“What—”
Drea clamped her hand over Cujo’s mouth and leaned down to his ear.“There is someone in the house.”
Cujo’s eyes opened wide as he sat up.He reached across to the chair and grabbed his shorts.Drea grabbed for her phone and dialed 911.Quietly, she told them Cujo’s address and that they believed the intruder was armed.
“Please stay on the line, ma’am, an officer is on his way,” the operator responded.
Suddenly aware of being naked, she looked around for something to wear.The idea of facing this in the nude just compounded her fear.Cujo reached over to the chair again, and presented her with his hoodie.He helped her pull it over her head while keeping the phone close.
A floorboard creaked, then stopped suddenly.“Kitchen,” Cujo mouthed quietly.He leaned over the side of the bed and produced his sneakers.Her shoes were over the other side of the room.Dammit.
The clock on her phone told her only three minutes had passed since she called the police.Each one of those minutes had felt like an hour.Fear coursed through her, a fierce, biting agony that caused her hands to shake.
Every now and then, the operator would ask if she was still there, if she was okay, but Drea kept the responses to a minimum.
“Stay here,” Cujo mouthed.He stood and crept toward the door.
Oh my God, was he going to go face them?She waved her arm to get his attention and shook her head, making the universal symbol of a gun with her fingers.
A floorboard creaked on the stairs drawing their attention to the door.Somebody was heading up toward them.Cujo stayed back against the wall.Drea pulled her knees up to her chest near the headboard.
The bedroom door burst open and Drea screamed, dropping her phone, sending it skittering across the wooden floor.The man she recognized as Mike MacArthur’s killer, the man she thought of as Rondo, burst into the room.Cujo launched from behind, grabbing him around the neck.The gun he carried went off, the bullet narrowly missing Drea as it tore into the headboard, sending splinters flying.
Cujo looked over at her to make sure she was okay, and Rondo took advantage of the move to land a punch on his jaw.By the time he recovered, Drea felt the cold, hard barrel of a gun pressed against her temple.
A second person rushed into the room.Gun drawn.Snake.
“Andrea?”Snake said, looking straight at her, then at Rondo.
There was no hope.Mike MacArthur’s killer was pointing a gun right at her, his pronounced brow and enlarged nose and lips even more disturbing in the shadows.
“Take the gun away from her head, you asshole,” Cujo said harshly.
“Where’s the laptop?”Rondo growled, his voice deep and thick like treacle.
“Take the gun away and I’ll tell you.”Cujo’s hands were fisted at his sides, and his chest heaved furiously.
“Like you have a fucking choice.We can kill you both and find it anyway.”Rondo laughed, a sickening sound.
“Closet, behind you.Top shelf under the sweaters.”Anger roiled the air around Cujo.Blood trickled from the side of his mouth.
Please, God.Where are the sirens?By Drea’s reckoning, it had been about six minutes.Would the police rush to this neighborhood?
Snake, gun in hand, opened the closet and retrieved the laptop.
“Please, let us go,” Drea begged.“We have nothing to do with this.You know that, right?”
“Shut the fuck up,” said Rondo.“Let’s clean up this mess and get out of here.”
She thought of her mom, and looked across at Cujo.Her bottom lip trembled and she bit it.Tears started to fall.This wasn’t the way it was meant to end.Her life had barely started.This couldn’t be it.
She heard the click of Snake’s gun and closed her eyes.
No.
***
“What the fuck?”Rondo yelled.
