by Taylor Smith
The banging stopped and there came the muffled sound of male voices. Paul Chaney? It sounded like Paul Chaney. He was talking to someone outside—and then he wasn’t. She strained her ears, but there was only the slap of hockey sticks and the droning of distant traffic. No, she wanted to scream, don’t leave, please! But it was hopeless. He was gone.
Mariah’s eyes closed and she felt tears welling up again while the intruder waited for what seemed like an eternity. Then, slowly, she felt his body relax. His hand slipped from her mouth, and he kissed her hard on the lips, then moved his mouth down her neck. She pressed herself into the wall, clenching her fists as his free hand began to travel over her body, exploring. When it reached her hips, he gripped the bottom of her sweater and tugged at it. “Take it off.” He took a step back, moving the knife away from her neck, flicking it impatiently. “Now—hurry up!”
Mariah stared at the weird eyes, knowing that there was nothing about her that they were seeing—not a woman, not the mother of a child, not even a human being. Those eyes were fixed on nothing but a toy and a victim, the way a cat watches a fluttering sparrow hooked on its claws, playing with it a little before the killing pounce. There was an inevitability about what was happening in this room, she realized. He was going to rape her, and then he was going to kill her. His strength and the knife in his hand gave him the right to do it. All that was required of her was that she bow to the forces of primitive nature being played out here—submit and get it over with.
She crossed her arms in front of her and grasped the bottom of her pullover, drawing it up and over her head. Bringing her arms back down, she began slowly untangling them from the wool. His eyes were focused on her bra and his chest rose and fell heavily. “Good,” he breathed, a grin stretching out his lips. His face was shiny, sweat shimmering unevenly on the pockmarked surface. He waved the knife over her body. “Now the rest.”
She nodded, and even managed a small smile, as she extracted her hands from the sleeves and lightly shook out the bulky sweater. And then she lunged, holding the sweater before her, driving it into the knife and wrapping it quickly around the blade and his hand. As he dropped back and struggled to free himself from the tangle, she raised her right hand and extended the heel of it, driving it into his nose, connecting so hard that pain shot up her arm to her elbow.
He staggered, a tiny trickle of blood seeping from each nostril, and then his knees buckled. His hands reached to grab her as she leaped past him toward the door, but one was still tangled with the sweater and the knife. His other hand wrapped around her arm, but she yanked herself free before he could lock on. He hit the floor with a thud.
Mariah ran out the door, pulling it shut behind her and then flying toward the stairs. As she started down, she heard the door slam against the frame and then rapid footsteps. She took the steps two at a time.
When she reached the bottom, she turned and glanced up. He was on the landing, his eyes wild with fury and the lower half of his face dripping scarlet from the nose, which was bleeding heavily now. He raised his right arm behind his ear, then brought it down with a snap. She saw the knife in slow motion as it flew out of his hand and spun toward her, the blade rotating over the ivory handle until the killing point was aimed directly at her.
At the last split second, she jumped aside, diving for the floor. When she scrambled to her knees and turned around, she saw that the blade had quietly stopped—Paul Chaney’s eyes went wide as the knife buried itself in his gut. He looked from his stomach to Mariah to the stairs. And then he stumbled back against the wall.
“Paul!” Mariah screamed.
But Burton was already down the stairs and on him, fumbling for the knife. Chaney grabbed the man’s wrist and the two of them grappled while Mariah cast her eyes desperately around the hall for a weapon of some sort. Finding none, she pounced on Burton’s back, wrapping her right forearm around his windpipe. She gripped her wrist with her other hand, squeezing as hard as she could until she finally heard him gurgle and he released the knife. His knee came up and connected with Chaney, who crumpled with an agonized groan into a ball on the floor.
Burton threw himself backward against the opposite wall, slamming Mariah into it. She slid off his back limply, collapsing on the floor. He turned and fixed her with a look of infinite hatred on his bloodied face. Then, with one last glance at Chaney, who was slowly unfolding himself on the floor, Burton flew to the front door. A second later, he was gone.
Mariah got to her feet and staggered to the door, slamming the dead bolt home. She moved toward Chaney, who had pulled himself to a sitting position, his knees still tucked into his chest. On the floor beneath his body appeared the ivory-handled knife.
“Are you all right?” she asked.
He looked at his left hand, the palm bleeding. Rolling his fist, he poked two fingers tentatively through the gaping hole in the front of his leather jacket. The knife had entered at the center, on the placket where the two sides overlapped, its lethal intent foiled by multiple layers of cowhide. He withdrew his fingers and nodded, stunned and unable to speak, his eyes closing again on the other pain that Mariah knew hadn’t dissipated yet.
She ran into the kitchen and locked the door to the garage. Placing her palms to the wood and pressing her cheek against its cool surface, she leaned into the door, eyes closed, willing herself to become just another part of the unfeeling architecture. The sound of Chaney calling her name from the hall brought her back among the living. She turned and examined the kitchen. Long, dark spatters stained one wall, the floor beneath it littered with the remains of the coffee carafe. The broom lay wedged into a corner, while on the table the scattered photos of David and Elsa provided mute testimony to still another aspect of the human capacity for cruelty. She picked her way past the glass on the floor and returned to the hall.
