Ever So Silent

by Christopher Little

  I creep softly across the lawn and around the back of the house. The goggles are unbelievable. Although green and grainy, the image is well-defined, high-resolution, and focused.

  Unlike at Deb’s house, I discover that the back door is locked. No problem. From my backpack I extract a double-suction glass puller—the kind car window installers use (“Safelite® Repairs! Safelite® Replace!”)—which I attach to one of the four divided lights of the back door. I etch a rectangle with my never-used tungsten carbide glass cutter. A little tap tap tap, and I am able to silently withdraw a piece of glass large enough for my arm to fit through. I unlatch the door and find myself standing in a mudroom. Although the field of view of the goggles is narrow, I move my head left and right, up and down and scan the room. It is as bright as a sunny day after a snowfall. I listen for the telltale beep beep beep of an alarm panel. Even though I don’t hear any beeps, I check the walls anyway. No alarm system. It makes no sense to me that someone would live without an alarm system. Hasn’t Vanessa ever heard of “home invasions?” The mudroom is filled with skis, skates, life jackets, swimming noodles, flippers, and boots. Every object is distinct. I have in my possession an enormous tactical advantage.

  I pass into the kitchen. The only sound is that of a ticking analog clock. Not a creature was stirring, not even Vanessa.

  ’Twas the night of a killing, when all thro’ the house,

  Not a creature was stirring, not even a mouse;

  The kitchen was tidy and cleaned with great care,

  In hopes that Mr. Sharpie soon would be there;

  Vanessa was nestled all snug in her bed,

  While visions of a murder danc’d in my head.

  I find the doorway which leads to the basement. Stairs are always a problem, particularly in an old Colonial. I widen my stance and place my sneakers on the ends of the treads. Hardly making a squeak, I duck-walk down to the cellar. Aided by the goggles, I have no trouble finding the breaker box. I press down on the main disconnect switch. It makes a loud snap. I freeze. After a few moments of intense listening, I can’t hear any movement upstairs, which is where I proceed next.

  I assume that Vanessa’s and Dave’s bedroom is on the second floor. (My English teacher used to repeat, tiresomely, “Assume makes an ass out of u and me.”) Never mind her, I turn out to be correct.

  I use the same duck-walk technique to mount the back staircase. I am trebly careful now as I get closer to my quarry. Four more treads (and four more risers) to go. This is when I hear the sound of a door opening on the second floor. My head and shoulders are above the floor level of the hallway, fully exposed.

  Vanessa, naked, emerges but immediately turns the other way. She walks away from me, down the hallway, and descends the front staircase. I can’t see her face, but the goggles give me a clear image of her ass.

  I retreat down the back stairs, sit down, and listen. This is not the way I planned it. I never like to deviate from my plans. I am patient. I will wait.

  Three minutes later, I hear Vanessa remounting the front stairs. I hear her walk halfway down the hall to where her bedroom is. I do not hear the bedroom door close. In fact, I hear nothing more.

  I sit on the backstairs for a full hour, waiting.

  I want Vanessa to be in REM sleep. Rapid Eye Movement sleep (hence, REM or R.E.M.) is sometimes called paradoxical sleep, which is physiologically similar to being awake. I want Vanessa to be in that state. Symptoms include: rapid breathing; an increased heart rate; rapid, low-voltage, desynchronized brain waves; and low muscle tone throughout her body. It is also the time when she will have a propensity for vivid dreams. If she has a sexual dream tonight, I somehow doubt she’ll be dreaming about Dave.

  It’s just after three o’clock. I flex my fingers and stand. I am ever so silent.

  Several quiet moments later, I’m outside her bedroom. I spy her immediately in the bed closest to the door. Her head is turned away. Her body is covered by a wrinkled sheet. Her feet and ankles are exposed to the hot night air. That is how well I can see with my priceless goggles.

  I’m amazed that one person can snore so rapidly. Must be REM sleep, as I had hoped.

  I take one step into the room. The floorboards do not creak.

  I am in.

  40

  Between the Sheets

  Wide awake, Emma felt a foreign object touch her ankle. It was not a bug. It was wet. She struggled not to flinch, and she managed to remain motionless.

