Claiming Carter

by W. S. Greer

  The sound startled me, and I stood there for a moment without moving—maybe even without breathing. I looked down at Meghan, and her head was again tilted as she stared at the door. Is that why she was there before? Had Meghan heard something coming from the living room while I was sleep? My imagination began to run wild as I thought about my cat hearing my house being broken into once again, but not being able to do anything to alert me of my intruder. All of a sudden, I wished I had a dog. Just then, another thud, this one louder than the first, and seemingly closer to the door.

  My heart felt like it was going to jump out of my chest. A sudden heat rushed over me as my fear began to consume me. I didn’t know what to do. Should I call Kelvin? What if I called Kelvin and it turned out to be nothing? I wouldn’t want him to drive all the way out here just to find out that I left a window open and the wind was coming in, or something stupid like that. Then again, what if it was an intruder? Maybe I should just call the police? It seemed like no matter what the question was, there wasn’t a good answer. So, I decided that it was probably best for me to just go check it out for myself.

  I inched my way over to the door with my cellphone in my hand. I wanted my phone close by, just in case I needed to call Kelvin right away. As I grabbed the door knob, I took a deep breath to steady myself, and then opened the door slowly. The hinges squeaked lightly as the door swung open, revealing a hallway of nothing but darkness. I leaned over and looked down the hall, into the living room, and again found nothing but darkness. However, something told me to at least give the kitchen a look before I went back into my room for the night. So, I walked down the hall slowly and glanced around in the kitchen. Nothing. All of the windows were closed as well. With only one room left to check, I made my way back down the hall.

  As I neared the guest bedroom that I’d turned into a storage room for crap that I had no use for anymore, but couldn’t bring myself to sell, I noticed Meghan sitting in the doorway. She was staring into the darkness, and that apprehensive feeling came roaring back. I walked over to the room cautiously and glanced in, but it was so dark that I couldn’t have seen anyone anyway. So, I clicked on the light and was pleasantly surprised to find that there wasn’t anything out of the ordinary. The window was closed, and all of the stuff I’d put in the room was still where Kelvin and I had put it just a little while ago. So, I clicked off the light and turned around to head back to my room.

  When I turned around, that’s when I saw him. It was too dark to make out his face, but I knew for sure that it was a man, and that he was standing directly in front me. I tried to scream, but before I could get it out, I noticed him shift his bodyweight to one side. The next thing I saw was his arm swing up quickly, and I heard a loud thud just before I fell to the floor. My face landed on the cold linoleum right next to the intruder’s foot. Then, I felt a cold hand grab me by the arm and turn me over onto my back. The man was standing over me, looking down at me. I tried to make out his face, but before I could gather my thoughts, I slipped out of consciousness and was consumed by darkness.

  “Wake up, Lily.”

  I tried to blink my eyes, but they felt about ten times heavier than usual. As I fluttered my eyes, my vision came back to me, but it was very blurry at first. The furniture in my room looked like fuzzy shadows, and I tried to rub my eyes, which is how I learned that my hands were tied to something. I tried to move my feet and learned that they, too, were tied down, yet my body was in a sitting position, and my mouth had tape over it. What the hell was going on?

  “Wake up.”

  I shook my head lightly, and felt a small trickle of blood stream down the left side of my face, but my vision finally cleared up.

  I looked down at my body and saw that my hands and feet were tied to a chair—one of the chairs from my dining room. I was being held in place by a fairly thin, green nylon cord. From the looks of it, it seemed like there was no way that this string was going to hold me down, but when I tried to use all of my strength to break free, the cord barely moved.

  “It’s parachute cord. You can’t break it like that. You have to cut it. The military used to use it in the suspension lines of parachutes during World War II.”

  I looked up and finally made eye contact with the man who’d broken into my house and apparently knocked me unconscious. My heart began to pound in my chest as Timothy Bulger walked over to me and placed a warm towel on my head, wiping away the blood.

