Chapter Ninety-Three
Ninety-Three
Before Quaddra could finish his sentence, Mary did the only thing that she could think of.
Using the only weapon that she had at hand, she stepped into his path and as hard as she could, threw her phone straight at him, catching him completely by surprise.
At such short distance, her aim was almost perfect, and the phone hit Quaddra across the bridge of his nose.
It was a heavy phone, encased in a metal case for maximum shock protection.
For Quaddra, it was as if he’d been struck across the face by a construction brick.
As the metal case connected with his nose, soft tissue and flesh were immediately torn open, sending blood flying into the air and into Quaddra’s eyes.
‘Arghhhh!’ The scream he let out was guttural – full of pain and anger.
He stumbled back several steps, while his hands shot to his face.
Blood dripped through his fingers. ‘You fucking bitch.’ He used the heels of his hands to try to clear the blood from his eyes, without much success. ‘Now I’m going to make you suffer.’
Right then, the only ‘fight’ that Mary had in her was the phone to the face, and she was fresh out of it.
She knew that if she got physical with Quaddra, she didn’t stand a chance.
He was bigger, stronger and faster than her in every way.
With the ‘fight’ part out of the way, all that was left for Mary to do was ‘flight’, so while Quaddra tried to blink the blood out of his eyes, Mary turned on the balls of her feet and ran, as fast as she could, rounding the workstation.
By the time she reached the stairwell, Quaddra was still half blind and on the other side of the workstation.
Mary didn’t look back, taking the stairs up to the house two at a time.
The lights were still off in Quaddra’s office, and since adrenaline had dilated Mary’s pupils, the shock of coming from the light in the stairwell into an almost pitch-black room practically blinded her, but there was no way that she was slowing down.
She blinked once and made a beeline for the door, but her legs were still unsteady from fear and cold, and the beeline was more like a zigzag.
As she got closer to the door, she lost some of her orientation and slammed her right knee against the edge of the Victorian chest.
‘Arghhhh, fuck!’ Mary cursed through gritted teeth, as she felt a soaring pain start at her knee before spreading throughout the rest of her body with lightning speed.
She paused for just a second before taking her next step, which almost brought her to the ground, as the pain was still too intense for her to put any weight onto her right foot.
Hopping on one leg it would have to be.
As Mary finally got to the door, she heard footsteps coming from the stairwell.
‘Fuck, fuck, fuck.’
The pain… the fear… the cold… the total desperation to get away…
all of it took its toll on Mary’s thinking because at the door, instead of turning left and heading towards the living room and the house’s front door, she turned right and headed towards the kitchen.
Only when she busted through the door did her brain re-engage.
What the fuck are you doing in the kitchen? the voice inside Mary’s head asked.
Too late to turn around now, as she could already hear Quaddra at the door to his office.
‘Arghhh, arghhh, arghhh…’ He sounded angry beyond belief.
Mary hopped onto the other side of the large kitchen island and immediately reached for the cordless phone on the counter, but she was so scared… her hands trembling so much… that she dropped it onto the work surface as soon as she took it out of its cradle.
‘Fuck!’
Practically out of breath, Mary reached for it again, with both hands this time. Shaky fingers or not, Mary had just managed to dial 911 when Quaddra kicked the kitchen door open, and if she was scared of him before, the sight of what he looked like then petrified her soul.
Quaddra’s face was completely covered in blood, which was still oozing from his facial wound – running down his cheeks, over his lips, and dripping down from his chin onto his chest and the floor.
His hands were also covered in crimson red.
The fire inside his eyes was still there, but it had joined forces with rage and specks of blood to create some kind of hell furnace, and since his face, hands and torso were bathed in plasma, Quaddra looked like some blood-thirsty psychopathic killer straight out of a horror movie.
Mary dropped the phone again, this time, onto the floor.
‘That was a cheap shot, Mary.’ Even his voice sounded different – deeper… darker… but at the same time, controlled.
‘Stay the fuck away from me,’ Mary yelled, as she hopped back a couple more steps.
‘Oh, what’s the matter, honey?’ Quaddra asked, blood spitting from his lips and dripping from his chin as he spoke. ‘Did you hurt yourself?’
‘Stay the fuck away from me,’ Mary told him again, but there was no conviction in her voice… just fear.
‘I’m afraid I won’t be able to do that, my love.’
What was really terrifying Mary right then, was that Quaddra seemed to be in no rush. He knew that he could get to her whenever he wanted. This was now a game to him. One that he knew he couldn’t lose.
For just a split second, Mary’s mind wondered if this was what Quaddra did to all his victims – play some crazy cat-and-mouse game…
chasing them around… making them believe that they had a chance of escaping, when the truth was they were already dead – they just didn’t know it yet.
Mary pictured Denise fighting Quaddra with every molecule of strength she had in her body, because she knew that Denise would fight him.
You better concentrate on the here and now, the voice inside Mary’s head said, bringing her back to the kitchen.
Quaddra wasn’t blinking so much anymore. Blood was still cascading from the wound on his nose, but it wasn’t spilling into his eyes.
‘You don’t have to kill me,’ Mary said, her head shaking at him, her heart beating in her throat.
She had no idea if her 911-call had connected or not.
She had no idea if an operator was on the line or not, or even if the phone was still working after it hit the floor, but she wasn’t really talking to Quaddra right then.
She was talking to the phone… she was talking to hope.
‘In the same way that you didn’t have to kill any of those women. ’
‘But I did,’ Quaddra said back. ‘In the same way that I now have to kill you.’ He took a couple of unrushed steps in Mary’s direction, rounding the kitchen island through the right side.
