The police had to find the gun. And they had to check it for fingerprints. I pulled out my phone and was about to call NPD dispatch when I realized they would probably see my cell phone number on the caller ID. I wasn’t sure if it would work or not, but I dialed *67 before I dialed the number for dispatch, hoping it would block my number.
The dispatch operator asked if I needed the police, fire, or EMS. I told her I wanted to leave an anonymous tip regarding the murder of Ryan Carter. She put me on hold. A few seconds later she returned to the line and advised me that the detective in charge, Jim Dorne, was off duty, but I could leave the information with her and she would pass it along to him in the morning. I drew in a deep breath and exhaled.
“Okay,” I said. “I have reason to believe that Mike Thompson is in possession of the murder weapon. It is in a fireproof safe underneath his bed.”
“And how do you know this?” she asked.
“I’d rather not say. But I’m positive that it’s there. Along with several prescription bottles of narcotics that aren’t prescribed to him. His address is 201 Wichita Drive.”
I disconnected the line and noticed my hands were trembling again. Surely they would follow up on the tip. Surely they would go to Mike’s house tomorrow and they’d find the gun and match it to Ryan’s head wound and to Mike’s fingerprints. I was proud of myself. I had promised I would find Ryan’s killer and clear my own name, and I had done just that. Now, all I had to do was sit back and wait for a call from Dave telling me Mike had been arrested and that all charges against me had been dropped.
I walked up the sidewalk to the front door and put my key in the lock.
Shit
, I thought.
I forgot to call about changing the locks.
Then I remembered it might not matter after Monday.
When I opened the side door, I was instantly grateful I had turned the thermostat back a couple degrees. I was sweating from a combination of the hot July night air and my exploits at Mike’s house. Ryan and I used to argue over what temperature to keep the thermostat on. I was always hot, so I preferred a crisp sixty-eight degrees, while Ryan thought it was a strain on the electric bill, so whenever my back was turned, he’d crank it up to a balmy seventy-two. I smiled at the memory, even though it would have caused a fight if he were still alive.
I threw my keys and phone on the counter and kicked off my flip-flops. The empty space on the kitchen counter where the roses had been sent a shiver up my spine and reminded me once again that someone had been inside my house. Someone had touched my things. I felt so angry at the intrusion.
I had left the television on when I left in a hurry an hour prior, and I could hear a rerun of
Friends
playing in the background. It was the episode where Ross insisted to Rachel that they were
on a break
. Which made me think of Ryan and Lindsey. Which made me mad all over again.
I went to the freezer and grabbed my pint of Haagen-Dazs Caramel Cone ice cream. It was three in the morning and I was hungry and tired. But I was still a bit keyed up, so I figured I’d plop down on the sofa and watch a
Friends
marathon until I calmed down enough to go to bed. I grabbed a spoon from the drawer, slammed it shut with my hip, and shuffled through the kitchen toward the living room.
As soon as I rounded the corner, I dropped my ice cream and spoon. I wasn’t alone. There was a man sitting on my couch. I don’t know why I didn’t run screaming in the other direction—I must be highly susceptible to shock. His back was to me, but I guess he heard me drop the ice cream because he reached up his hand and clicked “pause” with the remote control. He slowly stood and turned to face me.
“Welcome home, darlin’,” he said with a Jack Torrence smile and a Matthew McConaughey drawl.
It was Merle. My dad’s idea of a babysitter. He didn’t have his sunglasses on this time, so I could see his features plain as day. He wasn’t much older than me, I guessed. Maybe early forties, at most. His hair was black and slicked back with some kind of pomade. The pockmarks I had seen before were more pronounced than I had realized, and his eyes were dim and fixed on me. His clothes were different, though. He was wearing cheap polyester dress pants, a black belt, and a white button down long-sleeve shirt.
“What are you doing in my house?” I asked, startled.
“Why, darlin’, I thought we could enjoy a nice quiet evening watchin’ TV together.”
Was he serious? Was he delusional? I couldn’t tell if his smile was genuine or ironic. Without thinking, I played along.
“It’s very late. I think I’m just going to go to bed now, so if you’ll just leave your number, I’ll call you tomorrow and maybe we can talk.”
“But darlin’, I’ve been waiting for you.”
“Um…all right. Let me just go freshen up a bit, okay?” I was hoping he’d let me go to the bathroom and I could grab my phone from the kitchen counter and call the police. No such luck.
