Allison Brennan - Killing Fear

Thump. Thump.

What was that?

She drew her breath in to scream, but it came out a croak. She couldn’t even scream! She didn’t care if Mario thought she was a fool, she just wanted light. Any light.

As her eyes adjusted to the dark, the distant glow of the streetlights below cast odd yellow shadows across her ceiling. A shadow moved outside her bedroom window.

Just the wind. Come on, Robin! It’s just the wind! You’re three stories up.

Rain in San Diego was rare, but it had been drizzling for most of the evening. The clouds obscured any moon that might have been out. A mist hung above the streets.

Thump.

Click, click, squeak.

“Mario!” Her voice couldn’t shout above a whisper, it was as if her throat had been sewed tight and she was trying to scream through a pillow.

Her alarm. Yes! Her alarm would alert her security company. Any time the power went out, a silent alarm went off and the security company would send someone if they couldn’t reach her by phone. Her phone didn’t work when the power went out.

She needed to hide.

Just get to the door! Dammit, Robin, Mario is somewhere in the building. Get to the door and bang on it. Make noise!

She was at the edge of her partition. To the left was a wall, to the right open space, then her living area which contained two sofas facing each other. A large lamp was on the side closest to her bedroom. If she knocked it over, it would crash on the hardwood floor.

A sob escaped her lips. She was pathetic. Scared of a blackout. It was the first rain of the season, for all she knew the relay station had been flooded or something. San Diegans didn’t handle rain well.

Scrape, thump.

Cold, damp air rushed into her loft.

Her bedroom window was open. Someone had opened it.

Everything happened so fast, she didn’t have time to scream. She felt like her lips were thick and she moved in slow motion.

She started for the door, sucking in air to scream, then stumbled over the end table, falling hard on the floor. The air rushed from her lungs, the wind knocked out of her.

For two seconds she couldn’t move. Then she got to her knees.

“Robin?”

It was Mario on the other side of her door.

She opened her mouth to call out to him, then someone slammed her back down to the floor, forcing the air from her lungs with a rush.

She kicked backward, made contact with hard flesh. Her attacker grunted, grabbed her hair and yanked her head back. Any farther and he would have broken her neck. She couldn’t swallow.

Cold metal touched her throat. A sliver of pain shot through her body, as if her neck had been burned. Warm blood slid down her skin.

“One word and I’ll kill you.”

Theodore Glenn.

“Robin!” A key turned in the lock. Mario had a set of keys, but she’d slid the security bolt. To make her feel safer. Instead, her own fear had trapped her inside with a killer.

Glenn yanked her up, his left arm tight around her waist, his right hand holding the knife to her throat. He moved soundlessly through her apartment toward the open window.

Robin felt like laughing hysterically-or breaking down in tears. For years she’d trained with a gun. Took self-defense classes, qualified for a concealed carry permit, practiced drawing her gun quickly.

But when she saw the shadow, her only thought was to run. She didn’t even think to grab her gun on the nightstand. Fight or flight, and she’d chosen flight without consciously thinking about it. How pathetic was that?

Mario banged on the front door.

Crunch.

Glenn pulled her to the window next to her bed, the rain blowing into her room, dampening everything.

Her nightstand was to the left of the window. She needed to buy time for Mario to get in. As Glenn maneuvered her through the window, she reached down, feeling for her gun.

Her fingers skimmed the barrel.

Glenn pulled her to the ledge. She reached out for her gun. A pain unlike anything she’d felt sunk into her side.

“Don’t think about fucking with me, Robin,” he growled in her ear.

He also had a knife in his left hand, and this one had cut into her side. Her head swam, her fingers slid across the gun, and suddenly she was pulled onto the narrow ledge of her building with Glenn.

She should push them both over. Kill him with her.

Will.

She pictured her lover finding her broken body on the street below. She couldn’t do that to him. Just as important, she didn’t want to die.

Bide your time. He could have killed you inside. He had the opportunity, but he didn’t.

The drizzle had turned to a steady fine rain, and in only a few seconds Robin was damp. Out of the seven days of rain San Diego got every year, why did one have to be tonight?

Theodore held her tight. He pocketed his knives and held her tight with his right hand. She fought, bit his hand, and tried to jump back in through the window.

He backhanded her, and her head hit the brick facade. She shook it, the pain intense, blood dripping into one eye, and hadn’t yet recovered when he forced her onto a rope ladder he’d hung from the roof.

“Stop being stupid, Robin.”

From below them, Robin heard noise in her apartment. She slowed her ascent, but Glenn picked her up and put her over his shoulder. She was looking at the sidewalk below, and it was rapidly moving farther away as Glenn practically ran up the shaky ladder. He wasn’t even holding her, had balanced her on his shoulder, and she found herself grabbing his shirt, fearful of falling headfirst onto the concrete more than three stories below.

When he reached the roof, he held her legs tight against him and ran, walked right onto the roof of the building next door. She cried out, screamed, kicked-anything to get away. He was too strong. Dammit, so was she! She was a dancer, she lugged kegs in from storage. She fought twice as hard, reaching around and clawing his face.

“Argh!” He threw her off his shoulder and kicked her in the jaw. She rolled on the gravel roof, stunned. He hauled her up again and whispered in her ear, “You’ll pay for that, Robin,” as he hoisted her back over his shoulder.

The fall had disoriented her and she shook her head to clear her thoughts. They were on yet another roof. How had they gotten there? Had she blacked out for a minute?

She heard sirens in the distance. Glenn laughed. “Too late.”

They were at the edge of the building. He was going to throw her off. Was that his plan? All that drama for this ?

Something white was coiled on the edge of the roof. A rope. What was that for?

He took her off his shoulder, but didn’t let go of her arm. Robin jerked away, stumbled, but Glenn didn’t loosen his grip. He attached the rope to his belt, grabbed her by the waist, and jumped right off the building.

“She’s gone.”

Will listened to Mario tell him how Theodore Glenn had kidnapped Robin right from under his nose. SWAT director Tom Blade was pushing one hundred miles an hour to get them back to San Diego as fast as possible.

He didn’t want to believe that Glenn had gotten to Robin so fast, but it fit the time line. Hell, he had hours to plan it. He may have had it all worked out days ago. Waiting for the right time.

The only thing Will was certain of was that Glenn would kill Robin. The question remained as to where and when.

Will pictured Sara Lorenz’s shredded body and the rage that had caused it.

He’ll kill her soon. He won’t be able to stop himself.

Will closed his eyes, focused on the messages Glenn had left for him and Robin. His twisted desire to watch his victims suffer. His taunting of Will. His talk about Romeo and Juliet.