Surviving the Truth

by Tyler Anne Snell

  He pulled her business card back out as soon as he settled behind the wheel of his SUV. This time he called Clanton Construction’s main number printed beneath hers.

  After a few rings, a man picked up. It was clear that, based on the noise in the background, the man was probably not at a construction site.

  “This is Bobby. How can I help you this fine, fine afternoon?” There was laughter in the background along with a lot of chatter. Whoever Bobby was, he also sounded like he was having a good time.

  “Hi there, Bobby. I was actually looking for Willa Tate? Is this where I can reach her?”

  The sound of movement made the connection go slightly static. Wherever Bobby was, he hadn’t left the commotion, though Kenneth guessed he’d stepped away from it enough to hear better.

  “We actually closed early today due to an office event.”

  “Then Willa is with you?”

  Maybe she was with her coworkers and had just lost track of time?

  “Uh, can I ask who’s asking for her?” Bobby’s voice went from fun to focused in an instant.

  Kenneth assumed he was friends with Willa, so he got to the point without giving away the reason.

  “My name’s Kenneth. I am an acquaintance of Willa’s. We had plans to meet for coffee and she hasn’t showed up, so I was wondering where she is.”

  The sound of movement was loud again in Kenneth’s ear. Bobby called out to somebody. That person answered, but Kenneth couldn’t hear what was said. It didn’t matter. He realized he already knew that Willa wasn’t there. But he waited for Bobby to confirm.

  “Sorry, she left maybe a half hour ago. I can take a message for her if you want to leave one, though.”

  Kenneth didn’t want to leave a message. What he did want was information. After very little questioning, he found out that most of Clanton Construction was at the Rosewater Inn. He kept his thoughts to himself as to why they were at a bar so early in the day and ended the call.

  Putting his SUV in gear, he drove a little faster than he should have to the only bar in town.

  It was nothing, he told himself.

  Willa had just gotten sidetracked somewhere between the bar and the café.

  Two days after she had brought a potential unsolved murder to him and the same afternoon that he just so happened to want to meet her and talk about it.

  It was a coincidence that the woman he’d met who was so gung-ho about finding justice was now gone and not answering her phone.

  Even as he thought it, Kenneth gripped the steering wheel with force.

  Willa was probably fine. But he couldn’t shake the growing sense of urgency.

  So, a few minutes out from the bar, he decided to use his SUV’s hands-free calling to try the woman’s cell one more time.

  He could be overreacting, the feeling in his gut there because Kelby Creek had a history of people just disappearing.

  A history of phone calls being made but never answered.

  Of women there one day and gone the next.

  Kenneth tried to shake the thoughts that were starting to trail somewhere dark. Somewhere he never wanted to go again.

  But then the phone stopped ringing and Willa answered.

  Though, judging by the fact she answered in a whisper, he assumed it wasn’t time to feel relief just yet.

  “Detective Gray?” Her voice was low and hurried.

  Kenneth slowed his speed, ready to turn off the road to give her his full attention if needed.

  “Willa? What’s wrong?”

  The woman didn’t immediately answer. Much like her coworker Bobby, the sound of movement traveled across the line. However, unlike Bobby, Kenneth couldn’t hear any type of chatter or commotion in the background. Instead there was her movement and then silence.

  Kenneth eyed the console screen for second to see if the call had ended but then Willa’s voice came through again.

  “I’m at my apartment, above my sister’s garage,” she said, so low he almost couldn’t hear her.

  Kenneth matched her volume. Something was wrong. There was panic and fear in her voice even if it was faint.

  “What’s going on?”

  When she answered, it was like a whisper on the wind.

  Something that passed you by and left nothing in its wake.

  “Someone else is here.”

  Adrenaline surged through him at her words. He was grateful in that moment for a memory that was mostly good. Thanks to his internet search the day before, he’d confirmed that she was in fact a local and had noted her last listed address.

  He started to turn the SUV around, knowing exactly where he needed to head next.

  “Who is with you?” There was no answer. “Willa?” He made sure to keep his voice as quiet as possible. “Willa? Are you there?”

  She didn’t answer.

  The phone call ended.

  * * *

  EBONY HAD ONCE told Willa a story about how she was taking yoga to help spice things up in the bedroom with her husband. When Willa, who had been in the middle of filing at work at the time, had asked why, her friend had laughed.

  “It’s all about being flexible,” Ebony had responded. “When you’re flexible and bendy, you can have more fun.”

  Ebony had wiggled her eyebrows after she’d said it, which had only made Willa laugh all the more.

  “And here I thought people did yoga for health benefits and strength.”

  They’d shared another laugh when Ebony had pointed out that being bendy was a benefit to everyone involved before Willa had admitted that she was as flexible as a straight arrow.

  “Sounds like you should do some yoga then,” Ebony had responded. “You never know how important it is to be flexible until you’re in a situation where you want to be.”

