Page 40 of No Escape

Valerie waited, her spine tingling with nerves as she watched the patrol car. She held her breath as the driver stepped out of the car and walked with purpose along the road, responding to the false alarm. She had a few minutes at most, and she needed to act quickly.

Valerie crept toward the back door, moving slowly and silently. She could hear the sound of her heartbeat pounding in her ears as she reached for the handle, praying that it wasn’t locked.

To her relief, the door swung open, and she slipped inside the house, closing the door behind her as quietly as she could.

The house was dark and quiet, the blinds down and the air thick with the scent of cooking and the sound of the TV playing in another room. Valerie could feel her pulse racing as she crept down the hallway toward the front of the house, taking slow, measured steps to avoid making any noise.

As she approached the living room, she could hear the sound of voices, low and muffled. She stopped outside the door, her senses on high alert as she listened carefully to the conversation.

“He’s gone to investigate an alarm,” a man’s voice said, the sound of a radio briefly hissing. She assumed it was the other patrolman.

“Do… Do you think it’s him?” Joshua replied, nervously. “I can’t bear this.”

Valerie’s stomach lurched, the words sending a shiver down her spine. It was clear that they were talking about the killer. She felt bad putting Joshua through this, but she needed her questions answered, otherwise she had no hope of knowing where his cousin would go for his next kill.

Peeking around the corner of a doorway, Valerie watched the patrolman. He looked young and inexperienced. If anything, he seemed as nervous as Joshua.

I’ll use his inexperience against him, Valerie thought. For a moment, she wondered if this was how John Murphy thought when he was stalking his victims. The similarity made her feel sick.

But she had to go on.

Valerie was going to take a big risk. She couldn’t wait around any longer. The other cop would no doubt be back soon.

Standing in the hallway outside the sitting room where Joshua was perched nervously on an armchair, she made a fist and slammed the side of it into one of the walls.

“What… What was that?” Joshua said, his voice trembling.

“Hello?” the patrolman said. “I… I’m armed.”

Valerie hit her fist against the wall again, making a dull thud.

“Stay here,” the patrolman said.

He moved toward the door. Valerie listened to his footsteps and heard the unmistakable sound of his firearm being removed from its holster.

He walked so slowly that Valerie saw the barrel of the gun emerge from the doorway first.

Rookie mistake,she thought.

In one deft movement, she reached out, grabbed the gun, and twisted it forward. The revolver twisted up out of the patrolman’s grip. The patrolman swung wildly, but Valerie anticipated his every move.

She sidestepped his punch, reached around to his side, put her arm around his neck and then the gun to his back. Little did he know that she’d deftly switched the safety on at the same time so it wouldn’t accidentally go off.

“Stop,” Valerie said.

“Don’t shoot me, please,” the patrolman said.

“I won’t,” she said. “But I’m going to put you in your cuffs.”

She led him over to a radiator in front of Joshua’s silent, staring eyes, and cuffed the cop to the radiator.

“Please don’t kill us,” the patrolman said. “I’ve got kids.”

“Are… are you working with John?” Joshua finally asked.

“No,” said Valerie. “But the press has got it into their heads that it’s a possibility. I’m trying to stop him, Joshua, you have to believe me.”

She turned to the patrolman.

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