She laughed then grabbed the skewer with both hands, working it back out. It took her some effort, because she’d driven it so far into the chair. Then it slid out of my arm, covered in blood.
“I think it’s only fair to warn you,” I panted through clenched teeth. “I’m going to stab you with that fucking thing!”
She laughed again.
She placed the tip of the skewer on my left thigh.
“Just scream!” she cried, more demented than I’d seen her since this began.
I just glared at her.
She whacked the skewer with the hammer, driving it in. Her fury was hindering her. Twice she missed the skewer and brought the hammer down on my leg. Both times I felt it strike the bone, the impact radiating along my femur in both directions. That was a pain I never want to experience again. Finally she got the skewer through. I felt it come out and go into the chair.
She stood back, panting, and looked at it, madness gleaming in her eyes plainly now. Then she looked up to my face, searching for any sign of the scream she demanded. Finding none, she spun around and grabbed the pruning shears off the towel. Brandishing them in her left hand, she marched over and grabbed my right pinky.
For the first time since this whole thing began, I was truly horrified. I suppose it was my upbringing, but I’m not unfamiliar with pain or damage inflicted upon my body. But, generally speaking, my body is intact. The thought of having a piece of it lopped off was more than I could take. This was barbaric.
I opened my mouth to ask her again what information she wanted from me, just to engage her in conversation, however brief, to buy myself more time, but before I could form the first syllable, the lights winked out.
21
“What the hell?” Dillon hissed, releasing my finger. “Lyle! Lyle!”
Already I could hear footsteps on the carpet in the hallway.
“What the hell happened to the lights?” she snapped at him.
“I don’t know,” he said, slightly short of breath from either exertion or fear. “The power just went out.”
I heard him walk to the patio door and could then see his silhouette against the glass.
“The neighbors still have power!”
“Figure out what’s going on!” Dillon snapped. “Now!”
He turned and hurried across the kitchen toward the front of the house.
Dillon walked over and pulled open a drawer beside the refrigerator. A moment later, a flashlight blinked on. She used it to rummage in another cupboard and came up with a second flashlight and several candles. After arranging the candles on the island, she used the lighter she already had handy to light them.
I’d heard the front door open, but then Young was back.
“Hey!” he called. “Hey, Dez!”
“What?!”
Young returned to the kitchen in a hurry then pulled up short. With the kitchen now lit, he looked from the skewer sticking out of my leg to the blood oozing out of the new hole in my exposed abdomen, and he seemed to wobble slightly. He certainly looked green. Apparently Desirae hadn’t been exaggerating; Young didn’t do well with bleeding.
“What is it?” Dillon snapped, drawing Young’s attention away from the skewer and back to her.
He shook his head and tried to focus.
“Uh, she’s here.”
Dillon stared at him, irritation rolling off her in waves.
“Who’s here?”
“Your sister.”
Desirae found this as surprising as I did. We both stared at Young like he’d announced aliens had landed. Desirae was the first to recover.
“What the hell are you talking about?”
Before Young could answer, a woman walked into the kitchen and stopped beside him. She was an identical copy of the woman standing beside me covered in blood. She was Danielle Dillon.
Danielle was dressed in denim capris and a flowery top with ruffles and capped sleeves. Everything she wore, from her clothes and shoes to her jewelry and makeup, was expensive. For a woman on the lam, she was well funded. Her long hair was down. It was as long as her sister’s, though Danielle’s was layered with more framing around her face. She also had brown eyes, but hers were bright, clear, and sharp, unlike her sister’s that had become increasingly dark and hollow over the course of our time together in the kitchen. She was obviously just as tall and slim, but she was slightly larger through the hips, and I attributed this to the fact that she’d had a baby.
“Dezi,” she said. Her voice was so similar to Desirae’s it was hard to tell them apart.
If Danielle found anything strange or upsetting about her sister’s appearance or activities, she gave no indication of it. I thought she could tell her sister had finally snapped, though.
