Kill Jill (5 page)

She descends four steps, then pulls the freezer back in place. It proves harder than she anticipated, but she’s able to manage. She descends the ladder till her feet touch the concrete floor of Jack’s secret room. She feels the wall for the light switch. Finds it, flips the lights on.

Funny how Milly asked about a bomb shelter this morning.

Emma takes inventory. Mini-fridge, cot, wallet, money, forty bottles of water, snacks, canned goods, can opener, paper plates, plastic utensils, wet wipes, camper’s toilet, box of plastic bags for her waste, light bulbs, flashlight, batteries, ear buds, Jack’s handgun, box of bullets. Extra clothing. Sheets, blanket, and pillow for the cot. Table, chair, laptop computer.

Laptop computer?

She plugs the power cable into the outlet, hits the on button, waits for it to power up. Spends the next thirty minutes typing everything she knows about Jack into three different search engines, but nothing comes up.

That’s a good thing. If his plane crashed, it would have been reported by now. But the fact he’s not here could mean someone killed him and dumped his body in a swamp.

She turns off the computer, walks to the ladder, climbs the first step…

…And hears someone kick the back door open!

She starts to flip the light off, then decides it’s safer to keep it on. At least she won’t trip over something and make a noise.

She crosses the floor, sits on the cot, loads the gun. Listens to the heavy footsteps moving slowly down the hall above her. Hears a man’s voice calling to her in a mocking way.

“Are you hiding, Emma? I know you’re in here. Come out, come out, wherever you are! Emma?”

She knows exactly where he is by his footsteps and running commentary.

“Are you in the laundry room? No? How about the coat closet? No? Maybe you’re in the powder room? No? Could you possibly be hiding behind…the
couch
? No? Where
are
you, Emma?”

Even though his voice is high and creepy, she can tell he’s a big man. He’s almost certainly drunk, as well.

“Are you upstairs, Emma?”

She hears him climb the steps.

“What’s up here, Emma? A bedroom? Another bathroom? Maybe I’ll give you a bath. Would you like that, Emma?”

He continues speaking in a weird, sing-song voice, but he’s too far away for her to make out the exact words.

Until he comes back down the stairs.

She hears him walking directly above her, hears him open the door to the closet above her, where the freezer is kept.

“Don’t tell me you’re hiding in the freezer!”

She doesn’t hear him turn the closet light on, or open the freezer, but she assumes he does. She lifts the gun, aims it at the top of the built-in ladder. She can literally see the bottom of the freezer. If he happens to pull it toward him and lean over it, he’ll see the open area that leads to the secret room. If Jack’s gun works, she’ll blow him away as he descends the ladder.

He’ll have no chance of surviving if he descends the ladder.

If Jack’s gun works.

If she has the guts to pull the trigger.

She doesn’t hear him close the freezer, or turn off the light, but she does hear him close the closet door.

“I saved the master bedroom for last,” he says.

Emma gives a sigh of relief when she hears him say, “Are you under the bed? No? How about the bedroom closets? No? The bathroom? Are you hiding in the shower, Emma? I hope you’re naked! I surely do hope you’re naked!”

A moment goes by quietly, then she hears him say, “My, my! What do we have here?”

Then he goes quiet.

She knows he’s up there, in the master bedroom, but doing what?

Hiding?

Waiting for her to return?

Time passes.

No problem, she can wait him out. Thank God she was in the secret room when he showed up. She can sit tight for weeks, if need be.

Emma waits patiently for another twenty minutes, then hears a pop. The type of pop that can only come from…

Her balloons
!
The bastard has her balloons
!

A moment passes, then…

Pop!

Emma makes a face, squeezes her eyes shut, tries to force her mind not to think about the scent of latex, the texture, the…

Pop!

Her face flushes hot. She swallows. Feels her nipples grow hard as she imagines the life force filling a balloon. But what shape? What size? What color? Not knowing which ones he selected is making her crazy.

Pop!

Oh!

She’s…

Pop!

Oh, my God
!

She’s…
Omigod
! Did she just have an accident?

She did.

But…did she scream?

No. At least, she doesn’t think so.

But if he pops another one she will. Because that will take her to Multiple Land, a place she’s never been.

She listens carefully.

Is he blowing up another one?

If he is, she’s toast.

She prays he’s not.

But secretly hopes he is.

She closes her eyes. Feels her hand moving toward…

No! She can’t let it happen. If she cries out, she’ll have to kill him.

Whoever he is.

Thankfully, she hears him walking again. Hears him leave the master bedroom. Hears him walk down the hallway toward the back door. Hears his creepy voice say, “I’ll be back!”

Will he?

She hears the door slam shut.

Has he, in fact, gone?

She carefully places Jack’s gun on the floor, then lies down on the cot.

Two hours later she turns off the secret room light, climbs up the ladder, pushes the freezer away from the wall, climbs over it, puts it back in place, and checks the condition of the back door. She closes it, notices the frame’s intact. She gets a hammer and three quarters, presses the quarters between the door and the jamb, and pounds them flush against the frame. It’s not perfect, but it’ll do, since she’ll be spending her nights in Jack’s secret room for the time being.

She goes to the master bedroom, sees five burst balloons on her bed, one of her bras, and a pair of her panties.

She starts shaking, realizing what he did prior to bursting the balloons.