  “I’m sorry I hit you, Lily,” Tim said with a sigh. “I didn’t mean to hurt you. I panicked and thought you would scream or something when you saw me. I just needed to sit you down and talk to you, and this was the only way that I could think of. But, I am so sorry that I hurt you. Do you forgive me?”

  All I could do is stare at Tim as he continued to dab the towel on my head, even though I was sure he’d already cleaned up all of the blood, and was now just rubbing the spot where a bruise would certainly be showing up.

  “Oh, I forgot about the tape,” Tim chuckled, finally remembering that he’d placed tape over my mouth. “Now, I want to take this off, but I want you to listen to me before I do. So, I’m going to say what I’ve got to say, then I’ll take the tape off so you can talk, okay? Okay.”

  Tim walked over the bed and sat on the edge. “Now, I know you don’t believe me about this, but your life is in danger, Lily. That fucking guy you are screwing around with is very, very dangerous. He’s a killer, Lily. A dangerous, black killer. You should not be seeing a guy like him, and since you can’t make the decision to protect yourself, I will make it for you, and keep you here until you get it through your thick skull. All you have to do is think about it, Lily. The fucking fancy suits, and the fucking Bentley he brought to the school that day. He had a driver, for Christ’s sake. You can’t be that fucking dumb to just put this stuff off to the side, and I won’t let you. I won’t let you walk around degrading yourself and making yourself look like a fool by standing next to a thug, villain, murderer like Kelvin Carter.”

  Suddenly, Tim leapt off of the bed and the next thing I knew, he was sitting in my lap, rubbing my face with the backside of his palm.

  “You’re so beautiful, Lily. Everything about you is so perfect, so special. A guy like that doesn’t deserve you. You deserve someone who sees how special you are every day. Someone who loves you. Someone who doesn’t kill people!” Tim stood up and began pacing around the room with his hands on his hips. “Why would you want to be with a killer? Why wouldn’t you want to be with me? I know I made a mistake with Angela. You think I don’t know that? I know that, okay. I fucked up. I totally fucked up, but I ended it and it’s over now, and now it’s time for us to be together. We were meant to be together, Lily. I knew it from the moment I saw you. I knew you would be mine. You would be my love. I knew you would love me, and I’m not going to let this fucking gangbanger ruin it. I won’t let you ruin it.”

  As Tim continued pacing, I wondered if he wasn’t even talking to me anymore. He obviously had snapped and now was lost within his own emotions. I’d never seen him act anything like this before. It was true that Tim had turned into a total douche after the three or four month mark of our relationship, but this was something completely different. I used to feel sad for Tim, after seeing him with Angela, and seeing the look on his face when he saw me with Kelvin. But, now I felt something else. I felt fear.

  “I expect better of you, Lily. That’s why I am so caught up in this. Because I love you and I expect better from you. Okay? Now, I’m going to take this tape off your mouth. Please don’t scream. I don’t want to do anything I’ll regret, so please don’t scream.”

  Tim reached down and slowly pulled the Scotch tape off of my mouth. The moment my lips were uncovered, I thought about screaming, but Tim was obviously in a very unpredictable state, so I decided against it. I didn’t say anything at first, I just stared at him. He held a confused, stressed expression on his face and I wondered just how bad it’d gotten for him over the past few days. Seeing me
with Kelvin seemed to really have put him over the edge.

  After a second of trying building up my confidence, I finally spoke up. “You don’t have to do this, Tim. Please let me go,” I whimpered.

  “I can’t let you go until you realize how stupid you’ve been!” Tim screamed. He began pacing around the room again with both of his hands planted on the sides of his head. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to yell. I didn’t mean to. I just need you to understand how important this is. I’ve been trying to make you see, but he’d got his hooks in you so deep. Your fucking car gets ruined and you’re still sticking by this guy? It’s ridiculous!”

  “What? How did you know about that? I haven’t told anyone but Lexy and Kelvin. How did you know about that, Tim? It was you, wasn’t it?”