  The enemy was in the bedroom. She wished Pepper was.

  She rolled over onto her stomach. To suggest that she was still asleep, she snorted. She heard Vanessa in the next bed breathing softly. As she rolled, she slipped her right hand underneath the pillow and found the grip of the Beretta. Emma stayed that way, frozen, for a few moments, lying on her stomach, trying to breathe slowly, feigning sleep.

  Then she smelled an odor, the all-too-familiar smell of a Sharpie.

  She rolled gradually onto her back and snapped her eyes open. No moonbeams shone through the window. The only light available to her was indirect moonlight. But it was enough to see a black, shadowy creature standing at the end of her bed.

  The figure started. Emma heard a muttered oath: “Shit!” She couldn’t be sure, but the voice sounded lower pitched than Will’s tenor.

  Emma’s left hand shot for the light switch. Miraculously, she found it on first lunge. She snapped the switch on. Nothing happened. The half-light of the moon was all she had. Vanessa remained asleep.

  Underneath the sheet, Emma aimed her Beretta at the intruder, trying to decide her next move. She had every right to fire her weapon, no questions asked. But what if it were Will? She really didn’t want to shoot him.

  She wished she could spring clear of the sheets. Although she had the gun, the balance of power would be a lot less one-sided if she could get to her feet. But she knew she wouldn’t be fast enough.

  Suddenly the black figure went airborne.

  The full weight of the intruder’s body landed on her, smothering her and her gun hand. The unyielding, and unmistakable, rigidity of a ballistic vest crushed her chest. The Beretta slipped out of her grip and, for the moment at least, was lost in the sheets.

  A heavy fist clocked her in the temple, and her brain swam from the blow. Still, she was able to get her fingers around the intruder’s throat.

  She screamed, “Vanessa! Get up! Run!”

  Vanessa shrieked, “What? What!?”

  “Go! Get out! Get help!” Emma managed to bellow, although she could barely breathe.

  Vanessa leapt out of her bed and ran down the hallway, screaming bloody murder.

  The monster on top of her—heavy, tall, strong—was able to pry her fingers away, bending them back one by one. Emma knew she was not going to win a wrestling match against him. He was too powerful. Instead she groped for the equalizer, Archie’s Beretta, trying to find it in the tangle of sheets.

  She stole a glance at him. He looked like a sci-fi character. He had an all-black head and, where his eyes should have been, a single tube with a lens at the end. The blow to her head must have been worse than she realized.

  His other fist walloped her other temple. The pain was incredible. She felt like she would vomit. She jammed the heel of her hand up her assailant’s nose. She heard only a mild “ooof” for her efforts.

  He punched her repeatedly, pummeling her eyes with his fists.

  She kept scrabbling for the Beretta.

  41

  Knockout

  It is only when Vanessa rolls onto her back and her eyes spring open that I realize that I have been sucker-punched. Vanessa is Emma. Emma is Vanessa.

  Fucking Emma, my once and future nemesis. How dare she?

  My plans never go awry. There is no way that I could have foreseen this ambush. That would have been beyond anyone’s capability. Anyway, none of this is part of my plan. Rest assured, I will not apologize.

  Emma is underneath me. I have complete control over
her. I can kill her if I want to. But that is not the fucking plan! Killing her would be too easy, and it would defeat the purpose. Emma suffers while those around her die. That is the plan.

  I box her eyes. She is moaning and crying. I know she is in great pain. Payback for insulting my intelligence. The only answer is to knock her unconscious. Only then can I pursue and dispatch Vanessa.

  I wind up and deliver a shattering blow to the temple that I have already softened up. Emma’s body heaves, and she is finally still.

  I jump off her and off the bed. Outside the doorway, I scan both ends of the hallway. Vanessa must already be downstairs. I take the stairs three at a time. No need to be quiet now. The front door is wide open. I run outside. I can’t see her anywhere. I circle the whole house. No Vanessa. I realize that when I come back for her I won’t have the element of surprise. Fuck surprise! The cops will be all over her like maggots on a corpse. I refuse to apologize, but tonight has been a goddamn fiasco.

