Джанет Кантрелл - Fat Cat Takes The Cake

Chase squeezed her eyes shut and tried to recall the e-mail exchange.

rnorth83:wotz ur problem man

hunkyb:its all yr fault stay away from her its all yr fault

rnorth83:or?

hunkyb:ill smash in ur ugly face

“Stay away from her.” Of course. It was Bart Fender. The D in Ron’s notebook—that could be Dillon. She had been one of Ron North’s stalking victims. Bart could very well have been threatening him. What was all Ron’s fault? Dillon’s coma? Julie had been driven nearly crazy by his harassment. At one point, Chase had been afraid she was desperate enough to hurt herself, but Julie had insisted she wasn’t. Did Dillon try suicide because of Ron North?

If Bart were hunkyb and if he had killed Ron North, and if he had overheard them trying to put everything together, she and Julie may be in trouble.

She called Julie. “Did you make it home?”

“Just walked in. How about you?”

“I would be home by now, but someone spun out and caused an accident in front of me. I pulled over to catch my breath. I’m going home right now.”

She told Julie what she had put together and told her to be very careful.

“You, too!” Julie said. “I’ll keep my doors locked. Do you think he might try something tonight?”

“It’s getting harder and harder to get around. I don’t think so.”

“Call me as soon as you make it home.”

“I’m only about six blocks away.”

“I don’t care,” Julie insisted. “Call me.”

Chase promised to do that. She left her phone muted so she wouldn’t have any distractions. Driving in this blizzard would take all her attention.

Her hands tightened on the steering wheel and her shoulders tensed as she pulled onto the treacherous street. She was unaware that she was speaking aloud until she heard mumbled prayers spilling out of her mouth. Her prayers didn’t affect the snow, sadly. In fact, the intensity increased and the wind picked up in those last few blocks. She drove about five miles per hour.

By the time she steered into her parking lot, her whole body was as taut as a brittle gingerbread snap.

An older, beat-up car was the only other one in the lot. She didn’t recognize it. Maybe someone had left it there and gotten a ride. Nothing was open on the block and hers was the only residence.

She glided to a slow stop near her door, got out, and locked the car door.

Again, she shielded her face with her right forearm, not bothering to pull up her scarf for such a short distance, and waded through the snow. It had drifted to depths of at least four feet in places.

It was hard to see even a few feet ahead. Her boot sunk into a drift and cold snow came in at the top.

After six or seven steps, an arm snaked around her neck. Instinctively, she left her right hand on her face, keeping her arm between her neck and the incredibly strong person trying to get her in a strangle hold.

“You’re coming with me.”

She smelled pizza sauce on his breath. It was Bart.

THIRTY-FIVE

There was no time to panic. She had to stay alive. First she tried screaming.

“Shut up.” His voice was soft and menacing. “There’s nobody to hear you.”

“You let me go, Bart Fender! What do you think you’re doing? I haven’t done anything to you.”

She tried to step back onto his toes, but he must have been wearing steel-toed boots. So she tried to kick higher, aiming her heel for his family jewels. He was too tall.

“You figured out I killed that weasel, Ron North. I can’t have you telling anyone else.”

Think, she told herself, think!

“After you pass out, you know what I’m gonna do with you?”

She couldn’t bite his arm. Couldn’t reach it. Anyway, they were both wearing bulky, warm clothing. And gloves. She began trying to shake the glove off her left hand.

“Let me go,” she kept screaming. “Let go of me!” At least he wasn’t cutting off her wind and she could breathe fairly well. Although he was pressing so hard on the left side of her neck that she was starting to see stars. She drove behind her with her left elbow as hard as she could and met with a solid mass of hard muscle.

He raised his voice a bit. “I said be quiet. You’re annoying me. North deserved to die. He’s the one who killed Dillon. He drove her around the bend. She couldn’t stand to be alive anymore, even with me by her side. It’s all his fault she committed suicide.”

“She’s still alive, Bart.”

“Not for long. Everyone says she’s brain damaged, she won’t ever recover. She would be all right if they would be patient and wait, but they’re gonna pull the plug and then she’ll be . . . gone . . . forever.”

She shook back and forth, trying to send them both tumbling onto the icy pavement that lay beneath the snow.

“Okay,” she yelled as loudly as she could. “Tell me what you’re going to do.” Dare she hope that someone was within range to hear them? “You can’t kill me. Other people know everything I know and—”

“Yeah, your friend Julie. She’ll be next.”

“Next for what?” she screamed, lunging sideways with as much force as she could, trying to dislodge the solid Bart, who must outweigh her by at least a hundred pounds, she thought. Maybe two hundred. How could she get him off his feet? She kept rubbing her gloved hand on her stomach, trying to dislodge the glove.

Tires crunched on the ice. Was a car coming? She couldn’t tell if it was in the parking lot or passing by, out on the street, and she certainly couldn’t look around for it from her position.

“I’m gonna put you under the same bush where I put North. Can’t stand meddlers!” Now he was shouting, too.

Her glove fell to the ground. At last. She reached behind her and scratched.

Bart yowled, but kept his grip.

She reached again. This time she got an eye. She dug in and he let go.

Bart fell to his knees. Chase heard them crack on the icy pavement.

With one last, desperate lunge, he reached up and ripped her scarf off her neck.

She knew he wanted to strangle her with it. She shoved, pushed him over, kicked his head, and ran.

When she reached her door, she knew she would have to stop and unlock it. But when she glanced back, she saw a welcome sight.

“You’re under arrest for the murder of Ronald North,” Detective Olson said in his steeliest tone as he snapped handcuffs onto Bart’s hands behind his back. “You have the right to remain silent.”

“My eye! I need a hospital,” Bart whined.

Olson ignored him and kept speaking. The rest of the Miranda warning was music to Chase’s ears and she wanted to kiss Niles Olson on the lips right there.

“We’ll have the doc at lockup look you over,” Detective Olson said, shoving Bart into the rear seat of his car.

The ride to the station in the front seat of the policeman’s car was warm, but they had to endure a constant barrage from Bart in the backseat. After Detective Olson called a couple of people, including someone about Bart’s injured eye, he told someone else to impound Bart’s car, then he turned to her.

“When you said you were onto another suspect, I got pretty worried about you,” Niles said. “I had no idea where you were and you weren’t answering your cell phone.”

Maybe she shouldn’t have turned the sound off. “The suspect I thought I was after wasn’t Bart. The guy I questioned, I mean talked to, is harmless. Unless you’re harmed by health food and too much exercise.”

As they drove, the storm started to let up. The flakes slowed to a few dozen at a time and they fell straight down. The wind had vanished.

“We’ve been keeping an eye on Fender for a few months,” said the detective. “So when I followed him to your place, it raised about a dozen red flags.”