“No, I don’t think so. Besides, you look beautiful as always. I like ya just the way ya are.”
I weighed my options quickly. If I made a run for it, perhaps I could grab my cell phone and a knife from the knife block and make it outside before he could reach me. But knowing my luck, he’d catch me before I could make it to the side door. Plus, it would probably piss him off. If he didn’t already have intentions of hurting me, he would then. I had no choice but to keep up the ruse.
“Do you like
Friends
?”
“Huh? Oh, that silly TV show? Nah, I never watched much TV. I was in prison for a long time, ya see, and they only allowed us an hour of television a week. When I do watch it, I prefer somethin’ a little more educational.”
“You were in prison with my father.” It was a statement more than a question.
“Yep. Your father, he’s a saint. He saved my life. Those men in there…they were, well, takin’ advantage of me, ya see. And your father, he made ’em stop. I owe him my life.”
“So you agreed to watch after me. I appreciate it. I really do. Now, if you don’t mind, maybe we can catch up some other time? I’m awfully tired and I—”
“Nonsense,” he said as he stepped from behind the couch toward me. “See, I’ve waited a long time to get to spend some one on one time with ya. I’ve been watchin’ ya for a long time.”
“How long?”
“Almost two years now.”
“But I’ve only seen you recently.”
“I was tired of hidin’. Always in the background. No appreciation.”
“Oh, I appreciate you looking out for me very much. But I’m fine. I really am. You don’t need to watch out for me anymore.”
“I don’t think that’s true. You need me now more than ever. You don’t have to pretend anymore.” He took another step closer. I was trembling from head to toe but I didn’t want him to see, so I slid my hands into the back pockets of my jeans. “Oh, hey, did you like my roses? I know you love red roses.”
Oh my God. He sent the roses. Of course he did. Why hadn’t I thought of that before?
“Uh, yeah. I did. Red’s my favorite color. How’d you know?” Lie. Purple was my favorite color. He didn’t know me at all. For all the time he’d spent watching me, he knew nothing about me.
“All the ladies love red roses. The smart ones, anyway.”
Next came the question I wasn’t sure I should ask. But I figured if he had done what I thought he’d done, he’d want me to appreciate it.
“So, you’re the one who killed Lindsey? You killed her for me?”
“Damn skippy.” He brushed his hand through his slick black hair. “I killed that whore for ya. Aren’t ya going to thank me?”
Now we were standing only inches apart. I could smell the stink of cigarettes and beer on his breath. It took all the willpower I had in me not to scrunch my nose up and back away.
“Oh, yes,” I said with a weak smile. “Thank you.”
“I thought ya’d appreciate that.” He raised his arms and made a choking motion with his hands. “I choked the life right out of that little heroin addicted whore. Watched as the life drained out of her dull little eyes. I wish you could have seen it, Libby.”
Just hearing him say my name brought bile up into my mouth. I swallowed, and it stung the back of my throat.
“Me too.”
I couldn’t take it anymore. I had to at least try to get out of there. I tried to run toward the door, but before I could even make it two steps, he grabbed hold of both my arms and swung me around so I was facing him, only inches from his face.
“Where do you think you’re going?”
He was no longer smiling. His nicotine-stained teeth gritted in anger, and spittle flew from his mouth.
“Let me go!” I screamed as I tried to wriggle from his grasp.
“You little tease. Come here. It’s time I got a proper thank you for all I’ve done for you.”
He kissed me so roughly, and I was fighting him so severely, I could taste my own blood where his teeth had bitten my bottom lip. I stomped hard on his toe, but he didn’t let go.
“Let me go!” I repeated.
“Hold still,” he grunted as he wrapped his arms around my waist and pulled me closer to him. “Don’t fight me, girl. You know you want me too.”
“You disgust me!” I shouted in his face.
He looked genuinely hurt by my words, and for a brief moment, I thought he might actually let me go. Instead, something changed in his eyes. They were already dark and beady, but now there was a rage in them I’d never seen in anything other than an animal.
“After all I’ve done for you, you ungrateful little cunt!”
Merle reared back and slapped me with the back of his hand as hard as he could. The force sent me crashing to the hard linoleum floor. I brought my hand to my cheek and felt heat rising to the surface of my skin. He stood over me, straddling me, with both hands clenched into fists.
