An Excerpt from
 
Unholy Angelsby  Karen Fenech

October 22

    He ran her off the road.  Liz turned the ignition key.  The engine coughed, but didn’t start.  She clenched her teeth and tried again.  “Come on. Come on.”  She had to get out of there before he-
    The car door swung open. Liz fumbled with the seatbelt, and scuttled across the yellow seat to the passenger side. She yanked on the handle, then realized the caved-in door was wedged against a tree.
    “Well, hello there.”
    His tone was mild, pleasant, as he slid into the car beside her. He filled the driver’s seat, all but blocking out the sunlight behind him.  Liz’s mouth went dry.
    He reached for her. She shrieked and swung out with her feet, kicking him in the chest. He grunted, but there was no give, just muscle.   
    He grinned, baring straight, white teeth. “If I had more time, we could stretch this out a bit.” He sighed. “But we got to get ourselves back on the road.”
    His hand shot out, seizing the hair at her temple.  He wound the long brown strands around his fist. She cried out and clawed at his fingers. They were as thick as her wrist and covered in leather. The son of a bitch was wearing gloves.
    He dragged her across the seat to him. She grabbed the passenger door handle, but he broke her hold.
    Her eyes watered from the pain of his grip on her hair, but she had to stay in the car. It would be all over if he got her out of the car.  Panting, she clutched the steering wheel. It cut into her side, anchoring her, but the reprieve lasted for only an instant before he hauled her off  the seat and flung her over his shoulder.
    She landed hard. The breath left her lungs. Stars burst in front of her eyes. She got in one shallow breath, and then he was on the move. He set a swift pace, bouncing her against his body and keeping her breathless.  
    His sedan was parked behind her car. The engine idled; the trunk stood open. He rounded the vehicle, retrieved a roll of thick duct tape from the empty compartment, then tossed her inside, facedown.  
    She scrambled onto her knees. He grabbed her arms and forced them behind her back. In a moment she would be helpless.
    She struggled to pull back from him, but couldn’t break his grip. The tape screeched, then he was binding her hands.
    No more than a couple of minutes had passed since he’d forced her off the road.  He was efficient and fast. Impossible to elude. Perspiration soaked her body.  
    “Doug knows about you.” It was a lie, and her voice quavered. She forced some strength into it. “When I don’t come home, he’ll come after you.”
    Her abductor taped her ankles, then slapped a strip over her mouth. He leaned in close, close enough that she could smell his minty breath. “Sheriff  Doug won’t have to look far. I’m easy to find.”  His gaze slowly roamed her body, lingering on her legs and breasts, then his eyes stared into hers. “But he won’t find all of you.”

September 19
    “Damn you, Peter, we have to talk!”
    Liz jogged up the stairs to the narrow hall. The bathroom and bedroom doors were open. Peter’s study door was closed.  No doubt he was in there thinking of more ways to mess with her life. Liz bit down, grinding her back teeth.  Enough of that.  
    She struck the door with her fist, then entered.  Scotch. The room reeked of it. Peter’s desk was directly across from the doorway. He was slumped across his desk blotter, his blond head resting on his out flung arm. His face was turned into the crook of his elbow, hidden behind the brawny arm that had won him a football scholarship to Notre Dame. At forty, he still looked like he could suit up for a game. A tan golf shirt stretched across his broad shoulders and back.
    An uncapped bottle of the expensive brand of Scotch he favored stood on a corner of the desk. It was ten-thirteen according to the digital clock on the desk and he was still out. Too bad he chose last night to party.  No way was she going to be put off.
    She circled the desk, her steps soundless on the inches thick gray carpeting. “Time to wake up, Peter.”
    She shook his shoulder. It felt stiff.  She gasped and stumbled back.  Peter fell forward, striking the wooden desk top with his face.  
    She grabbed the phone on the desk. Hands shaking, she dialed 911. A woman answered.  
    “This is Liz Janssen at ah-” Liz tapped her forehead. “Fifty-five Kent Street.  I think my ex-husband is dead.”

