BREAKING STEELE (A Sarah Steele Thriller)

by Patterson, Aaron; Ann, Ellie

  I’d known them both a long time so I knew the codes and how to work most everything from the few times I house-sat for them. The house was dark with all the blackout blinds drawn. I turned on all the alarms but put them into silent mode so I could see what ones got tripped, but they wouldn’t send out an audible alarm.

  I sat in the dark security room watching, waiting for him to come.

  The house creaked in the wind. A timer buzzed somewhere, maybe the dryer. Nothing happened. Maybe Williams had just driven past, nothing more. Was I losing it?

  It had been over an hour and I was about to give up when a little red light came on. The large monitor showed a map of the house.And when the silent alarm went off, a message flashed onscreen.

  SOUTHEAST WINDOW BREACH!

  It was one I left cracked open. I had gone through the house making sure all the doors and windows were locked except for the one right off the back porch. I figured he would go around checking them and my hunch was right.

  Finding the camera on that side of the house, my hands started shaking again. I needed to throw up but forced it down. Using my sleeve, I wiped the sweat off my brow. A dark figure ducked in through the open window and stood in the dining room. He was dressed in black with a hood over his head.

  A warning message flashed again, but this one was different.

  POLICE WILL BE NOTIFIED, TO CANCEL TYPE IN YOUR PASSWORD!

  I typed in the password and the warning message disappeared. I could break a window later if I needed to, but right now I needed time alone with Williams.

  Williams, I didn’t know which one, made his way slowly toward the stairs that led up to the bedrooms, my bedroom. I flexed my left hand and began to wrap the right with a torn piece of my shirt. Kickboxing classes taught me to wrap my hands and feet before a fight; it would protect them. And just the act of wrapping the cloth made my hands stop shaking.

  Loading a round in the chamber just like Solomon showed me, I slipped the gun in my left pocket. This was it, and just down the hall was a man who wanted to kill me. I was done running, this time he better run.

  Chapter 51

  WALKING AS QUIETLY AS I could, I made my way down the hall toward the guest room. It was getting dark, but the sunlight cutting through the slats in the blinds cast a creepy glow through the side windows. Slivers of light cut across the hall and I moved past them as fast as I could without making any noise.

  The hall was empty.

  I held the gun in both hands, off to one side and down. I didn’t want to turn a corner and have it knocked from my hands.

  With my back to the wall I peeked into my room. There standing over the bed, which I’d stuffed with pillows to make it seem like I was under the covers asleep, was Williams.

  He had his hood off and was holding a long knife in his right hand.

  Stepping into the room, I raised my gun and pointed it at his back.

  “I’ve been waiting for you, Glen.” My voice sounded calm and low.

  He spun around and bent his knees a little as if to attack. “Sarah Steele.” He did not sound as shocked as I hoped. “You are better than I thought. How long have you been waiting in the dark for me?”

  “Long enough, now sit.”

  Williams grinned and his shook his head. “No, I don’t think I’ll do that. And stop calling me Glen.”

  Before I could react, he grabbed a pillow and threw it at me. Lunging forward, he batted at the gun and it flew from my hands. I stumbled backward and he hit me in the midsection. All the air in my lungs left in a whoosh. White stars crossed my line of sight but I righted myself and my kickboxing training took over.

  Hands up, elbows in. I crouched.

  Grinning, he held up the knife and slashed at me. One step back and then I sent a roundhouse kick his way—

  Crack.

  The sound of his ribs connecting with my foot gave me a little hope. I came up with my knee and grabbed his head at the same time, forcing his head down as my knee came up.

  A sick crunch and a wet groan told me I broke his nose. He dropped the knife and I frantically searched for my gun as he crumpled to the carpet.

  There, next to the wall was my gun. I ran to it and scooped it up. Turning, I aimed the gun at Hank, or whoever he was, and he looked up at me holding his nose.

  “Don’t move or I’ll shoot. I mean it!”