Suddenly, his face changed again. Now he looked almost sorry.
He squatted down and brushed the hair out of my face. His touch made my skin crawl.
“I’m sorry, darlin’. It’s just…I love ya so fuckin’ much. I thought you’d be happy. I thought you’d love me back. Especially after what I did for ya.”
“I know! You killed Lindsey! I never asked you to do that!”
“I’m not talkin’ about that little whore.”
My confusion must have been evident, for he tilted his head to the side and said, “Oh…ya really don’t know, do ya?”
“Know what?” I pushed myself back up to my feet, and miraculously, he let me stand.
He stood up and faced me, again inches from my face. “When I saw what that no-good husband of yours was doin’ behind your back with that little tart…well, I just couldn’t stand by and do nothin’. He didn’t deserve ya. You belong with me.”
Horror. That’s the only word that comes to mind to describe what I felt in the moment I realized the man standing before me had killed Ryan.
“You killed my husband?”
“I did it for you, baby. For us. What did ya expect me to do? He was fuckin’ that whore behind your back. And you didn’t deserve that. I promised to protect you and I did.”
“But how…”
“I shot him. That’s how.”
“But I mean, I didn’t hear the gunshot. How is that possible?”
He scratched his head, and he looked down at his finely polished, cheap black dress shoes. “That’s the part I regret. I really didn’t know they’d blame ya for it. I promise I wouldn’t have let them send you to jail. I was workin’ on a way to clear your name…”
I repeated myself, only louder this time.
“How did I not hear the gunshot, Merle?”
“Rohypnol. It’s a very strong sedative. Easy to get on the black market. Especially when ya know the right people. It was meant for that asshole, not you. It was supposed to make him sleep. You weren’t supposed to be home.”
Ryan’s beer. I rarely drank beer, but that night I was out of wine and I was frustrated with Ryan because of our argument. Merle had snuck in and laced Ryan’s beer with Rohypnol. That also explained my pounding headache and the dizziness. And like he said, I wasn’t supposed to be home that night. I was supposed to be out of town for a deposition. How had he known that? Then another thought occurred to me. The gun. Apparently, the gun I’d found in Mike’s house was not the real murder weapon.
“Merle, what happened to the gun?”
“Oh, that. That’s an easy one. Soon as I left here, I drove out to Lock Eight and threw the gun in the river. All that rushing water. There’s no way they’ll ever find that gun. Even if they do, I wore gloves, so, no prints.”
It all made sense, but it didn’t matter now. I had to get out of there.
I sprinted across the living room toward the kitchen. This time I must have caught him off guard because he was a split second behind me. He caught me right before I could make it to my phone. He grabbed it, smashed it on the ground, and stomped on it.
“Nice try, darlin’. If you’re not gonna thank me, I guess I’ll just have to take my thanks where I can get it.”
He grabbed my tank top and ripped the fabric right down the middle.
Oh, God. He’s going to rape me.
I fought with every bit of strength I had in my body. I kicked and punched and wiggled so much he had a hard time keeping hold of me.
“Keep still! I’ve waited two years for this! I want my thank you and I want it now.”
He grabbed hold of the top of my jeans and yanked them down. I continued fighting him as hard as I could, but he was so much stronger than me. I had always heard people say not to fight. To just let them have what they want and get it over with. But I just couldn’t do it. The thought of this disgusting man putting his hands on me was just too much for me to bear. So I continued to fight. I wasn’t going to make it easy on him.
“Hold still!” he shouted as he fumbled with my underwear.
I kneed him between the legs. He crouched down but didn’t let go of me.
“You bitch!” he growled.
Out of the corner of my eye, I saw the knife block. I reached my arm out as far as I could but it was just beyond my reach.
He finally got my underwear off and I was certain my luck was out. He was going to rape me. I wasn’t going to let it happen. I stretched and reached so hard my shoulder muscle felt like it was going to rip. Finally, I felt the handle of one of the knives. I fumbled with my fingers while Merle tried to force my legs apart. I squeezed my thighs as tightly as I could. Then my hand was around the grip of the knife. I slid it quickly out of the block and without hesitation, plunged it deep into his chest. Right in the heart. He stumbled backward, grabbing at the handle of the knife. He looked up at me with eyes wide as saucers.
“You stabbed me.”