Photographs Ch. 09

Christie sat on the edge of her bed, holding the now crushed bug in her hand, and tried not to panic. It drew her eyes again and again, this little piece of plastic and wire that held the power to destroy everything she held dear. She tried to think of how exposed they might be, and what she should do if they were. She had swept for bugs on Wednesday and found them all over the house, but missed this one. She had missed it on Saturday as well. The signal was cutting in and out, and weak enough that her detector didn't sense it twice, and even a third time while he held it in her hand. The small device was probably malfunctioning. Maybe it didn't catch anything; maybe it did. The fact was, Christie and Danny had sex in her room on Thursday night while Steve was out. Even if the bug only caught bits and pieces, Steve could possibly have enough information to figure out what was going on.

Danny was still traveling from Berkley. Steve was at his studio, doing who knew what. She had time to act. First sending a text to Danny telling him to meet her at his Uncle Sean's home, she went to pack. In Danny's room she threw clothing into his duffel bag. He had a small bag with him that would have essentials, and most of his textbooks. She gathered up what she could find of the rest and dumped them atop the clothing. Zipping the bag, she carried it to her own room. There she grabbed a small suitcase and stuffed it with jeans and t-shirts, underwear and socks. Sensible clothing and toiletries. Riffling through the desk turned up passports and extra credit cards.

She was just glancing around the room, trying to see if she had missed anything, when she heard the rattle of the garage door opener coming to life. No time! She couldn't lug around all this gear and still escape, so she grabbed her purse and raced for the front door, hoping to slip out while Steve was coming in through the garage. She almost made it.

"Christie," Steve said as he rounded the corner from the kitchen to the entry hall. The scariest thing about it was that he didn't yell, didn't scream, didn't express anything but a an icy calm. In that tone, though, she heard his awareness of what she'd done. She had her hand on the deadbolt. That close. She twisted the bolt open, thinking that if she managed to get outside, he wouldn't want the neighbors to hear. But hands seized her from behind. Steve yanked her away from the door and threw her into the wall. She tried to slip sideways to reach the door, but tripped over the brass umbrella stand. It rolled sideways with a clang and spilled umbrellas over the floor.

"Who was it Christie? My bug caught you. You were in bed with somebody. Who was it?" Her relief that he didn't know it was Danny only lasted a moment. Steve grabbed her by the front of her shirt. Then, even with all the beatings he had delivered over the years, he hit her for the first time in the face, a hard, open-handed slap that sent her sprawling. She tasted blood from the corner of her mouth.

Christie, on all fours now, scrambled for the door across the cold tile, trying to rise. Steve bent over her and hit her with his fists this time, on her right kidney, and again on her ribs. She collapsed to the floor. Doubled over by the pain, she let him roll her to hit her more on the face and abdomen. She had known that Steve had incredible self-control, but she didn't realize how much he held back until this moment, when he let it all go. Her face, her ribs, her stomach, he punched them all with equal ferocity. She heard a snap when he hit her on the upper chest.

"Who was it?" he screamed. "It was Ralph, wasn't it?"

Christie was fit and reasonably strong, but she was no fighter. She had scrappled with Steve on a few occasions when she decided to defend herself. None of those experiences prepared her for this. She tried, raking him with her nails, reaching hands up to gouge his eyes. He evaded her easily. Powerless to defend herself, she could only roll into a ball and try to take the worst of the blows in less vital places. When he paused for a breath she moved to rise again. He shoved her down and her head hit the heavy umbrella stand. She lost consciousness for a moment.

The feeling of her pants being dragged from her body roused her, but by the time she was alert enough to act, Steve already had his shaft in her and fucked her mercilessly. She wanted to scratch his eyes out, but he used his weight to pin her upper arms to the floor. Christie tried to twist and struggle. The pain from whatever he had broken in her chest was indescribable, incapacitating her.

"Did he fuck you like this, Christie?" He grunted and continued, "I'm going to kill you, and then I'm going to kill Ralph. Maybe I'll kill the brat, too. I want that to be the last thing you think about."

"This is what you've wanted all along," she croaked. Her breaths came in short, painful gasps. "Isn't it? That's why you bugged the house. Not because you didn't want anyone else to have me, but because you wanted an excuse to beat the crap out of me."

"I wanted you to want to be with me, but you never did. Even when you were ten."

She couldn't help it. Despite the pain, despite the fact that at that very moment she was being raped by her husband, she laughed.

And then his hands were on her throat. Christie, truly panicked but with her hands now free, reached out blindly for any kind of weapon. Her fingers touched fabric. An umbrella. Feeling for the handle, she could tell it was an old-fashioned one, with a tapering point at the top. It was rounded at the tip, but very narrow. Steve had his eyes focused on hers, wanting to see the light go out of her eyes. It began to, her vision narrowing. Quickly, before she could no longer see, she raised the umbrella to grasp it in shaking hands. She cried out as the broken thing in her chest moved, and stabbed him in the throat. Blood gushed. Steve fell to the side, and Christie passed out.

#####

Danny received Christie's text as the team bus approached the UCLA neighborhood: Found bug. Meet at Sean's. DO NOT COME HOME! He texted back: Let me know when you are safe.

He glanced around the bus. The young men were mostly sleeping, a few studied like Danny had been, others chatted. All were oblivious to the fact that his world had just come crashing down.

He dialed his uncle, who told him he hadn't heard from his mother. Reluctant to explain the situation there on the bus with teammates all around, he told his uncle that his mother intended to visit and to please call him when she arrived.

If she left the moment she sent the text, Christie would arrive at his uncle's house in about twenty minutes. She wouldn't look at or answer her texts until she wasn't driving, so it was reasonable not to expect a reply. He packed his books and papers back into his bag and waited.

Twenty minutes passed without a phone call. He called his uncle again, but she still hadn't arrived. The bus pulled into the UCLA campus at that moment. He would have to hike to the parking garage where he left his car, and from there it took twenty minutes to home in light traffic. He had no intention of going to his uncle's house if he didn't know where his mother was.

Another half hour. It would be half an hour before he would know if his mother were safe. Danny barely saw the traffic around him as he drove home. In his driveway, he raised the garage door even though he wouldn't park there. He wanted to see who was home. Both Christie's and Steve's cars sat in their spaces. The front door was unlocked. He twisted the knob quietly and eased the door open to find the bodies of his mother and father lying there in an enormous pool of blood. It covered them both.

"Mom?" Horrified, he knelt in the blood at his mother's side and felt for a pulse. Her heart beat in a regular rhythm, but her breathing was uneven. After dialing 911, he checked Steve, but he had no pulse. Christie had killed him. He searched her for wounds. Most of the blood must have been Steve's, because other than her face, he found nothing bleeding.

"Christie?" he said as he looked her over. "Christie?"

Her eyes opened, and she smiled.

"Christie?"

"Safe?"

"We're safe. He's dead."

She nodded and grimaced. "He didn't know," she whispered.

"About us?"

She nodded again and closed her eyes.

Danny wanted to gather his mother into his arms, but he was afraid to move her. So he knelt at her side in a pool of blood until the paramedics came.