  Coughing up more blood, he wiped at the damp hair that hung in his eyes. “You got a mean kick. Learn that from your boyfriend?”

  “Shut up, you don’t get to talk about him.” I coughed, and my breath wheezed. My lungs weren’t holding air like they should.

  “Oh ...” He held up his hands in mock surrender. “What are you gonna do, take me in, call the police?” He laughed and winced. Hunching over, he clutched his side and cursed. “You know where that got you last time.”

  I spoke through gritted teeth. “You really shouldn’t be baiting me right now.”

  “Ha, you won’t kill me. You are the ADA, you have a code, a promise to uphold the law. Besides, you have no idea who I am and what I am capable of.”

  “And you don’t know what I’m capable of.” I should have been scared, shaking and freaked out, but I wasn’t. My hand was steady and my mind was working like a well-oiled machine.

  “Where is your loser brother Glen?” I took a step back trying to get between him and the door just in case he tried to run.

  “Where do you think? Figure it out, you’re smart enough.”

  I lifted the gun and closed one eye. His right hand shot up and he grimaced. “Stop, fine, just stop!”

  I lowered the gun and waited.

  “My guess, halfway to Bali by now. He does not like to get his hands dirty, more of an observer.” Hank coughed and spit. He sunk to his knees and grinned up at me. “Come on, Sarah, you know you want to, but you, like most women, are weak …”

  Something wasn’t right; he was stalling and not just to keep me from shooting him. Hank chuckled and that same look I saw in court crossed his face, the one that was not worried, not scared, as if he knew the ending.

  Before I could react, the bedroom door exploded inward, throwing me forward. I hit the ground and rolled and managed to hold onto my gun. Hank crawled away from the door, and through the haze a tall man in a suit stepped into the room. It was the same man who had kidnapped me during the trial.

  “Kill her!” Hank bellowed.

  The tall man nodded and lifted a pistol. I threw myself toward the foot of the bed and turned as a gunshot sounded. The room became a barrage of noise as I looked down the sights and fired three times at the tall man’s chest.

  His body jerked and he stumbled backward. He fell onto his back and did not move. I got to my feet and turned toward Hank. He was cowering in between the nightstand and the bed, blood still dripping from his face.

  “You have been tried by a court of law,” I said. “But it did not carry out justice to completion. Now there is only one thing left to do.”

  “No, wait—”

  Hank lunged forward and grabbed my ankle, throwing me to the side. I lost my balance and fell. Hank was faster than he looked and was on top of me before I could get to my feet. He hit me in the face and the pain paralyzed me momentarily.

  His face grew pale, his eyes glowed, and he bared his teeth at me. “Die!”

  I couldn’t see, it was just pain and a blur of blood and fists. Kicking up with my knee, I connected with something and Hank grunted and rolled off me. I took the chance—it could be my only chance. I groped for my gun. When I couldn’t find it, I panicked.

  I was on my knees and Hank grabbed my shoulder and spun me around. My vision cleared and I balled my fist and punched him as hard as I could in the throat. He gasped and I felt his windpipe collapse. I followed it up with my other fist and hit him again in the throat, remembering what my kickboxing instructor had said: “You can’t do anything if you can’t breathe.”

  Hank doubled over, gasping and clutching his neck.
I stood up, panting, and looked for my gun. I found it under the bed. Holding it with both hands I pointed it at the dying man. He was on his back. Blood pooled at the back of his throat, making gurgling sounds with each weak breath. His eyes looked like two glowing embers. They were full of hate, and rested on me.

  My body shivered as Hank Williams took his last breath. It sounded like someone trying to suck in air through a straw. His body went limp and I stood over him for what seemed like a long time. I was not going to be like one of those girls in the movies that assumed the bad guy was dead only to have him come back and kill them.

  Leaning over, I felt for a pulse.

  Hank Williams was dead.

  Looking around the room, I walked over to the tall man who was on his back breathing hard, I pulled the trigger and put one bullet through his heart. The room smelled like gunpowder and sweat. I wanted to throw up but I held it down.

