it the same face? She’d said the name, too. How had she known his mother’s name, if it wasn’t true?

  What was the husband doing there, standing in the yard in the dark and the rain? He was supposed to be thousands of miles away.

  Fog surrounded his brain as he looked from the husband to her. She stood there in her long, wet, white nightgown. Dark spots of blood splattered across her face and arms. Her hair was dripping wet. He heard her call out.

  “Zack. Zack, help me.”

  Sellers looked back at the husband.

  “Why haven’t you killed her yet?” the husband called in a loud, flat voice. “Kill her now.” Sellers raised his knife, then the husband pulled his hand from his jacket pocket. A nine-millimeter caught the light from the lightning and the moon and glinted in the husband’s eyes. With clarity, Sellers realized he’d been set up. The man had never intended to pay him the rest of his money. As soon as he finished off Lawyer Armstrong, the husband would shoot him.

  As if in slow motion, Sellers glanced back at the woman and saw surprise and terror reflected in her face. She had to have heard what her husband said. Instead of lunging toward her, Sellers went for the husband. It didn’t matter to him whether or not she was his sister. No one welshed on a deal with Alan Sellers.

  Sellers saw the whites of the husband’s eyes as he leapt on him, knocking him to the soggy grass, and plunging his knife into the man, raking it through his body before pulling it out and slash
ing it across the man’s neck. He turned back to the lawyer, sister or not, he didn’t care. He took a step toward her, reaching out with the knife.

  The lawyer slammed the shovel down sideways on Sellers’ arm, slicing a chunk of it. He dropped the knife and went down on one knee. The shovel came at him again, at his head. He used his other arm to shield himself. With his uninjured arm, he grappled around for the knife. Just as he glanced to the side, the shovel swung at him sideways. For just a moment, he tasted fear on his tongue as the shovel hit him again.

  CHAPTER SIXTY-TWO

  MARTIN

  Martin and Joe pulled up to the Armstrong house just seconds after another unit arrived. The light of the moon and the headlights from both police units illuminated a white Lexus SUV in the driveway. An officer stood at the front door, banging on it and punching the doorbell. Another ran toward the backyard, his right hand gripping his handgun in his holster. Martin followed the second officer. If Dena was asleep, they could alert her from her bedroom window, in the back.

  He reached the gate and moved the other officer aside. “I know this lock,” he said unlatching it in record time. A raspy voice was saying, “No. No,” over and over. His weapon in one hand and flashlight in the other, Martin ran toward the speaker.

  Dena Armstrong held a shovel over her head. She swung it down, striking what looked like two bodies in the wet grass. A mask of blood covered her face.

  Martin holstered his handgun and dropped the flashlight onto the ground beside her. When she struggled with the shovel, trying to raise it again, he stopped her. “Let go. It’s all right.” He took the shovel and threw it to the side and pulled her to him. Blood covered much of her body. It oozed from her hand and arm, but not her face or head. He breathed a deep sigh of relief.