“So you finally come to see your sister,” Desirae said.
Danielle looked away from Desirae, focusing on me and the rest of the kitchen. She shrugged as she moved toward the opposite end of the kitchen on the other side of the bar, keeping the counter between her and Desirae.
“I heard you wanted to see me.”
Desirae laughed. It was the laugh of madness. It sent shivers down my spine.
“Precious Dani. Precious, perfect Dani. Always a step ahead of me, always smarter, always faster, always better. Yet here you are. Because I finally won.”
I had no idea what Desirae was rambling about. None of it made sense. I had serious doubts she’d ever make sense again, with the damage she’d sustained. It seemed to me Desirae had finally reached her breaking point.
As Danielle continued to walk across the kitchen, she drew Desirae’s gaze. Desirae turned to face her and finally had her back to me. With Desirae having finally cracked, I didn’t think there was much hope of things getting any better. I had no idea why Danielle was really here, but it had been her Desirae had wanted. If she had her, she wouldn’t need me anymore. Or Priscilla or Natalie. And the longer I sat here, the more I’d bleed.
Without any real idea of what I was doing, in a move born out of total desperation, I flung myself backward in the chair. The momentum caused the chair to rock back on two legs, teeter, then fall back and crash against the floor. Young and Desirae both cried out and whipped around to see what had happened. As if my life depended on it, because it did, I kicked my right leg and ripped the chair leg free of the chair with strength I didn’t know I had.
Desirae, nearest me, was armed with only a flashlight. Seeing me topple over, she flung it down and ran to the island, snatching up the long knife. She ran toward me, gripping the knife in front of her with both hands. I raised my leg and kicked, sinking my foot into her belly. She doubled over as her grip on the knife slackened. I kicked again, striking at her arms. The knife flew out of her grip and clattered to the floor. I kicked a third time, lunging at her head. My goal was to incapacitate her. I still needed to get free from the chair before she could get it together and grab another knife. My heel connected with her nose, and I felt the telltale crunch. She stumbled backward, clutching at her face with both hands, then fell to the floor.
Young had taken a minute to figure out what to do. When he had, he came hurrying around the counter, trying to grab my gun out of his waistband. I struggled against the chair, jerking up on the arms. With a grunt and an extra boost from the surge of adrenaline, I ripped my right arm free. Young finally got his hands on the gun. I reached out for the knife that had fallen from Desirae’s hands. Stretching, straining against the skewer still painfully nailing my thigh to the chair, I got my fingertips on it. Pulling it toward me, I finally got it close enough to grab. I picked it up then swung my arm back toward Young, who was now standing over me.
He was holding the gun in both hands, pointing it at my head. I noticed his hands were shaking as he did so; this really wasn’t his bag. But he pulled the trigger.
The gun clicked harmlessly. Confused, he pulled the trigger again. Swinging the knife toward him, I brought it down on his hands and the gun. I felt the knife connect, and a
n instant later Young was screaming. The gun clattered to the floor, and there was blood everywhere.
“Safety’s on,” I said.
I didn’t waste any time trying to assess the damaged I’d done to Young. Using the knife, I freed my left arm from the chair then closed both hands around the skewer. I cried out with the pain I felt in my forearm and then again as I pulled the skewer free of the chair and slid it back through my leg.
“Oh, you bitch,” I hissed between breaths.
I sat up and freed my left leg, then I got to my feet.
Danielle Dillon was beside me now, having run around the counter. I picked up the gun and held it in my right hand, the knife and skewer in my left. Young was slumped against the cabinets, holding his hands to his chest, sobbing and bleeding. Desirae was gone.
“Are you okay?” Danielle asked me.
“Shit, where’d she go?”
“That way.” She pointed to a doorway at the back of the kitchen. “You don’t look so good.”
“I’ve felt better.”
I started walking. Well, limping might have been more accurate. The pain in my leg was horrendous, and the lemon was still burning.
“Do you have a phone?” I asked Danielle as I made my way to the guest suite.
