Page 75 of Red Snow
“No!”
“Yes!”
Without saying another word, I see Jeffrey’s hand tighten around the hacksaw and start moving in a sawing motion. The blade slices right through Brandi’s throat like it was butter, and blood squirts out of the large wound onto her lap. She tries to scream, but her vocal chords are severed all the way through, so there’s nothing but a horrifying gurgling sound.
I take off in a full sprint towards them, but before I even get halfway down the hall, Jeffrey’s hand disappears into the darkness, taking his saw with him, and I hear his heavy footsteps running away from me.
When I reach Brandi, I wrap my hand around her throat, but the wound is so deep I already know she has absolutely no chance of surviving this. Even with my hand over her throat, she’ll lose consciousness in the next twenty seconds, and she’ll be dead in the next thirty.
“Oh my god, I’m so sorry, Brandi” I say as I look down on her. Her eyes look up to meet mine, and I can see the fear in them. She didn’t expect this, didn’t deserve it, and even as her life fades away, she still doesn’t understand how it all changed so quickly. We were just having sex in my kitchen a couple of hours ago, and now she’s tied to a chair in an empty house, slipping away.
“Oh my fucking god!” I hear Marcus scream. I look up and see him standing in front of me. Just like we’d planned, he came through the back door, but it was thirty seconds too late. “Brandi. Fuck!” he barks.
“I have to stay with her,” I say, still holding my hand over Brandi’s throat. “Go kill that motherfucker!”
“With pleasure.” Marcus pulls his gun from his holster, chambers a round, and walks off into the darkness the same way Jeffrey ran.
Once he’s gone, I look down at Brandi and see that her eyes are wide open, no longer blinking. Her breathing is shallow, and I know it’s almost over.
“I never meant for this to happen,” I whisper in her ear. “I’m so sorry, Brandi. Thank you for bringing some excitement into my life when I thought I was losing it forever. I promise you, I’m gonna get this fucker for this. I won’t arrest him. He’s gonna die tonight, I promise you that.” When I’m finished talking, I look at her face, and I see it. She’s gone.
I take a second to breathe. I can’t believe I just watched Brandi’s murder happen right in front of me. He fucking killed her. That sick, twisted, son of a bitch killed an innocent woman just to get at me. He killed Brandi. Now I’m going to kill him.
I let Brandi’s head slump forward as I step away from her lifeless body and pull my gun from the shoulder holster. I chamber a round and start walking into the darkness. My eyes have adjusted a bit, so it’s not as dark now as it was before.
In front of me is more studs, and about twenty feet ahead of me is Marcus. I can see him holding his weapon in front of him as he takes slow, cautious steps through the house. He steps in front of an open doorway, swinging his gun in front of it, only to find nothing there. I pick up my pace so I can clear the rooms with him.
I’m only ten feet away when he steps in front of another open doorway. He swings his gun in, but this time, Jeffrey jumps out of the room.
Marcus fires off two shots, but he can’t see, and Jeffrey is already standing behind him with a knife in his hands. I aim my weapon at Jeffrey, but the two of them tussling has them moving all over the place, and if I take the shot, I risk hitting Marcus, so I run to catch up to them, but just as I get there, I see Jeffrey plunge the knife into Marcus’s upper back, barely missing his neck. My partner screams in agony and collapses to the floor, just as Jeffrey turns on his heel and runs away again.
When I reach Marcus, I see the knife still stuck in his back as he lays on his side, writhing in pain.
“Goddamn it!” I scream.
“I’m fine,” Marcus yells up at me. “I’ll be fine, Jarrod. Just go get that motherfucker. Go! Now!”
I don’t want to leave Marcus, but I know I have to stop Jeffrey, so when he tells me to go, I don’t hesitate. I jog down the hallway I saw Jeffrey enter, holding my gun out in front of me. There are two rooms ahead of me before I reach the end of the house, and I know there’s nowhere else for Jeffrey to have hidden. This is it. It all ends now.
“Come out, you fucking little bitch!” I hear myself snap. I can’t help the emotion running through my body. I’m mad beyond normal limits. Furious is too soft of a word to describe the rage I’m feeling. “You wanted me, Jeffrey, well I’m here. Just me. Come out so I can send you to meet your mother. Come on, asshole. Let me send you to hell where your mother is waiting.”
Suddenly, before I even reach the first room, Jeffrey comes darting out of it. He has the hacksaw that he used to kill Brandi in his hands, and he’s running at fucking light speed, screaming at the top of his lungs. The sight of it all catches me off guard, and before I can shoot, he tackles me and both of us fall to the floor. My gun goes flying down the hallway, and now it’s just the two of us in hand-to-hand combat.
Jeffrey punches me in the stomach, stealing all of the air out of my lungs, but I’m too pissed off to be stopped by a punch. I reach back and punch Jeffrey in the jaw, but to my surprise, he takes it with almost no problem and climbs on top of me, swinging like a madman. His arms go flailing in all directions as he screams and tries to hit me, but does more damage to the floor beneath me. Once he realizes he isn’t beating me to death, he reaches up above my head and grabs the hacksaw he dropped when tackling me, and tries to press it to my throat. Just before the blade hits my skin, I grab his hand with my own and push with every muscle fiber in my body, while he presses down with every muscle in his.
“Die, you motherfucker!” he screams as he leans on the saw with his bodyweight, bringing it within an inch of my throat.
He pushes with everything in him, but I refuse to die like this. Not after he killed Brandi and stabbed Marcus. I don’t fucking think so. This is for them just as much as it is for me.
I take a deep breath and let out a guttural scream as I push up, forcing Jeffrey’s entire body off of me. He feels himself being raised up off the floor and tries to fight back, but I lift my knee and connect perfectly with his balls. He screams and sits up, dropping the hacksaw, and in that moment I reach down and grab the gun attached to my ankle and aim it at Jeffrey’s neck. He freezes, staring down at me.
“Oh. Good one, Granger,” he says with a smile. “Well played. What now? Huh? Am I under arrest?”
Brenda. Britney. Brandi. Marcus.
The names flash in my head as the words come out of my mouth. “Nah, you’re not.”
I squeeze the trigger, and the gun kicks with an ear-splittingbang. I feel a splash of blood hit me across the face, and Jeffrey’s body falls to the floor next to me. Even in the dark, I can see the hole in his neck, and the blood oozing from it and pooling on the floor beneath him tells me that he won’t be alive for long. I think to move, but I want to watch him die in front of me. I’m watching this happen for Brandi, since she isn’t alive to see it herself. After a few more seconds of gasping and gurgling, Jeffrey goes limp for good.
