Lisa Gardner - The Survivors Club

He is sliding down her back. He is rubbing against her and there is no mistaking his arousal. “I'm going to fuck you good,” the man says. He laughs and laughs and laughs.

Jillian finally twists beneath his body. She beats at his thighs. She knits together the fingers on her right hand and tries to jab them into his ribs. And he whips her head from side to side to side until she can no longer feel the sting. She is in a dark, black place with a weight crushing her body and a voice stuck in her head and he is going to fuck her good.

His left hand curls around her throat. It starts to squeeze. She tries to claw at his wrist, but encounters only latex.

Oh no. Trish. Oh no.

She must get him off. She can't get him off. Her lungs are burning. She wants to fight. She wants to save her sister. Oh please stop, please.

Somebody. Help us.

The lights grow brighter behind her eyes. Her body slowly, surely, goes limp. The man finally loosens the grip his legs have on her ribs. His weight comes up off her body slightly.

And she jabs her hand forward as hard as she can and nails him between the legs.

The man howls. Rolls to the side. Clutches his balls. Jillian twists her shoulders, grabs at the floor, and tries to find something to pull herself free.

And then the weight is completely gone. The man is gone. He is curled up on the floor and she's gotta move. Phone, phone, phone. The kitchen counter. It's on the kitchen counter. If she can just get to the phone, dial 911.

Jillian pulls herself across the hardwood floor. Gotta move, gotta move. Trisha needs her. She needs her.

Come on, Jillian.

And then, before she even feels him, she hears him coming again.

“No,” she whimpers, but she's already too late.

“Goddamn, fucking bitch! I'm gonna KILL you! I'm gonna SNAP your goddamn neck, I'm gonna pop out your fucking eyes. Goddamn…”

He slams down upon her back and grabs her throat with his steely hands. Squeeze, squeeze, squeeze. Can't swallow. Can't breathe.

Her chest, growing so tight. Her hands, plucking at his gloved hands. No, no, no.

Come on, Jillian. Come on, Jillian.

But he is too strong. She realizes this as the world begins to spin and her lungs start to burst. She is proud. She is smart. She is a woman who believes she controls her own life.

But he is brute strength. And she is no match for him.

She is sinking down. She wants to say something. She wants to reach out to her sister. She is so sorry. Oh Trish, oh Trish, oh Trish.

And then, all of a sudden, the hands are gone.

“Fuck!” Fast footsteps run across the room. Footsteps pounding up the stairs. A distant boom as the external door bursts open.

Jillian draws a ragged, gasping breath of air. Like a drowning victim bursting free from water, she bolts upright, desperately dragging more oxygen into her lungs.

He's gone. He just… gone.

The room is empty. It is over. She's alive, she's alive. She is not stronger. She is not more capable. But she is lucky.

Jillian pulls herself unsteadily to her feet. She staggers across the room. She falls onto the bed next to her sister's form.

“Trish!” she cries out.

And then, in the unending silence of the room, she realizes that she is not lucky at all.

Seven A.M. Monday morning, Jillian Hayes remained prostrate on her bed. She stared up at the ceiling. She listened to the sound of her mother's muffled snoring down the hall, then the faint beep, beep, beep of Toppi's alarm clock going off for the first time. The adult-care specialist hit snooze right away. It would take three or four more alarms before Toppi actually got out of bed.

Jillian finally turned her head. She looked out the window of her East Greenwich home, where the sun was shining bright. Then she looked at her dresser, where the manila envelope still lay in plain sight.

Seven A.M. Monday morning. The Monday morning.

The phone next to her bed bleated shrilly. Jillian immediately froze. It might be another reporter demanding a quote. Worse, it might be him . He probably hadn't even started the ride to the courthouse yet. What did he wake up thinking about on a day like today?

The phone rang again, loud and demanding. Jillian had no choice but to snatch it up; she didn't want it to disturb her mother.

“Did I wake you?” Carol asked in her ear.

Jillian started breathing again. Of course it was Carol. Good ol' Dan was probably up and out already. Heaven forbid that even on a day as important as this day, he stay at home with his wife. Jillian said, “No.”

“I couldn't sleep,” Carol said.

“I now know every pattern on my ceiling.”

“It's funny. I feel so nervous. My stomach is tied in knots, my hands are shaking. I haven't felt like this since, well”-Carol's laugh was brittle-“I haven't felt like this since my wedding day.”

“It will be over soon,” Jillian said quietly. “Do you think we should call Meg?”

“She knows about breakfast.”

“All right.”

“What are you going to wear?”

“A camel-colored pantsuit with a white linen vest. I laid it out last night.”

“I went shopping. Nothing in my closet felt right. Then again, what do you wear for this sort of thing? I don't know. I found this butter-yellow Chanel suit at Nordstrom. It was nine hundred dollars. I'm going to burn it when the day is done.”

Jillian thought about her camel suit, then the coming day. “I'll join you,” she said.

Carol's voice grew soft. “What did you do with the clothes you were wearing that day?”

“When the police finally gave them back, I took them to the dry cleaners. And I've never… I've never picked them up.”

“We'll be thinking about Trisha today.”

Jillian's throat grew a little tight. “Carol… Thank you.”

And then, of course, the most important question, the question the whole phone call had been about.

“Do you know… Do you know what will happen?” Carol asked.

Jillian's gaze went back to the manila envelope on top of her dresser. Then she glanced at the clock. Seven-ten A.M. At least one hour to go.

“No,” she said honestly. “But I guess we're about to find out.”

NINE-OH-FIVE A.M. DOWNTOWN, THE SCENE WAS PRETTY much what Griffin had expected. Lots and lots of flashing lights. Very little organization. Even with an official vehicle and blaring horn, it took Griffin thirteen minutes to fight his way through the last three blocks around the courthouse. Almost immediately, he saw the problem. The media wasn't just there. They were there .

White media vans choked off the main artery of South Main Street. Choppers flooded the air. He'd already figured that most of the local news stations had sent reporters to cover the opening day of Eddie Como's trial. Apparently, at the first sound of rifle fire, the reporters had yelled a collective yippee and called in every station resource they could muster. Now if only the police could manage such great coverage of the scene.

Griffin drove his car up onto the curb, parking on cobblestones that technically formed a courtyard around one of the RISD buildings. Three students hastily scrambled out of his way, cursing. About four dozen more remained rooted in place, staring awestruck at the unfolding drama.

Climbing out of his Taurus, Griffin was immediately assaulted by the acrid stench of burning gas and scorched metal. Thick black smoke poured out of the parking lot just across the street, where men were frantically shouting orders and shooting four streams of water onto a mangled heap of flame-covered autos. The state fire marshal was already there, along with a collection of rescue vehicles and illegally parked police cars. A slew of Providence detectives stood alongside the fire marshal, waiting for the firemen to squelch the flames so they could move in to secure the scene.