“Yes. Why?” she asked, hurrying after me.
“Why? To call 911. I need help, and these two need ambulances.”
Hello! Keep up!
I pushed open the bathroom door and saw Priscilla was awake. She was sitting on the floor in front of the tub beside Natalie. An empty, bloody chair sat in front of them. There were nail clippers on the counter, and I guessed Priscilla had snipped Natalie free of her bindings. The girls sat with their arms and hands entwined, their knees drawn up to their chests. Both were bloody and crying, their mascara streaking down their cheeks.
“Oh, my God!” Natalie sobbed when she saw me.
I looked at my reflection in the mirror above the sink. I didn’t look great, but I’d certainly looked worse. Of course, to Natalie, to whom nothing bad had ever happened, I probably looked like death warmed over.
“Are you two all right?” I asked, moving the chair out of the bathroom.
There were mumbled answers through the sobs. I didn’t understand any of them, but I took them as affirmatives because both were sitting up, awake and breathing. I turned to Danielle.
“Stay with them. Lock the bedroom door and this door. And call 911.” I held the knife out to her. “Here’s this. Just in case.”
“You want me to stab my sister?” She looked at the knife, not reaching for it.
“If your sister manages to get through these doors, she’ll intend to do much worse to you. I want you to have something to defend yourself with. I know you’re a fighter.”
Her eyes snapped up to mine. Then I saw them fill with determination. She took the knife.
“Where are you going?” she asked.
“I’m going to find Desirae.”
__________
When I returned to the kitchen, the house seemed unnaturally quiet, aside from the pot still boiling on the stove. I cut through the kitchen, picking up the flashlight Desirae had dropped. Young was no longer crying on the kitchen floor. I made a mental note to keep my eyes peeled for him. It was possible he’d be upset about what I’d done to his hands and want a little payback.
In the beam of the flashlight, I could see drops of blood that had fallen from Desirae’s nose. She’d run into the family room that opened to the front of the house on the other side of the kitchen. I followed the blood drops to the front door. It was standing open, and the blood drops trailed out over the threshold. From the other way, I could see a much heavier blood trail, and I guessed this to be Young’s. His led up the stairs.
I had to make a decision, and I chose to follow Desirae. It was a very real possibility Young would arm himself with another weapon and take a run at Danielle and the girls in the bathroom, but it was a risk I was willing to take. From what I could tell, Young wasn’t a killer. He didn’t like violence, and he wasn’t hard to overcome. I also thought Danielle would have fewer qualms about using force against Young than she would her sister.
Trusting my instincts, I darted out the front door. I could see now only the power to the guesthouse had gone out; the rest of the property was still lit. No doubt Danielle had cut it before going inside. Smart girl. I was beginning to like her.
I followed the dark drops on the pavement around the garage and to the main house. They led right through the front door, which was standing open. I climbed the steps onto the front porch, listening hard. I had a fair measure of trepidation. This was a big house, and Lyle Young had claimed to have an open-door policy. I knew of at least one other person who resided on the property, and there could have been any number of others. Of those others, I had no way of knowing who was in on what. It didn’t escape my attention that I could very well be walking into an ambush. The smart play would be to go back to the guesthouse and wait for the police, then let them get Desirae.
That was the smart move. But Desirae had spent the last however long torturing me. And my boyfriend’s sister, which I was upset about, of course, but she’d stabbed me with that stupid skewer and ripped off my fingernail! Not to mention she had doused me with lemon juice, which was still burning. No, the smart move wasn’t for me—not this time. I had some unfinished business with Desirae.
Inside, I could see the blood drops moved away from the threshold, in the same direction Young had led me when I’d interrupted his lunch. I put the flashlight down on the porch, tucked the skewer into my back pocket, and held the gun in front of me with both hands, then I stepped inside. I pushed the door open all the way, making sure no one was waiting behind it. Satisfied, I moved into the house carefully, my senses on high alert.