She goes to the kitchen, removes a knife from the drawer, brings it back to the bedroom, uses it to lift her soiled bra and panties from the bed.

She retches once, twice, in horror and disgust, and nearly drops them on the floor, but manages to carry them down the hall, holding them as far away from her as possible, while trying not to gag. She makes her way to the kitchen, drops her bra, panties, and knife in the trash.

On the way back to the bedroom, she grabs a tissue, uses it to collect the balloon pieces, tosses them in the master bathroom trash basket.

Then she changes into running clothes.

Emma turns the porch light on, goes outside, strains her eyes to see if the kid in the Ford pickup is spying on her again. If he is, she can’t tell. Too much tree cover. But really, what difference would it make? She can’t very well grab his ear and threaten him like her cabbie, Frank Sturgiss, did. She stretches a few minutes, walks down the porch steps, notices a tiny red dot glowing in the grass a few feet away. Walks over, reaches down to see what it is, but it’s disappeared. She gives up the search, starts jogging Leeds Road in the same direction Frank the cabbie walked yesterday morning. Frank’s been gone about thirty hours, and though she barely knew the man, she misses him. Felt a lot safer when he was around.

Leeds Road runs north of Willow Lake. If you enter from the south, Jack Russell’s place is second on the left. During tourist season, all these homes will be filled to the rafters with families. But tonight, the first four houses she passes are empty.

Jack’s neighborhood is on a peninsula of land that surrounds a large, wooded hill, where Frank says the townies hang out. Normally Emma wouldn’t run in a strange place this close to dusk, but she’s had a rough three days, needs to unwind, and wants to know where her neighbors are.

Leeds Road circles the hill for three-fourths of a mile. In that stretch, Emma sees evidence of four permanent residents. The closest is only three hundred yards away, which is reassuring. Maybe she’ll pay them a visit tomorrow.

When Leeds dead-ends at Route 53, Emma turns left, runs a quarter mile to Thread Hill, which offers another mile of lakefront houses. When the road ends at the woods, she turns around, heads back the way she came. Emma can comfortably run an eight-minute pace for an hour, but it’s getting darker now, so she decides to cut her run short. When she gets back to Jack’s house, she finds a midnight-blue Mustang parked in the driveway.

Approaching from the rear, she sees the windows are fogged. Should she circle around to the back of the house? Or tap on the trunk to see who gets out of the car?

She opts to tap on the trunk, figuring to keep the car between her and the bad guy, should there be a bad guy. Just as she’s about to tap, she thinks,
what if there are two men in the car?

By then it doesn’t matter.

The driver’s door opens, a man climbs out. A very large, very angry man who says, “Emma Wilson?”

She recognizes the voice. Heard it three hours ago, in her home, before he masturbated on her underwear. What a charmer.

But he’s not being charming now.

The term “seething with anger” comes to mind. As does drunk. And redneck. And…did she mention angry?

“Emma
Wilson
?” he repeats, through clenched teeth.

“Yes?”

“I’m Darryl Rhodes. Invite me in.”

“Last time you were here you left some DNA in my bra and panties.”

“I won’t ask you again.”

“Good. Because you’d get the same response. No! Now fuck off, Darryl.”

Darryl doesn’t like her response. Likes it so little, he looks ready to lunge at her. Emma tenses, ready to sprint. Suddenly the passenger door opens, and a young lady who can’t be more than twenty gets out. As she does, the interior light allows Emma to see extensive cuts and bruises on her face.

“You must be Abbie,” she says.

“Yes ma’am.”

“Why are you here?”

Darryl looks across the car at his young wife, curls his lips into a sneer as ugly as a puss wound. “Tell her, Bitch.”

Abbie gives him a pleading look, then gives up and says, “I had sex with your fiancé.”

Darryl says, “Tell her
when
.”

“Last month.”

“You hear that?” Darryl says. “Your fiancé was cheatin’ on you last month with this
whore
! What do you think about
that
?”

Emma says, “I don’t approve of your tone, nor do I tolerate drunks on my property.”

“Is that right? Well, it ain’t your property, though, is it?”

“Not yet. Which is all the more reason not to let you stay. You’ve delivered your message. Jack cheated on me. Anything else?”

“Yeah, I got somethin’ else. Are them tits of yours real?”

“I can’t think of a single reason to answer that question.”

“I got one. Your fiancé fucked my
wife
!”

Emma pauses a minute, then says, “If you’ve got more to say about that, you’ll have to sit on the porch to do it. Otherwise, leave.”

“Where will Abbie sit?”

“Wherever she likes.”

He gives Abbie a look. “Guess you’ll be sittin’ beside me on the porch, Sugar Plum.”

She reluctantly walks toward him, follows him up the steps, takes a seat beside him.

Emma knows beyond a doubt she can outrun this giant hillbilly at any distance. The fact he’s twenty feet away, drunk, and sitting down, makes her safe as Fort Knox. Nevertheless, she reminds herself to remain alert in case things turn ugly.

“You didn’t answer me, Emma,” Darryl says. “How does it make you feel that the man you exchanged solemn promises with was fuckin’ a married woman no more’n a month ago?”

Emma says, “Is that true, Abbie?”

“Yes, ma’am. I’m real sorry.”

“I believe you. Do you plan to do it again?”

She looks at her husband, then back at Emma. “No ma’am.”

“You promise?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“Good. I forgive you.”

“You do?” Abbie says.