Chapter 10 - Blood and Blue Lights
Vance didn't scream like a normal man.
He let out an ungodly, guttural roar of pure agony, like a wounded bear. The heavy, concentrated pharmaceutical solution hit his corneas with the burning intensity of boiling acid.
His hands flew to his face instantly, abandoning the weapon inside his coat. He stumbled backward, knocking over the heavy coat rack, which crashed into the foyer wall, shattering the framed mirror above it.
"Run!" I screamed at the top of my lungs.
I didn't run for the front door. The front door was locked, and opening the deadbolt would take three vital seconds.
I spun on my heels, clutching Sadie tightly to my chest, and bolted toward the kitchen.
Behind me, Vance’s heavy boots tore through the splintered wood and broken glass. He was blinded, swinging blindly into the air, knocking over furniture, screaming curses that curdled the blood in my veins.
"I will butcher you!" he roared, slamming into the archway between the foyer and the dining room. "I will butcher you and that little bastard!"
A deafening, muffled *CRACK* ripped through the house.
A bullet tore through the drywall three inches from my ear, showering Sadie and me in white plaster dust. Sadie shrieked in terror, her hands clamping over her ears.
"Mommy!"
"Hold on to me, Sadie! Hold on tight!"
I reached the kitchen. The sliding glass door was still locked, just as Mark had left it.
I set Sadie down behind the granite island, shoving her under the breakfast bar where the barstools provided a shield of thick wood. "Stay here! Do not move! Close your eyes!"
I turned back to the kitchen entrance.
Vance stumbled into the kitchen, his face covered in bright red, blistering chemical burns, his eyes swollen shut, blood and tears streaming down his cheeks. In his right hand was a sleek black pistol fitted with a thick carbon-fiber suppressor.
He raised the gun, tracking the sound of my breathing.
From the floor behind the kitchen island, a figure suddenly moved.
It wasn't Mark.
It was Evelyn.
The sixty-two-year-old woman, who had spent her life manipulating, controlling, and drugging her family to maintain a facade of suburban perfection, lunged from the shadows beside the pantry.
She wasn't holding a knife this time.
She was holding the heavy cast-iron skillet that had been sitting on the stovetop from dinner.
With a wild, guttural shriek of maternal fury—not for Sadie, not for me, but for the destruction of the world she had built—Evelyn brought the heavy iron pan down with all the force of her body directly onto the back of Vance’s skull.
The impact sounded like a baseball bat hitting a wet leather sack.
Vance’s knees buckled instantly. The suppressed pistol flew from his grip, skittering across the hardwood floor and coming to rest against my sneakers.
Vance hit the floor face-first, landing heavily on the broken ceramic shards of the shattered teapot, and did not move again.
Evelyn stood over him, the cast-iron skillet trembling in her hands, her beige cardigan splattered with blood, her breathing coming in ragged, wheezing gasps.
Outside, the night exploded into a blinding kaleidoscope of red and blue lights.
Sirens wailed in the distance, descending on our quiet suburban street like a horde of screaming banshees. Tires squealed against the asphalt of our driveway. Car doors slammed.
"Police! Open the door! County Sheriff's Department!"
I didn't look at Evelyn. I didn't look at the unconscious monster bleeding out on my kitchen floor.
I kicked the pistol away, reached under the island, and pulled my daughter into my arms.
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"It's over, baby," I sobbed into her hair, sinking down against the cabinetry as the front door was kicked off its hinges with a deafening crash. "It’s over. The spoon is gone."
***