  Leaving the room, I put my back to the wall and slid down to a sitting position. All the emotions of what just happened hit me full force. I didn’t cry. But the groan that came out of me came from deep in my soul.

  What had I done? All this anger buried deep inside me was gone, and the coldness scared me.

  Chapter 52

  BEFORE THE SWEAT HAD dried on my face, I’d called Detective Monroe. In a hushed voice, I told him that there’d been a break in at Mandy’s, there were two dead men, and that one of them was Hank Williams.

  I went back and stood in the doorway to my room. Blood was soaked into the carpet and the tall man in the middle of the doorway stared up with soulless eyes. This time I couldn’t hold it in. I bent over and threw up in the hallway.

  * * *

  FIFTEEN MINUTES LATER, THE detectives and policemen found me curled up on the couch, in a daze.

  “They’re upstairs,” I whispered.

  Detective Monroe ran up the stairs two at a time. I could see his profile as he looked in the room. Revulsion flooded his face, and then he entered.

  Detective Ross stayed beside me. He didn’t say a word, but I could see it in his eyes: pity. He knew I’d been through hell, and he wanted to help.

  I’d already gone through an abridged version of the story in my mind. As an attorney, I knew what I could tell them and what I had to keep to myself. But I was too weak to tell it.

  “Can I give you my testimony later?” I said in a thin voice. My eyes could barely stay open.

  He took a throw blanket at the end of the couch and settled it over me. As it collapsed around my shoulders, I completely relaxed. I barely even heard him say, “Of course.”

  I closed my eyes and fell asleep.

  Chapter 53

  I WOKE TO SEE Mandy’s face above mine. With a gasp, I threw my arms over her shoulders and squeezed her as hard as I could. At the sight of her loving face, tears silently streamed down my cheeks. My face was so bruised that even the tears hurt.

  “There, there, baby,” she said, and her voice cracked. “You’re okay now. Everything’s going to be fine.” They were the same words I’d said to Angela not twelve hours earlier.

  I sat up, and then winced. My rib felt cracked, and it hurt to move.

  “Do you need to see a doctor?” Mandy said, wide eyed with concern.

  “No.” I groaned. “I don’t want to move.”

  Their living room was swarming with cops and forensic techs. Monroe sat in the lounge chair across from me, writing his notes. Ross was in the kitchen, drinking coffee with Rick.

  “I think it’s time we heard that story,” Monroe said.

  I told them every truth I could. I left out the part about following Hannah. I said after I left their office I went to the bed and breakfast I was staying at. Then, after I texted Mandy, I came straight here.

  “Rick says you silenced a security breach just as Hank arrived.” Monroe eyed me with one eyebrow raised.

  My face filled with fear, which wasn’t fake. “I thought it was just a bird hitting the window. The alarms go off sometimes when that happens.”

  Monroe nodded, and urged me on. I told them, in as sparse a language as possible, about how Hank had attacked me in the bedroom, but I’d had a gun. And then his tall man showed up, and I’d shot him several times. And then I went into more detail recounting how Hank had tried to kill me with a knife but I got a deathblow in before he had the chance.

  Mandy’s face was horror-stricken. No doubt it mirrored mine.

  Ross, who had been listening from the kitchen, finally entered. “You shouldn’t have had to deal with that, but you handled it well.” He eyed me strangely. “You’ve had a lot of blood on your hands in the past twelve hours.”

  I looked away. There was no need to remind me of something that would haunt me for the rest of my life. Did he suspect something?

  “You’ve silenced a very evil man, Sarah Steele. He deserved what he got. A woman named Heather Dade came to the office yesterday,” Monroe said. I perked up at the familiar name. “She told us that she was a friend of yours, and that you wanted her to testify against Hank Williams. Then she went on to tell us everything he’d done to her as a child.” He shook his head. “He’s been a monster for a long time, we just didn’t know it.”