  “Of course it was me, goddamnit! I’ve been trying to scare you away from him but you’re not fucking paying attention. Do you have any idea how hard it was to break into your house while you were gone, and then watch you get in your car and follow that thug on his motorcycle? You were supposed to put the pieces together and think it all had something to with him.”

  “What! You broke into my house? You came in here and messed up all of my furniture? You ruined my car? All to get me to stop seeing Kelvin? That is insane, Tim!” I was furious. I couldn’t believe that everything that had been going wrong in my life over the past few days was all Tim’s doing. I never thought for a second that Tim was the one who’d broken into my house. It was all too much to take in.

  “I was trying to protect you!” Tim bellowed. “It was for your own good, Lily. If you can’t see that this guy is dangerous, then you are insane.”

  “Are you fucking kidding me? You broke into my house in the middle of the night and tied me to a fucking chair, and you have the nerve to say that I am the one who is insane? You’ve lost it, Tim. You’ve lost your fucking mind.”

  Tim finally walked over to the bed and sat down on the edge again. “You know what? You’re right. I don’t know what’s wrong with me lately. I wasn’t like this before. I used to be normal. I used to think good thoughts. But, that all changed when I met you. You changed me and now I’m not the good person that I used to be.”

  “I didn’t change you, Tim. You changed on your own. We used to have some fun together—in the beginning, at least. The only reason we’re not still together is because of the decision you made to start sneaking behind my back with Angela. It’s your own fault, Tim.”

  “I know. You’re right, it is my fault. I chose to hook up with Angela, but I also chose to break it off with her. I ended it so that we could be together, Lily. We can still be together now, can’t we?”

  I shook my head back and forth. “I’m with Kelvin now.”

  “You stupid fucking bitch!” Tim blared as he reached back and slapped me in the face with the palm of his hand. “You did this to me! You are the reason I can’t sleep at night. You’re the reason my heart hurts every day. You’re the reason I’m doing all kinds of shit that I have never done before. Look at me. This isn’t me. I don’t do this. I don’t break into people’s houses. I don’t do this. You made me do this. You made me this way. It’s all your fault. I should kill you for what you’ve put me through.”

  The moment the words spilled out of his mouth, I felt my heart clinch up in pure panic. I never thought he would take it that far, but he’d finally said the words. He wanted to kill me if he couldn’t have me to himself, and there wasn’t anything that I would have been able to do to stop him if he decided to carry out his desires.

  “That’s what I should do,” Tim continued. “I should just kill you. If you keep seeing Kelvin Carter, you’re as good as dead, anyway. My life will never be the same again, thanks to you. So why not just end it all right now? I could kill you, and then blame it on your little boyfriend. How would you like that?”

  “Tim, please don’t do this. You don’t have to do this. You can just move on with your life.”

  “I don’t want to move on! I want you, and if I can’t have you, then nobody can.”

  Tim walked over to the table next to my bed and reached into a jacket that I hadn’t noticed was there. When he turned around to face me, I saw that he had a large, jagged knife in his hand—probably the same one he used to slash my tires.

  “Oh my god, please, Tim. Please don’t do this,” I begged as Tim began slowly walking towards me. “Please, please don’t do this.”

  “You haven’t given me much choice, Lily. I’m a fucking wreck. I’ve been through hell because of you. It’s only fair that you go to hell because of me.”

  Tim turned the knife around in his hand, preparing to stab me with it. “You made me do this,” he muttered, just as the door behind him swung open.

  They stared at each other for what seemed like an eternity. Tim’s face held a very jealous, loathing expression. Kelvin was the complete opposite as he stood in the doorway wearing black basketball shorts, a plain white t-shirt, and all white tennis shoes. As he stared at Tim, he looked calm and collected, like he was calculating something in his head that he didn’t want anyone else to know. He looked prepared and courageous, and as he glared at Tim, there was one thing that I could tell for sure just from looking at him—there wasn’t an ounce of fear in his body.

  “Well, look who decided to show up,” Tim said, his voice filled with obvious hate. “We were just talking about you, lover boy, and here you are. You have perfect timing.”

