Page 46 of Finding Silence
For one thing, I noticed the suitcases she arrived with earlier bore luggage tags for this morning’s flight from Portland. Also, the level of rage you’d expect with that kind of destruction would be hard to contain and seems unlikely for the controlled, buttoned-up woman.
There’d been something off about this from the start; the frenzied wreckage in the music room does not line up with the cold, deliberate way Phil was being set up to look like an addict. Almost like there were two different people involved. One who was enraged and unhinged, like Duncan Brothers was on that recording I heard of him, but the other would have to be cunning and manipulative.
It isn’t that hard to imagine Grace as a calculating mastermind, using Phil’s former bandmate as a weapon in some larger scheme.
“What do you mean? Two perps?” Savvy echoes.
My tires squeal as I take a corner too fast, and my heart is pounding in my chest.
“I don’t think Brothers worked alone, there’s no way he could’ve circumvented the alarm. Not without inside help.”
Savvy doesn’t respond immediately and I can almost hear her thinking.
“You think Grace?—”
A loud car horn has me jerk on my steering wheel, narrowly avoiding a pickup with the right of way to the intersection I am blowing through. Luckily the road up the mountain is clear and I lean on the gas.
“Dad? What’s happening? Where are you?”
She sounds like she’s running, barking orders at someone.
“I left her with that woman, Savvy. I thought she’d be safe.”
“Daddy, don’t you do anything stupid. We’re on our way.”
But I’m already turning into Phil’s driveway. Slamming the Bronco in park, I reach for the glove compartment where I keep my gun. I won’t be going in unarmed this time.
“Honey, she means too much to me to wait around for the cavalry,” I tell Savvy, before I end the call and tuck my phone in my pocket.
I approach the front door with some caution, well aware I wasn’t exactly stealth in my approach. It’s locked, but it looks like some lights are still on. When I peer in the dining room window, I can see light coming from the kitchen, but I don’t see any movement.
A small surge of hope flares up perhaps I’m wrong, and Grace has nothing to do with this. They could be having a friendly drink on the back deck, or maybe they’ve gone to bed and simply left a few lights on. But my gut doesn’t quite believe that.
So when I move left, to go around the house, I do it carefully. I pass the garage and poke my head around the corner. Halfway down, I notice faint light filtering from the small bathroom window and also from Phil’s larger bedroom window, which is farther toward the back.
I take one step in that direction when I see a brief flash at the same time I hear the crack of a gunshot. My heart sinks, and for a moment I’m paralyzed with fear—for Phil—but then decades of experience kick in and I start moving.
Pressing my back against the siding, I approach the window, even as I hear vehicles coming up the driveway behind me. Then I take a deep breath in, and carefully poke my head around the frame. It takes my brain a second to process the scene inside; two on the bed—Phil is one of them—blood fucking everywhere, and Grace hovering over them, a gun in one hand and a large knife in the other.
No time to think.
I swing around, fully facing the window, and train my gun on the menacing figure. She doesn’t even see me as I squeeze off a single shot.
Everything moves in slow motion, the impact of the bullet shattering the window before hitting the woman center mass, her body going down next to the bed. Unable to see her from my vantage point, I ignore the shards of glass sticking out of the frame, and climb through the window.
Everything in me wants to rush to Phil’s side, hoping against all odds she is still alive, but I first have to make sure the threat is neutralized.
Leading with my gun, I round the bed to find Grace crumpled on the floor. She dropped her weapon but has the knife still clutched in her hand.
“I’ve got her, Dad,” I hear my daughter’s voice behind me.
I didn’t even realize she was here.
I move aside so she can step around me and watch as she kicks the gun out of the way and swiftly removes the knife from the woman’s hand. It’s not until she kneels down beside her and checks her for a pulse I turn away.
Only then do I trust myself to look at the carnage on the bed. It’s a man, a massive hole in the back of his head, suggesting the gunshot I heard was for him. At first glance it looks like Phil may have suffered a similar fate, her body almost as bloodied as the man next to her.
For a moment, I’m overwhelmed by the crippling pain of loss—as sharp and as gut-wrenching as I remember—and a wave of anger at the injustice of losing a woman I love twice in one lifetime, tearing an agonized howl from my gut, but then I catch movement. Nothing more than a slight rise of her chest, but it’s enough to snap me into action.