  Mandy hugged me again, clutching me as if she’d never let go. I felt so glad Heather had come forward. Now she might feel some peace after all these years.

  “Well,” Monroe snapped his notebook shut, “I have good news for you. Our boys caught up with Glen Williams at the airport while you were sleeping. He’s in jail now.If the DNA is a match, he will be going away for a very long time.”

  Joy shot through me. All the work Joshua and I had put in the case was now seeing fruition. “Will he go down for what happened to Tracy in the barn?” I asked.

  “He sure will,” Ross said. “Certainly as an accessory to murder, if not for the murder itself.”

  I grinned. I would love to be on that case. I’d like to watch as his smug face realized that there was no getting out of it this time. The justice system had failed once, and I didn’t have high hopes that it would win out again. But I wasn’t ready to give up on Lady Justice yet.

  Leaning back into the soft cushions, I felt my heart slow for the first time in days. It was as if a great weight had lifted from my mind.

  Two killers had been on the loose. And now they wouldn’t be hurting anyone anymore.

  The wild urge in me was gone. It had been placated.

  For now.

  Chapter 54

  MANDY FUSSED OVER ME and told me to take a week off, but I bargained for a day instead. I slept the longest I ever had, a full eight hours, and woke up feeling like a new woman.

  At the breakfast table, Mandy served me warm cinnamon rolls with green tea just the way I liked it.

  “How long are you going to spoil me like this?” I asked, taking a big mouthful of the sweet bread.

  “Don’t get used to it,” she said. “But we are going to take a trip to Rio next month. We’ve always wanted to go there together, and we better do it soon before you’re attached to another case.”

  I gave a small smile. Another case. I was looking forward to my next one. Where would it take me this time?

  I zoned back to the present. “Okay, we’ll go.” I said. “Let’s book the tickets right away before Dan calls me in. The investigation turned up nothing with our finances but did find out that Sawyer was behind the paid jury scandal.”

  “I never trust lawyers.” She grinned and spooned some sugar into her coffee. And then her eyebrow creased.

  “What is it?” I asked, my stomach dropping.

  “There’s just something I don’t understand, something that doesn’t add up,” she said. “If you came here from the bed and breakfast, why didn’t you bring your bag?”

  I hesitated a beat to think up a lie. “I left my bag because I wanted to sleep there tomorrow night.” But the hesitation was all she needed to know that something was up.

  Silence stretched between us. I took
a sip of tea, and it tasted more bitter than normal.

  “I know you’re holding something from me,” she said. I was about to say something when she held up a hand. “And that’s okay. Just know that I’m here.”

  I moved my roll from one side of the plate to the other. My heart felt full. Those words meant more to me than she’d ever know.

  Chapter 55

  THE DNA FROM THE basement where we found Angela was not a match for Glen Williams and his case began to fall apart just as fast as the one against Hank Williams did. I cursed the judge and Dan almost fired me for embarrassing him. Our DNA evidence was thrown out because of how long it sat in the barn, but it really didn’t matter because nothing matched Glen Williams anyway.

  I spentthe better part of a week obsessed, and pored over all the notes and video of the Hank Williams trial, and tried to find the connection. The DA’s office was a hellhole. Dan was angry, but I guessed it was because I wouldn’t respond to his advances and because the case was falling apart and making him look bad.

  “I just don’t get it.” Joshua nodded and looked at me from behind a stack of boxes. We were putting in long days again in what seemed to be a repeat of the Hank Williams trial.

  “It has to be something stupid,” Joshua said and went back to work.

  I had a video on and was watching myself give the opening on the Hank Williams case. The camera panned to Hank and something jumped out at me. “No way.”

  Joshua looked up at me and blinked. “What?”

  I skipped forward to another scene and watched Hank intently.Then without saying a word,I ejected the DVD and put in one from earlier in the week at Glens Williams arraignment. Glen sat there in court with a bored look on his face, the same look his brother had, it was creepy. Glen fiddled with a pencil and I gasped.