“Mariah—oh God, you’re bleeding!” Chaney cried, leaping to his feet.
Her eyes drifted to her chest, where a line of blood ran down between her breasts and into her bra. She touched her throat. “It’s just a nick,” she said numbly, examining the blood on her fingers.
He moved forward and she felt his arms go around her, but she recoiled from him and from the cold touch of leather on her bare skin. She crossed her arms in front of her chest and stood pressed against the wall for a moment. Then, shivering, she went to the hall closet and reached in for David’s old hockey jacket. Her hand froze in midair. She stared at the jacket, remembering the countless times she had seen him wear it—and the times she had snuggled into it as he pulled her close. She looked at the fuzzy crest of his college team stitched on the breast and remembered how she used to trace it with her finger, lying against him in parked cars or under autumn trees. Looking away from the jacket, she pulled down a fleece cardigan, zippered herself into it and shut the door.
“I almost left,” Chaney was saying behind her. “I was going to go and look for you at the swimming pool, but then I decided to check the garage. I tried the kitchen door. I saw—” He hesitated. “I saw everything in there—the broken glass and everything. Then I heard pounding on the stairs and I just ran into the hall.”
Mariah turned around and leaned against the wall, sliding down to a sitting position. “You saved my life. He was going to kill me.”
“Who was he?” She shook her head. Chaney watched her for a minute, then said, “I’ll call 9-1-1.”
She pulled up her knees and buried her head in her arms as Chaney went into the kitchen. She heard his voice vaguely, but it seemed to be coming from somewhere a long way away, down a long tunnel. Then it was closer, and she looked up to see Chaney crouched in front of her.
“The police will be here in a few minutes,” he said. She nodded dumbly. “Mariah, those pictures—”
Her head snapped back. “Oh, God! I’ve got to get rid of them!” She scrambled to her feet.
Chaney grabbed her. “No, Mariah! The police will want to see them. They’re evidence. You can’t touch them.”
“No! They don’t have anything to do with him! I have to get rid of them! No one can see them!” She struggled against him, but he held her tightly. “Let me go!”
“Mariah, what are you talking about? Where did they come from?”
“From Lindsay.”
“What?”
“Lindsay—someone sent them home with her from school. Someone’s trying to terrorize me. I don’t know why.”
“Someone did terrorize you, Mariah. He nearly killed you!”
“No, he didn’t know anything about the pictures. He was in the house, waiting, when I got back from dropping off Lindsay. She gave me the envelope in the car. I had just opened it when that bastard came into the kitchen.”
“They could be related.”
“He was a stalker, the one who followed me from the pool the other night.”
“He could have been a hired thug.”
Mariah glared at him. “And who are you, Chaney? What’s your role in all this?”
“What?”
“You heard me! This is about Vienna again, isn’t it? About whatever game you and Katarina Müller were playing there.”
He was stunned. “How do you know her real name?” He blanched as the truth dawned. “It was you! You’re CIA!”
“Never mind how I know! What were the two of you up to?”
“I was never in league with that woman! She used me—maybe to get to David, I don’t know. I was an idiot. I knew what she was, but I played along for a while, thinking there was a story in it.”
“What are you talking about?”
“She approached me out of the blue at a reception one night—came on hot and heavy. I didn’t much like her, but there was something about her.”
“Yeah, I’ll bet.”
“No, I mean I was suspicious of her. I’m not sure why. Maybe it was just because she was so damn calculating. Anyway, I’ve got a friend in the German embassy—an intelligence officer. He told me she had been an agent for the other side during the Cold War. He was curious to know what she was up to now and so was I, so I played dumb.” Chaney sighed. “You have to believe me, Mariah. I didn’t realize until too late that she was going after David. I never would have let it go on if I had known.”
“You knew about them.” It was an accusation.
He bit his lip, watching her closely. Then he nodded. “I saw them together one night, going into her apartment building. It was the evening of the ambassador’s reception.” He sighed again. “That’s why I did what I did on the terrace that night, Mariah. You looked so unhappy. I thought you must have suspected that David was cheating on you. I just wanted to hold you and make the hurt go away.”
Mariah stared at him and then slid back down the wall. “Oh, God, what happened? How could he have done it?”
Chaney crouched in front of her. “I don’t know, but we’re in this together, Mariah.”
“What’s it got to do with you?”
“David was my friend…and I care about you, too,” he said quietly. “Ever since David and Lindsay were attacked, I’ve been following up leads, trying to figure out who was behind it. Someone seems to be real annoyed about my snooping.”
“Annoyed?”
“I got fired this morning.”
From off in the distance, they heard a police siren. As Mariah stared at Chaney’s sober face, the siren grew louder. She glanced around nervously. Suddenly, she grasped his arm. “All right, listen, we’ll work together. Maybe we can figure this out. I have some information that might help. But we’ve got to get rid of those pictures.” He started to shake his head, but she gripped his arm tighter. “Please,” she pleaded. “I want the police to get that bastard who attacked me. But if those pictures become part of the investigation, they could come out in court eventually and Lindsay would find out about her father’s affair. She adored David. I could kill him for what he did, but I can’t let her be hurt any more than she already has been. Please, Paul, help me.”