  Kelvin didn’t say a word. He just stared at the man in front of him.

  “Look at you, standing there with that smug expression on your face like you don’t have a care in the world. Like you’re better than everybody else. I bet you feel real special, don’t you? Do you have your special, fancy car parked outside? How much did that cost you? Did you buy that with some of your blood money? Break some guy’s legs and force him to pay you so you could go buy your little fancy car, and use it to seduce and trap a third grade teacher? Is that about right? Sound familiar?”

  Kelvin still didn’t say anything. Instead, he glanced down at me, but only for a second. We made eye contact very briefly, but in that moment I knew that he was checking to see if I was okay—and to see if I was listening to what Tim was saying.

  “Don’t you look at her!” Tim snapped, grabbing Kelvin’s attention once again. “Keep your eyes on me. She’s not yours to look at. I won’t let you pull her into your life of crime and drugs. You’re going to have to go through me first.”

  Tim took a quick step towards Kelvin, but Kelvin didn’t move. When he realized that he couldn’t get Kelvin to flinch, Tim took a step backwards, to his original place.”

  “Stop this, Tim,” I said in a fearful tone. “Please just put the knife down.”

  Tim turned to me and stared directly into my eyes. “You better shut your mouth.”

  “You talk to her like that again and I’m going to beat the shit out of you, and stab you with your own knife,” Kelvin said calmly. It was the most melodramatic statement I think I’d ever heard.

  I felt a sudden rush of panic, mixed with a hint of excitement. The last thing that I wanted was for Tim to flip out and do something crazy, but I felt totally comfortable that Kelvin would protect me if he did. He was so composed and confident that I felt like he had control of the situation, even if Tim was the one holding the knife.

  Tim turned around and directed his attention back to Kelvin. “Oh, is that right? You’re going to do something to me, mobster? Don’t you stand there and pretend like you really give a fuck about Lily. You people only care about yourselves. You are the scum of the earth.”

  “Scum of the earth?” Kelvin replied. “I think you might want to look in the mirror. You broke into your ex-girlfriend’s house, assaulted her, tied her to a chair in her bedroom, and held her hostage at knifepoint. You are the very definition of scum of the earth.”

  “Well, you would know, wouldn’t you? I’m sure you’ve seen plenty of scum in your line of work. Have you to
ld Lily about your occupation? Have you told her that you’re a mob boss? Or were you too busy trying to get in her pants by showing off your car?”

  Kelvin flashed a condescending smile. “You don’t have a clue what the fuck you’re talking about. You think I’m a mob boss?”

  “Don’t patronize me! We both know who you are, Kelvin Carter. My friend in Chicago PD told me all about you. You’re a gangster who’s involved in all kinds of illegal activity, from extortion, to money laundering, and everything in between. You’re under suspicion for a number of murders and missing people, but, because you’ve bought some pretty high players in the Chicago PD, you don’t get any heat about it. Yeah, I know all about you. Sound about right?” Tim had a very smug look on his face.

  “Sound’s completely wrong, actually. You should tell your guy in Chicago PD to do better research. That’s if I decide to let you leave here tonight with all of your teeth.”

  “You think I’m afraid of you?” Tim barked. “I am not scared of you! You should be afraid of me, because I’m the one who has nothing to lose. You already stole Lily from me, and now that I don’t have her, I really don’t give a shit about anything else.”

  “Please, just put the knife down, Tim” I said quietly.

  Before I could get the last word out of my mouth, Tim had already turned around to face me. “I told you to shut up!”

  All of a sudden, I watched as Kelvin took two giant steps towards Tim. Just as he was turning back around to face him, Kelvin reached back, clinched his fist, and hit Tim with the most devastating right hook I’d ever seen. Tim’s body flew backwards and he landed on his back behind me, dropping his knife. I thought for sure that Kelvin would rush to pick up the fallen weapon, but he didn’t. He just stood there, staring at Tim as he lay on the floor behind me.