  Fuuuck!

  Rattled and frustrated, I can’t decide what to do next. It crosses my mind that I may have inadvertently killed Emma. Maybe I should go back up and check on my punching bag?

  I re-climb the front stairs. When I get to the top, I am shocked to see the same naked figure I once thought was Vanessa stagger through the bedroom door.

  Emma is not only alive, she is armed. Of all the equipment I brought, it never occurred to me that I would need a gun to kill Vanessa. I have guns, of course, but I don’t have one with me.

  I freeze. I can’t tell if she can see me.

  She lurches down the hallway toward me. The hallway is pretty dark. I don’t think she can see me yet, but I’m not sure. I ease backwards.

  It turns out she can see me.

  “It’s Emma,” she says in a surprisingly strong voice after the beating I’ve given her. “If that is you Will, it’s time to stop this insanity. Give yourself up. I promise to do everything I can for you. I love you, Will.”

  I don’t answer.

  “Put your hands in the air and walk slowly toward me. I have Archie’s Beretta, and I will use it if you force me to.”

  Emma kept shuffling unsteadily in my direction, narrowing the gap considerably.

  I think desperately of ways to escape. But now, even though her gun hand continues to waver, I think that she is too close to miss.

  Then I hear Emma say, “I’m sorry.”

  All of a sudden, the hallway lights up like the fucking Fourth of July. The explosion deafens me. Instinctively, I duck. The bullet, of course, is a whole hell of a lot faster than my reflexes. I take a slug in my arm. I scream. The pain is unbearable. I feel my upper arm. There is blood on both sides, anterior and posterior. It is a through-and-through, meaning there is both an entrance wound and an exit wound. I remember this from my combat medic days in Iraq.

  I nearly shout, “You little shit!” But I stop myself. Emma still doesn’t know for sure who I am.

  Emma is stumbling toward me. Her gun hand is wavering. Through the goggles I can clearly see a cloud of gunpowder still wafting from the end of the barrel.

  I take my chance. I start to turn, and fuck if I don’t lose my footing. Ass over teakettle, I tumble down the stairs. At the bottom, dazed, I stagger to my knees. I am temporarily blinded, because my night vision goggles have popped off my head in the fall. I still have my balaclava.

  Emma appears at the top of the stairs, an indistinct blob in the dark. But I see her moving as she descends toward me. I can’t believe she still has the wherewithal to crawl, let alone walk. At the very least, my beating must’ve given her a concussion. The woman has more steel than I gave her credit for.

  Still she comes, lurching like she's in a B horror movie.

  I manage to get to my feet. Wobbly, I aim for the front door. I hear her pace quicken on the stairs. I can’t believe Superwoman is still after me. My arm is on fire.

  I turn to face her and wait for come-what-may. She reaches the bottom of the stairs. We are only about five feet apart. She stops, but I can see that her unsteady gun hand is darting like a hummingbird. I smell equal measures of gunpowder and fear. There is enough ambient moonlight from the open doorway to see her naked body glistening. I wait to see what she will do. Advantage, Emma. Yet, all the while I am calculating my chances to take her down despite the burning agony in my upper arm.

  In a weak, shaky voice, she says, “Take off your ski mask. I need to see your face.”

  I stare at her eyes, not at her gun.

  That’s what I learned in Close Combat Class. Close Combat Class (via the United States Marine Corps) is a required course, even for medics.

  I shake my head, no.

  She repeats her demand.

  Again, I shake my head.

  If you want to see my face, you will have to kill me first.

  The stalemate continues. Her gun continues to float.

  I develop a plan and try to summon the courage to execute it. My eyes dart from hers to her gun hand. I wait until her wavering hand is on an upswing. Then I bend over double and tumble onto my back rolling my body into her ankles. The moving blow sends her flying over me. I hear her weapon clatter across the floor. My arm explodes into the fiercest pain I’ve ever felt. I let out a shriek. I can’t help myself. I hold my injured arm tight against my chest.

