I blurt out what’s happened and also explain that I’m pretty sure the woman who broke into my rental home killed a man named Jamie Larsson two weeks ago.
After she promises to send a team and I sign off, I scurry back downstairs with Sam’s clothes and sandals. Though my fear has subsided a little, my heart is still beating wildly.
“They said a car is being dispatched immediately,” I tell him. He’s leaning against the kitchen door frame with one eye on Percy, who’swrithing a little on the floor. It’s impossible to tell if she’s in a lot of pain or just struggling to free herself.
“I don’t think you did any serious damage,” Sam says as he notices me taking her in. “But she might have a concussion.”
“I don’t care if she does,” I exclaim. “She killed Jamie. She told me so.”
“Yeah, I caught that part.” He accepts his clothes and sandals from me but then gestures toward the dining room. “Why don’t we wait in there? I can still keep an eye on her, but I’ll be less tempted to strangle her.”
While I drop into one of the chairs, he hurriedly dresses.
“So, tell me what happened earlier,” he says. “I woke up because I heard you talking to someone, but how didyouknow she was down here?”
I explain about the candle smell and then fill him in on the parts of the exchange with Percy that he missed, as well as the other creepy incidents at the house that I now know she was responsible for.
“And she said Jamie gave her akey?” he says, finally sitting. “That makes no sense. Like I told you, he said they’d only gone out a few times.”
“I know, but she seemed to know him better than that,” I say. I’m still struggling to sort it all out in my mind. “And it now seems clear she was in a rage at the party, at a level that no one realized.”
He reaches out a hand and lays it across mine. I feel my pulse begin to slow.
“God, Kiki, she was in a rage about you, too,” he says. “She could have killed you.”
“Bothof us. Thank god you parked your car down the street and she had no idea anyone else was here.” I glance down at my phone, which I’ve rested on the edge of the table. “Wherearethey?”
And then, as if it’s answering me, the sound of a siren cuts through the night.
“Here we go,” he says. He takes his hand back and sweeps it through his hair. For a moment I can still feel the warmth of his touch on my skin and then it’s gone.
I struggle up and move quickly to the front window, with Sam right behind me, to see that an ambulance and a state police vehicle have pulled up to the front of the house.
“Okay, why don’t you get the door,” Sam says, “and I’ll go check on her again.” He reaches out and gives my arm a comforting squeeze. “And keep in mind, they’re going to separate us before long. We’re on our own from here.”
“Right,” I say.
I tell myself that there’s no reason to be anxious, and that this is the moment I’ve been waiting for—to prove to everyone that Jamie didn’t take his own life. All I have to do is explain the encounter with Percy and relay her chilling words about Jamie.
The siren is off now, and the sound of doors slamming and the clomp of footsteps comes from outside. There’s so much to tell them, but there’s one thing I have no intention of sharing: how Percy said Jamie wasn’t the man I thought he was, and that he had sins he needed to be punished for.
I don’t know what she meant, but it won’t stop echoing in my mind.
27
ISWING THE DOOR OPEN. TWO GRAY-UNIFORMED STATEtroopers—one male, one female—enter, followed by two EMS workers with a rolling stretcher, and then two more male troopers. The room starts to buzz like an overturned beehive. The woman appears to be in charge and introduces herself as Trooper First Class Gallagher. After Sam and I provide our names, I quickly recap what I told the 911 operator and Sam explains that the person who broke in and threatened me is tied up in the kitchen.
“Okay, please remain here for now,” Trooper Gallagher directs us. Sam and I retreat to the far side of the living room as the rest of the group heads to the kitchen, minus one trooper who hangs back with us. Though I can’t make out specific words from where I’m standing, I’m aware of the ambulance crew and cops talking in short bursts to one another, and I hear crackling noise from a two-way radio. Next comes the click of metal and the sound of Percy moaning again. They must be moving her onto the gurney. I flash back to the look on her face as she sneered at me and the gleam of the blade she thrust in my direction.
Sam gives my hand a quick squeeze. “Hang in there,” he whispers.
I squeeze back, grateful for the gesture. I’m starting to feel lightheaded, and my legs are a little wobbly, perhaps from the letdown of adrenaline that was surging through my body.
The trooper in the room with us, a clean-shaven guy not much older than thirty, seems to keep one eye on the kitchen and the other on Sam and me, but his face is otherwise expressionless.
Suddenly, both EMS workers emerge from the kitchen, rolling the gurney toward the front door, with three troopers alongside it. The body of one trooper blocks most of my view, but I catch a flash of bright red and realize that Percy’s in a plastic head immobilizer. A second later I glimpse the lower half of her body, squirming beneath a sheet.
“She did it,” she suddenly calls out. “She attacked me.”