  Willa had waved the woman off when she’d said it because they both knew the situation she was talking about was one in the bedroom behind closed doors and beneath the sheets.

  But now?

  Now Willa wished that she was a bendy, flexible person.

  If she managed to get out of her hiding place, she swore to herself that she would take Ebony up on the offer of joining her at yoga.

  That was if whoever was ransacking her apartment didn’t find her first.

  Because as much as she was okay with the size of her living space on any given day, the truth was that it was small. Thus, it would only be a matter of time before the man riffling through her things got to the window seat and, since the cushion that normally rested on top was no longer there, be able to see the seat’s hinges and know that it opened.

  And that an un-bendy, nonflexible woman was hiding inside trying to be as quiet as possible.

  Footsteps sounded somewhere near the counter at the kitchenette. Something scraped the floor; the intruder must have moved a stool that had already fallen when he’d first entered. Willa didn’t have time to replay all the ways she could’ve handled herself better when her uninvited guest had started trying to break through her door. It wasn’t like there were many places to hide or a way to escape. She could have jumped from the second floor onto the concrete below to the driveway or tried to find a weapon. She could have done a lot of other things probably a lot smarter than smooshing herself into the window seat.

  But she hadn’t.

  The only thing she had done that had made a lick of sense was to grab her cell phone.

  Shortly after, Detective Gray had started to call. She’d been quick to put her phone on silent. Willa had wanted to answer the first two calls but instead she watched the phone light up the board beneath her. She couldn’t tell exactly where her intruder was but then she heard him moving around her desk. At that point she’d been too afraid to move. Too afraid to even dial 9-1-1.

  She also couldn’t remember if the keys on her phone
made noise as you typed in a number.

  Then she couldn’t remember the emergency setup on her phone. Wasn’t there just one button to push? One key to alert the authorities without making a noise?

  Her heart had been and was still beating a mile a minute.

  When the detective called for a third time, Willa found some luck.

  She heard the intruder rummaging around in her bedroom. Plenty of distance between the two of them where, if she talked quietly enough, the outsider couldn’t hear her.

  Then her luck, as small as it was, disappeared.

  The footsteps returned to the living area and she ended the call.

  Those footsteps came closer to her hiding place.

  Willa held her breath.

  Just go away, she silently pleaded.

  She should have just gone straight to the coffee shop from the bar. She shouldn’t have come home to change into something nicer. Why had it mattered what she’d been wearing?

  Because you wanted to make a good second impression. Because, even though he ticked you off by not believing you, he looked darn good doing it. That’s why you’re wearing a sundress and not your work slacks. That’s also why there’s a tube of lipstick on the counter that you dropped before your bad mistake was banging through the door.

  Willa berating herself was a good distraction for the moment.

  Her heart didn’t beat as fast and she wasn’t on the brink of crying anymore.

  She was just waiting.

  Waiting for a man she didn’t know to hopefully find her address, speed her way, and save the day from the intruder taking his dear sweet time to rob her.

  Because that’s surely what he was doing, right?

  Those footsteps sounded like gunshots now. They were closer. There was nothing in the world that could take Willa’s mind or nerves off of the fact that whoever was standing next to her hiding place was either looking out the window or looking down at the lid of the seat.

  She should have just worn her slacks.

  The intruder grabbed the lid of the window seat and started to pull up. The creak from the hinges that needed oiling were squeaking before the guy could even get his fingers beneath the lip.

  Ice went through Willa’s veins.

  And sirens sounded in the distance.

  Police sirens.

  It was enough to change the next order of events.

  As the lid rose, Willa pushed up with her back and aching, partially numbed legs, and yelled something awful.

  She didn’t have time to take in the details of the intruder shocked by her sudden presence. All she could catalog before she went into fight-or-flight mode was that it was a man. He was wearing a mask and an oversize jacket, and he was much, much bigger than she was.

  “Help! Help!”

  Willa’s momentum and now raging adrenaline and fear toppled over the side of the wooden seat she had just sprung up from. The man, still coming to terms with her appearance, had stumbled a foot or so back. Her yelling for help seemed to shake him out of his surprise. He went for her as she hit the ground, palms first, elbows second, knees third.

  His hands, large meaty things encased in gloves, planted themselves on either side of her rib cage and pulled up. It was an awkward and off-putting thing for him to do, driving his momentum down at an odd angle while she tried to roll out of his hold.

  Soon both of them were on the floor.

  “Help!” she yelled again, struggling with her voice.

  Willa managed to flip onto her back in time to use her arms and legs to try to keep the man from grabbing at her again.

  For a large man, he was deceptively fast.

  He was on his feet and using one of them in a flash. His boot pushed Willa’s flailing leg closest to him to the ground. She cried out in pain and then in absolute fear as he used one of his hands to grab her wrist. He pinned the right side of her body to her own living-room floor.

  “Let...let me go!”