    “Mrs. Janssen?”
    Liz glanced up at the man standing in the doorway between Peter’s bedroom and den. Thick, dark hair curled over the collar of a white shirt that was tucked into faded jeans. His dark deep set eyes watched her, studied her.
    She nodded. “Yes, I’m Liz Janssen.”
    He left the door way and walked slowly into the room, toward where she stood against a white wall. From the back pocket of his jeans, he withdrew a police shield. He held it up for her to see.  “Doug McBride.”   
    The new sheriff and brother to Sean, Peter’s closest friend.  Doug was tall and wide in the shoulders like Sean, but his features were rugged, not refined like his brother’s.
    Doug returned his ID to his pocket. “I’m sorry for what’s happened.”
    The paramedics had confirmed Peter’s death a few minutes earlier.  She was told an empty bottle of prescription pills was found clutched in Peter’s fist. It was expected that the medical examiner would confirm that his death was a suicide. Liz closed her eyes.   
    “I need to ask you some questions,” Doug said. “Are you up to answering them now?”
    She opened her eyes. Her hands were almost steady again. She clasped them. “Yes. I’d like to do this as quickly as we can. I have to find Will, my son, and tell him about Peter.”
    Doug nodded. “Let’s talk downstairs.”
    Liz led Doug out of the bedroom. The living room was dark and now felt too cold.  Since she’d found Peter’s body, she hadn’t been able to get warm. She went to the curtains, bunched them in her fists and drew them apart.  Heat and light struck her. She squinted in the sudden brightness, but kept her face to the hot sun.
    Doug went to sit on the end of the sofa. He placed a tape recorder on the coffee table beside a vase, pressed “record,” then stated the date and their names.  “What time did you arrive here, at Peter’s house, Mrs. Janssen?”
    Liz turned to face the sheriff.  She had read the time on Peter’s desk clock, right before she touched him. Ten-thirteen.  She was probably accurate within a minute or two when she said she got there five minutes before that.  
    “Why were you here this morning?” he asked.
    Liz hesitated. Since she filed for divorce, seven weeks ago, Peter had been using his position as manager of the bank in Branville to tie up her finances.  Last week, she’d handed Wayne Wallace her credit card for a fill-up, then watched his acne-scarred face redden as he stammered, Sorry, Mrs. Janssen, my machine says this here card’s over its limit.
    That morning she went to withdraw funds from her account and was denied, though she’d called the bank and confirmed that the check from her publisher had cleared. The money was there, all right. She just couldn’t get it.  Because of Peter. When she charged into his office to confront him, his assistant told her that Peter hadn’t arrived for work yet so she drove here.
    Liz licked her lips. Peter was dead. There was no point in making public that he’d been abusing his job by playing games with her finances.
    “Mrs. Janssen?”
    “I came by to address a concern I had over the sale of our house, Sheriff.”
    “That would be this house?”
    She nodded. She wanted a fresh start in a new place, but Peter had seen no reason to leave the house until it was sold. Likely, he could have stayed put for a very long time. Branville was one of the smallest towns in West Virginia. An hour drive from the nearest city, it was nestled between miles of farmland and forest. The remote location made the property a hard-sell.  
    “How did you get into the house?” Doug asked.
    “The door was unlocked.” She hadn’t locked a door since moving to Branville, seventeen years earlier. “We always kept the door unlocked.”
    “How long have you and Peter been separated?”
    “Almost two months.”
    “Have you spoken or seen each other in that time?”
    Liz shook her head. “Not at all.”
    “How did Peter feel about the separation?”
    Liz closed her eyes, thinking back to that last evening as she sat waiting for Peter to come home. It had been almost midnight. The houses opposite hers were dark. Crickets chirped somewhere beside her on the front porch.
    She had no idea how long she would have to wait. She didn’t know Peter’s schedule, had no clue what he did with the time he wasn’t at the bank. He arrived thirty minutes later. The glow from the porch light illuminated his casual dress-slacks and a short-sleeved shirt. Though there was no breeze, his hair looked windblown. He finger-combed it as he strolled onto the porch.
    He passed her chair. She reached out and touched his forearm briefly to stop him. It had been years since they’d made even that much physical contact. When Peter turned toward her, she saw no need for preliminaries. “I want a divorce,” she said quietly.
    He faced her for another moment; then, without saying anything, continued into the house.  The next morning, Liz consulted an attorney.
    She looked up at Doug now. “Peter never told me how he felt about us separating, but the marriage has been over for years, for both of us, Sheriff.”  It was Peter’s bruised ego, not a broken heart, that had kept him from letting her move on with her life.    
    Doug stopped the recorder. “That should do it. If I have any further questions, I’ll be in touch.”
    Liz was anxious to reach Will.  She inclined her head to Doug, and left the house.
    As she rounded the hood of her hatchback, Will’s car squealed to a stop behind the ambulance.  She met him at the foot of the driveway and stopped in front of him.
    Except for his size, which he’d inherited from his father, the seventeen-year-old looked like her-light brown hair that he kept cropped short, brown eyes, and a crooked smile. And like his mother, everything he felt showed on his face. His brows were lowered, his mouth tight and, in his eyes, she now saw fear.
    “What’s an ambulance doing here? What’s happened to Dad?” Will asked.
    Will and Peter held a special closeness. How was she going to tell him that his father was dead?  
    In the tense silence, she became aware of Will’s car idling. The compact automobile had years and miles on it. Will loved it.  She knew most of the affection for the car was due to the hours he spent working on it with his father.
    “Never mind.” Will brushed by her. “I’ll find out for myself.”
    Liz clutched his arm.  “Dad’s dead, Will.” He had to hear the rest now before someone else could tell him. “An empty bottle of pills was found in his hand.”
    “I want to see Dad. Now!”  Will yanked his arm from her grasp. Liz’s eyes filled with tears, and Will’s eyes widened. “No!”
    His features tightened in pain and he squeezed his eyes shut.
    “I’m so sorry,” Liz murmured.
    Will’s eyes opened again. “Sorry?” His voice throbbed. “Save it, Mom. We were a family until a publisher called raving about your book and you figured you didn’t need Dad anymore so you walked!”
    Though Will had watched the estrangement between his parents grow over the years, the separation had still hurt him. “Our separation didn’t happen because I sold my novel,” Liz said quietly. Branville Books, the store she owned in town, was her business-not hers and Peter’s-and had kept her modestly self-supporting, though Will would not realize that.
    His eyes glittered with anger. “How do you think Dad felt knowing he’d been used?”
    “Dad didn’t know about the call. He didn’t even know what I’d been working on.”
    Will’s Adam’s apple bobbed.  “Dad knew. I invited him to join us for your celebration dinner. He didn’t answer me right away. I thought he was going to accept, but he shook his head, and told me to have a good time. He’d have come if you’d asked him to.”
    She would not remind Will that weeks passed where she and Peter failed to exchange a word.  Peter wouldn’t have joined them, but before Liz could tell Will that, he mumbled, “If only I came sooner.” Tears filled his eyes. “I knew he was lonely.”
    Liz dug her fingers into his forearms. She could feel him trembling. “There was nothing you could have done. He was gone before I got here this morning.”
    Will broke her grip on him. “Not hours. Days. I came by to tell him I was moving in with him-today.” He gritted his teeth. “Right after I talked to you.”
    “You wanted to live with your father?” Liz asked softly.  When she left Peter,  she took Will with her, and made new living arrangements for them both. She never considered that he would live anywhere but with her.  
    Nothing could hurt her worse than hearing her son say he didn’t want to live with her- or so she thought. His face and shoulders tensed and he leaned toward her. Her little boy was now a man who loomed over her.  The sudden rage in him startled her and for an instant she thought he might actually harm her.
    He hadn’t raised a hand to anyone since a school yard tussle in the first grade. With his early development though, he could have easily become the school bully. After that incident, in one of their last talks as a family, Peter had calmly explained to their son that since he was bigger than the other kids, it was his responsibility to hold his temper-even if others challenged him.  This was the first real display of temper she’d seen from him in the years since.
    Will wheeled away from her now and struck the car’s hood with his fists. “Dad,” he cried out. “Dad!”
    Her child was suffering and there wasn’t anything she could do to take away his pain. She felt helpless and hated it.  She reached out and touched his back. “Let’s go home.”
    “I don’t have a home.”
    “You’re not alone, Will,” she said softly. “I’m right here.”
    Will pulled away from her. Tears fell onto his cheeks. “Dad needed you.  Look where it got him.”