The wailing of the siren was piercing now. Then it whined to an abrupt halt, and they heard the sound of a cruiser crunching to a stop on the road outside. Chaney hesitated briefly, and then leaped up and ran to the kitchen. At the sound of a knock on the front door, Mariah rose to her feet. She watched in the kitchen doorway as Chaney stuffed the photos into the envelope, and then jammed the envelope down the back of his pants. He looked up at her and nodded. She opened the front door.
For the next few hours, Mariah recounted the horror of what had happened, stunned to realize that it had been barely twenty minutes that she had been terrorized by the intruder—it had seemed agonizingly longer than that. Over and over—first for the patrol officer, then for the investigators, then later in the hospital emergency ward where she and Chaney were taken to have their cuts and bruises examined and photographed and treated, and to receive tetanus shots for the knife wounds—she described the sequence of events that had begun when she returned to her house that afternoon. The only detail she left out was any reference to the envelope and its contents.
One officer took Chaney out to a police van to question him separately, while Mariah walked through the house with the officer heading the investigation, Sergeant Albrecht. She pointed out the places where she had struggled with Burton, describing his pockmarked face and mismatched eyes, shaking again as she recalled the moment she had understood that he was going to kill her.
“You say he was in the house when you got home?” Albrecht asked. Mariah nodded. “How did he get in, do you suppose?”
“I’m not sure. The dead bolt was on the front door when I left. I usually come and go through the kitchen.”
“That’s the door to the garage?”
“Yes.”
“Did you lock it when you went out?”
“No, but I always close the garage door with the remote.”
The sergeant grimaced. “Those things aren’t secure, you know. They operate on a few common frequencies—any amateur hacker can defeat them.” He sighed. “Did you close the garage door when you left this morning?”
“Yes, I’m sure I did. But I was running late and in a hurry. I don’t think I stayed to see it close completely.” She buried her head in her hands. “This was my fault, wasn’t it? I should have been more careful.”
“It wasn’t your fault, Ms. Bolt. Maybe you made it a little easier for him, but an animal like that, he’d have found a way in sooner or later, especially if he was stalking you, as you said. Don’t worry—we’ll get him. My people are dusting for prints now and we’ve got his weapon. And blood samples for DNA typing,” he added appreciatively. “Do you think you broke his nose?”
Mariah looked at the heel of her hand, which was already showing signs of a bad bruise. Her wrist ached and felt swollen. “I’m not sure, but he was bleeding like a pig and I sure as heck hurt my hand when I hit him.”
“That’s a mean right hand you’ve got there, ma’am,” Albrecht said. She smiled a little. “We’ll alert the hospital emergency wards in the area to watch out for broken noses attached to mugs fitting your description of this creep. Chances are he’ll lie low, but we might get lucky.”
Mariah nodded. Then her head snapped up. “I just remembered something. There was a cup on the counter when I came in. I thought it was out of place at the time. I didn’t leave it out this morning and I’m pretty sure my daughter didn’t.”
“Where is it now?”
“I put the cup in the dishwasher—navy blue. There’s a white one in the machine, but that was mine from breakfast.”
“Okay, good. I’ll have one of the officers check it for prints. We’ll also want to get your fingerprints and Mr. Chaney’s so we can know whose prints are whose.” He took her by the elbow and led her to the door of the bedroom. “Here,” he said. “Put these on.”
Mariah puzzled over the tinted goggles he handed her, but she did as she was told and then they went in. The room was dark, the heavy drapes drawn. Someone was moving slowly around the
room with a light, pausing now and again to place markers and take samples before moving on.
“This is Officer Harmon,” Sergeant Albrecht said. “She’s using a portable laser to search for fibers and fluids.”
“Almost done,” the officer said. “Two secs, and then we can turn the lights back on.”
“Just stand against the wall here and try not to move or touch anything,” Albrecht instructed Mariah. She stood in the corner, watching the laser illuminate minute fragments that she knew would never have been picked up by the naked eye, grateful for the officers’ thoroughness, but feeling the anger rise in her again as she remembered the reason for it.
“Okay, all done. You can hit the lights, Sarge.”
Albrecht flipped the switch and took Mariah’s goggles from her. “I’ll leave you with Officer Harmon now, Ms. Bolt, while I see how the boys are doing outside.”
Mariah nodded, wincing in the light. She looked over to see Officer Harmon, a young black woman, coiling up a cable on the light wand. Mariah’s pullover was still lying where her attacker had thrown it after untangling the knife. As she glanced around the room, she noticed that a drawer—her lingerie one—was open, a few items tumbling out. There was a pair of panties on the floor. She stared at them.
“You said you never removed your clothing,” Officer Harmon said, “except for the sweater.” Mariah nodded. “Then it appears the creep was examining your undies while he waited. I assume you don’t usually leave things scattered like this?”
Mariah looked over at her. “No, I don’t.” She stared again at the drawer, feeling nauseated and furious at yet another violation. “I didn’t see this before. My back was to the dresser.”