  The man didn’t relent. Willa tried to get out of his hold and move her leg at the same time. He held fast to his position. When Willa tried to use her left hand to free the other, he was unfazed. It was like hitting and clawing at a wall.

  “The cops—the cops are coming,” she croaked.

  Willa prayed that the sirens they heard were actually heading to her location, but just as she had the thought, their volume decreased. They were heading away from them. It was a cruel twist of fate. One that the intruder must have found joy in.

  He didn’t speak but he did chuckle.

  Every part of Willa deflated at the sound.

  Tears started to prick the corners of her eyes.

  She thought of her sister and her parents and her friends.

  She thought of Josiah Linderman. Wondered if she, too, was about to go missing as she was convinced he had.

  The intruder used his free hand and slipped it into his jacket pocket.

  Willa started to fight again; a fish pulled from the creek water and struggling to get back.

  He had expected that. Whatever was in his pocket, he didn’t pull it out.

  Instead, he did something that might’ve been even more terrifying.

  He removed his foot from Willa’s thigh and dropped to his knee next to her on the floor. Before she could do anything, his right hand went around her neck.

  Willa tried to scream but he snuffed out the sound.

  Blinded by fear and panic and pain, she was convinced she was about to die.

  Chapter Six

  Kenneth was seeing red.

  Red and black and sunshine yellow.

  The only thought that went through his head was not to shoot for fear of hitting Willa. Instead he did what he believed anyone else would do.

  Kenneth was on the man the second he stepped through the door of Willa’s apartment.

  The punch caught the man wearing black off guard, but not as much as the tackle. The attacker might have been tall and wide but so was he. And if a career in law enforcement had taught Kenneth anything, it was that a person with surprise on their side often had the best advantage.

  They both fell backward onto the floor though Kenneth managed to get to his feet much faster. He threw another punch with every intention of trying to knock the man out.

  It didn’t take.

  Instead, Kenneth took an uppercut that nearly put him back on the floor.

  Behind him, Willa could be heard coughing.

  Then the red returned.

  The anger.

  The rage.

  The absolute audacity of the man for attacking a woman in her home.

  Of trying to strangle her.

  All while wearing a mask.

  The past rushed into his heart just as Kenneth’s gut told him what to do in the present.

  He felt that anger and rage vibrate through him, riding along with his adrenaline. This time when his fist connected with the man beneath him, he knew it was going to end their fight.

  The man grunted but didn’t swing out again.

  Kenneth took a step back and pulled out his service weapon again. He’d placed it back in its holster when he’d realized he couldn’t get a clear hit on the man without endangering Willa when he’d first come into the apartment.

  Yet, the man was fast. He had his own gun in hand in a second flat.

  Kenneth should fire off a shot.

  But there was Willa to consider.

  He didn’t know exactly where she was behind him and he didn’t know if he could shield her if the man got a shot off first.

  “Let’s keep calm,” he said. “This doesn’t need to escalate. I’m with the Dawn County Sheriff’s Department. We can figure this out without anyone else getting hurt.”

  By the widening of his eyes, the only thing Kenneth could see through t
he ski mask was that the news carried some kind of weight. The man stood slowly, gun trained on Kenneth, but the aggression that had been pouring off the man in waves had lessened.

  When his eyes darted to the door, he was forced to do the one thing Kenneth assumed he’d been trying not to.

  He spoke.

  “I’m a fast shot.” His voice was deep, gravel-filled. It was also strained. He was hurting. “You might be able to stop me but not before I can kill her. Let me leave and I won’t.”

  “I can’t just let you leave,” Kenneth said.

  “Then you’re about to be in a room with two dead bodies.”

  Willa made a noise.

  Kenneth had to admit the statement was chilling.

  Not to mention convincing.

  The way the man was standing, his tone, despite reflecting obvious pain, was confident in his skill set and his threats.

  Kenneth wished there had been a deputy cruiser closer to their location but when he’d called into the department, almost everyone had been responding to a nasty wreck out on the county road. Rerouting a couple of cars would take a few minutes. Maybe if he could get the man to talk...

  “You have five seconds before you’re the only one standing,” the man added, certainty in his words. “Five. Four. Three.”

  “Fine.” Kenneth shook his head. “Leave. But I’m not lowering my weapon. Willa, stand up and get behind me.”

  The man didn’t seem to find the directive displeasing. He started slowly moving toward the door, never taking his aim away. There was movement behind Kenneth as he turned, letting him know that Willa was also following directions. By the time the man was about to escape, Kenneth felt the soft touch of her hands on his lower back.

  “Leave the gun,” Kenneth commanded.

  The man shook his head.

  Kenneth fired his own weapon.

  Willa screamed as the man returned fire.

  It turned out he wasn’t fast. He also wasn’t a great shot. At least, not after being hit in the shoulder by Kenneth’s bullet.

  His squeezing the trigger was as sloppy as his aim. The man’s bullet embedded somewhere in the wall behind them. His gun clattered to the floor and he was out the door, running.