    Doug nodded at a bearded paramedic who charged out of Peter Janssen’s study, then entered the room for the second time that day.  Someone had opened the window, clearing the Scotch-scented air. The smell of death replaced it.
    Doug snapped on latex gloves, taken from the glove box in his truck, and bent over the body. Peter’s face was gray.  Doug pressed his forefinger to the left cheekbone. The skin didn’t blanch. It had clotted. Under normal conditions, clotting took no less than six hours. The medical examiner would determine time of death, but Peter had been dead at least that long.
    The deceased’s receding blond hair looked freshly combed, his shirt was cleanly pressed, and tucked neatly into the waistband of his pants. Careful not to disturb the body for the M.E., Doug looked for surface wounds. There were none, which made sense since Peter’s appearance was too neat for him to have been involved in a struggle.
    Nothing about the condition of the body suggested that anyone other than Peter had caused his death. Doug straightened away from the corpse.  
    He strolled around the room, fingered a football trophy centered on a table, and the spines of the hardcovers lined up like soldiers in a floor-to-ceiling bookcase.  Plaques from professional banking institutes lined another gray wall.
    A closed manila folder sat on a dark wooden credenza. Doug opened the file, and pulled out two papers.  One was a printout of statistics for half a dozen computer companies.  Four on the list were circled with yellow highlighter.
    The other was a fax confirming stock purchases that Peter had made in the highlighted companies. The fax was dated September 18, the day before.  
    Eyes narrowed, Doug studied the fax. Strange that Peter would increase his investment portfolio, then kill himself.
    The inconsistency bothered Doug. He planned to confirm the information later, and pocketed the fax.
    The credenza also held a computer and laser printer. One printed page lay in the tray.  Doug picked it up and read, Forgive me, Will.
    Doug had known about Peter’s son prior to Liz Janssen mentioning him.  Doug’s brother, Sean, bragged about Will Janssen almost as much as he did his own boys.  
    Sean . . .    
    Doug passed a hand down his face.  Sean considered Peter family.  Peter’s death would hurt him.
    “Sheriff McBride?”
    Doug turned to face a short, round man. “You got me.”   
    “I’m Dr. Ingersoll. County medical examiner. I’ll take that body off your hands.”