The house was big and open, and I’d only been in one small part of it one time. Here, Desirae had the home-court advantage. Given she had already bested me once, I would have to be extra cautious.
The blood drops led in the direction of the kitchen. Knowing Desirae’s fondness for kitchens and their utensils, I thought this was a likely place for her to go. Especially since she’d left all her weapons in the guesthouse. I was hoping she didn’t have a gun. The only guns I’d seen were mine, but I didn’t want to make any assumptions. The game would be much different if she had a gun, and my anxiety about following the crazy woman into a huge, foreign house would be much higher. If she was sticking to knives and the like, I wouldn’t be so worried.
I kept to the walls and took corners carefully. I saw the drops disappear around the corner into the room I knew to be the kitchen. I couldn’t hear anything—no footsteps, no breathing, no rummaging in drawers.
Neither did I hear any sirens. If Danielle had called 911 when I’d left her in the bathroom, I thought surely they would have arrived by now. Then a horrible thought occurred to me. What if I’d been wrong about Danielle Dillon? What if she had a different part in things, like a part responsible for murder? Her sister had become a murderer. After growing up in the same circumstances, it wasn’t even a reach to think she could have turned out the same way. If this was true, I’d left her holding a knife with two helpless girls.
Suddenly, I had a strong urge to turn around and go back. Then I was torn. My gut told me I was right about Danielle and to continue after Desirae, but my head made a compelling argument. I let a mental string of curses go and continued on. The longer I stood around trying to figure out what to do, the more time I wasted and the worse things could get. I was already here, so I decided to see about Desirae.
When I got to the kitchen, I inched around the door carefully, expecting to see her with each step I took. When I’d gotten to the other side of the door, I stepped inside, my gun immediately covering the last corner not visible from the doorway. It was empty. I moved through the space quickly, searching the floor for blood drops telling me where she’d gone. On the other side of the island, I could see the pla
stic apron on the floor and bloody fingerprints on the roll of paper towels on the counter. The blood drops stopped there.
I made my way out of the kitchen through a different doorway and continued on. I passed room after room and found no sign of Desirae. Some of the lights were off and some were on. As I went into each room, I turned on the light if it wasn’t already on. I wasn’t necessarily trying to be sneaky about catching up with her.
When I got to the back corner of the house, I was standing outside French doors leading to the master suite. The light was on inside, and one door was open. As I approached, I expected to find the room empty, like all the others, but when I got closer, I saw a dark smear on the doorframe. It was blood, left by someone brushing against the jamb on the way into the room.
I carefully examined what I could see of the room from the door then went in. The space was huge. The bed, a king in a huge frame, was pushed against the wall on the right. The wall on the left had three large arched doorways. My first guess was that these were a bathroom and his and her closets. Keeping my gun in front of me and my eyes on the room and the doorways, I closed the door, not bothering to be quiet about it.
“Desirae!” I called, moving into the room slowly, cautiously.
I heard nothing.
“Desirae, come on out.”
I didn’t expect this to work, but I thought it was worth a try.
As I neared the first doorway, I looked in with the aid of the light pouring in from the bedroom, which was minimal. I could see enough to confirm this was a closet, and from the smell of cologne I guessed it to be Young’s. I kept moving, approaching what I could now see was the bathroom. It was also dark, the light from the bedroom insufficient enough to light the whole space.
“Desirae,” I said again. “I know you’re in here. There’s no point hiding.”
I walked on, toward the next doorway, which I could see was another closet. I turned my head slightly to glance over my shoulder at the other side of the bed, just to make sure she wasn’t crouched down there behind me. Then I heard a primal growl come from the closet. I turned around in time to see Desirae fly out, arms raised. In one hand, she clutched a carving knife, in the other, a cleaver. I didn’t think people kept meat cleavers in their kitchens anymore. But then, Desirae had a thing for kitchen equipment and probably had lots of stuff most people didn’t.
Catherine Nelson - Zoe Grey 02 - The Trouble with Theft Page 26