  It takes all my willpower to raise myself to my feet. When I do, I take one step toward Emma’s writhing body. With the full force of my leg, I kick her head. I am only wearing sneakers, but the blow is a knockout. Emma is finally motionless, but my arm is about to drop off.

  I retreat to my car, nursing my bloody injury.

  I have to assume that Vanessa is long gone and has probably found some way to telephone the police.

  42

  Dilated and Sluggish

  Emma couldn’t understand why she was cold and miserable. She felt her eyes flutter, then open. She realized that she was lying on the floor. Where are my clothes? The horrors of the night before came back. Where was Vanessa? Why hadn’t she called the police? Maybe Mr. Sharpie had gotten her after all.

  A hesitant light filtered through the hallway window. She looked behind her. Through the open doorway, she saw dawn driving the darkness from Hampshire. Her head felt sledgehammered. She was head-achy and nauseous. She touched her right temple. Her fingers recoiled. The simple, light touch caused intense pain.

  From a sitting position, she glanced around. On the floor underneath a radiator she made out her Beretta. She remembered firing her weapon and hearing a scream. She remembered feeling his body armor on the bed, but the scream on the stairs told her that she must’ve hit him somewhere. She didn’t want to kill anyone, let alone Will, and she had, to the best of her ability, at least, aimed away from his head. But the body armor confused her. Joe Henderson had worn a vest during the Escalade incident. Joe must have been the intruder. Maybe.

  A few feet away from the Beretta was a black device which looked a lot like a set of night vision goggles. So that’s how he did it, whoever he was.

  She began to gather her thoughts together. Then, her actions.

  First, her clothes. Second, a phone.

  After a long time getting dressed, she found her cell phone on the table between their beds. She dialed, held the phone to her ear, and looked in the mirror over Vanessa’s bureau. Both sides of her face had virulent black and purple contusions. Her face looked camouflaged for battle.

  “911 operator. What is the location of your emergency?”

  “Laura, it’s Emma Thorne. Could you please dispatch police and an ambulance to 17 Highcroft Terrace, the Mack residence. We have a missing assault victim—”

  “Jesus, Chief, is the ambulance for you? Are you okay?”

  “Pretty banged up, to tell the truth. But I’ll live.”

  “Units are on their way,” she shifted to the matter-of-fact manner dispatchers affect. “Could the perp still be in the residence?”

  “No,” Emma said enigmaticall
y, “he left hours ago.”

  “Stay on the line with me until they arrive.”

  “I’m okay, but thanks.” She pressed End.

  Emma sat on Vanessa’s porch and watched the sun rise. She remembered doing the same thing at Deb Barger’s house.

  The morning was full of promise for another gorgeous day. For her, the day would be pain-filled. In the distance she heard the first warble of an approaching siren, soon multiple sirens.

  Without knowing exactly why or how, the reason she had woken up in the first place popped into her head. She looked down at her ankle. Sure enough, a Sharpie mark. It was a single line. An I? Or a 1? Or just a line?

  The solution came to her like a slap on the cheek. She didn’t need to write down any more combinations of letters and numbers to solve the riddle.

  The killer was three quarters of the way. So far, he had spelled W-I-L. This meant that Joe Henderson was no longer a viable suspect. Either Will had killed Vanessa, and only one more letter would be delivered. Or, he hadn’t caught Vanessa, and there would be two more victims. Emma shuddered. She felt cold in the warm sunshine.

  Had Will morphed from an insular depressive into a sick killing machine? She didn’t even know whether a depressed individual could become a sociopath or a psychopath or whatever the hell he was. And why would he be leaving breadcrumbs pointing directly to him?

  Emma rubbed her eyes and tried to reassure herself for the umpteenth time that, if Will couldn’t get out of bed, how would he have the wherewithal to murder?

  She had the saddest feeling that Vanessa had not survived the night.

  When will it end?

  Stella was the first to arrive in Emma’s old chief’s vehicle. Emma noticed that she had added more LED lights behind the grill, and that the headlights now wig-wagged. Emma was surprised that she even noticed.

  “Whoa!” said Stella, standing over her. “You look like you had the shit kicked out of you. What the hell happened here?”