    Doug remained at Peter’s house until the state crime scene team had finished there.  It was a short drive to his next destination.  He stood outside the two swinging doors leading into the Branville Hospital for a moment, thinking of what he would say and knowing it wouldn’t matter.  There was no way to ease this kind of hurt.  
    Patchwork rugs covered sections of the light-wood plank floor of the Branville Hospital. Crayon drawings and finger paintings hung edge-to-edge on the glossy white walls. One of the pictures had the words Doc McBride printed in squiggly letters beneath a stick-figure with a stethoscope around the neck. Sean was the only physician in Branville. As Doug stood taking in the drawing, his brother’s voice drifted from one of the rooms down the short hall where his office and examination room were located.
    “That will fix him right up, Vinnie,” Sean said.
    Doug leaned against the counter, and waited for his brother to finish with his patient. Someone giggled. Sean peeked into the foyer. He nodded at Doug and waved his right arm in a circle. A curly-haired boy of maybe six, tiptoed out after Sean. Behind the child, limped a shaggy white dog with a bandage wrapped around its left front paw.
    Sean crouched and cupped the boy’s shoulders. “Now, you know how Nurse Robbins feels about animals being in the hospital.” Sean’s voice lowered. “So remember your promise. If you run into her, Duster wasn’t in here.”
    The boy giggled behind his hand and looked at the counter Doug leaned against.
    “Nah, that’s not Nurse Robbins. That’s my brother, Sheriff McBride,” Sean assured the boy.
    Doug inclined his head at the boy and Vinnie giggled again. The boy dug deep into the front pocket of his jeans, then stretched out his arm. He unballed his fist. “Thanks Doc McBride.” In his palm, Vinnie held a huge red jawbreaker.
    Sean gazed at the boy’s hand for a moment, then scooped up the candy. He winked. “Try to keep Duster out of Mrs. Crosby’s roses.”
    Vinnie turned and hooked his finger in the dog’s red collar. Boy and dog trotted out. Sean watched them until they were through the exit doors. Doug watched Sean.
    “A few more of those huge fees,” Doug said as he strolled up to his brother, “and Maureen can have the kitchen remodeled.”

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