Mary hopped back once again, but this time she tentatively placed her right foot on the floor.
The pain was still there, on her knee and shooting up her leg, but the ‘fight or flight’ adrenaline that was still flooding her system had anesthetized enough of it for her to be able to stop hopping on one leg.
She took another step back, and as she did, her eyes made contact with the knife-block that Antonia always kept on the kitchen counter – six laser-sharp Japanese knives that could slice through almost anything with tremendous ease.
Without missing a beat, Mary reached for one of the knives, grabbing a six-inch blade with a thick wood handle.
‘Stay the fuck away from me, Quaddra,’ she yelled again, extending her right arm at him.
Quaddra chuckled. ‘What do you think that you’re going to do with that, Mary?’
‘Come closer and you’ll find out.’ The blade did not look steady in Mary’s hand.
Quaddra allowed his lips to break into a smile that scared Mary because it didn’t look like a smile.
It was just a meaningless gesture – muscles pulling skin over his skull – which made the smile look creepy and lifeless, as if his whole face was being operated by a puppet master.
Add the fact that most of his body was, by then, a crazy mess of smeared blood, and Quaddra looked like a creature who had been summoned from the depths of hell.
‘Oh, c’mon, Mary,’ Quaddra said, lifting his left hand to his face again, as if he was going to wipe some of the blood away, but that was just a distraction tactic.
As Mary’s attention moved to his hand, Quaddra launched himself at her, right arm extended, aiming for her throat.
This time, Mary was the one who was caught completely off guard, especially by how fast Quaddra had moved. Somehow, he had managed to bridge a six-foot gap in a fraction of a heartbeat, as if he really was some creature from beyond.
Instead of stabbing the knife at him, all that a terrified and desperate Mary was able to do was to reflexively angle the knife up, trying to protect her face.
Out of pure luck, she managed to place the knife just between her throat and Quaddra’s hand, and as he closed his fingers around it, the laser sharp blade sliced through his palm, almost down to the bone.
‘Arghhhh!’ Quaddra’s hand immediately recoiled back, the sudden jerking movement sending more blood flying up into the air before splashing down over Mary’s face and naked torso.
‘Fucking bitch!’ Quaddra yelled, taking two steps back. His left hand shot to his right one to try to contain the bleeding.
Mary also wobbled back a couple more steps, her eyes blurred by tears, her whole body shivering from fear and adrenaline, her face, hair and torso splashed with Quaddra’s blood.
‘I told you to stay back.’ Her voice came out one octave higher than normal.
If adrenaline had anesthetized some of Mary’s knee, it seemed to have done the same to Quaddra’s hand, because despite how deep the cut to his right palm was, he launched himself at her again, with even more power this time, but this time, Mary was a little more prepared for it and she managed to swing the blade from left to right and top to bottom.
Quaddra, once again, covered the distance between him and Mary in a flash, which completely shortened Mary’s defensive movement, taking most of the power away from the stabbing.
The knife entered Quaddra’s front a few inches below his left shoulder.
The wound was deep enough to cause a lot of pain and bleeding, but far from enough to be able to stop him from smashing into Mary, sending both of them crashing to the ground – Mary falling backwards and Quaddra falling on his stomach.
As they hit the floor, the knife scattered from Mary’s hand and she panicked. It was now the two of them in a floor-wrestling match, with no weapons. If Quaddra managed to grab hold of Mary, wounded or not, it was over.
As Quaddra lifted his head to look at her, she began crab-crawling backwards – on her hands, butt and feet – as fast as she could to, once again, try to put some distance between the two of them.
It didn’t work.
Before Mary could get away, Quaddra extended his right arm, sending more blood flying Mary’s way and somehow, he managed to grab hold of her left ankle.
‘Where the fuck do you think you’re going?’
Fueled only by panic, Mary kicked out her legs in utter desperation – once, twice, three times – that was when her left foot connected with Quaddra’s nose.
The wound already on its bridge sliced open even more, and Quaddra, with another guttural scream of pain, let go of Mary’s leg, bringing both hands to his face.
Blood dripped from his hand, nose and shoulder, creating a small red and viscous pool on the kitchen floor.
Mary desperately back-crawled some more, her legs still kicking wildly, until she was out of reach from Quaddra’s arms.
The knife that had scattered from her hand had ended up by the fridge, which was where Mary had managed to back crawl to.
She grabbed it again, and with her back pressed tightly against the fridge, extended her right arm out to defend herself one more time, but Quaddra was still where she’d left him – by the kitchen island – holding both hands to his face.
That was Mary’s chance.
Using mostly her left leg, and with a little help from the fridge handle, she managed to pull herself up and back to her feet, but as she did, she saw that Quaddra was also getting back up.
The veins in his arms looked pumped, as if he’d just finished a heavy workout.
Blood covered his face like a mask, but it was the pure rage and anger that burned in his eyes that truly terrified Mary.
She needed to get out of there, and she needed to get out of there now.
‘I’m going to bleed you dry,’ Quaddra said, as he tried to launch himself at Mary one more time, but as he did, he stepped straight into the small pool of blood that he had created on the kitchen floor. His foot slipped awkwardly and he crashed down again… hard.
Now this really was Mary’s chance.
Fucked up knee or not, Mary turned around and ran out of that kitchen as fast as her legs would carry her.
Out of breath and in pain, she ran past the stairwell that led upstairs and crossed the living room in a hobbling sprint, but it was only when she reached the entry lobby that hope seemed to come back to her.
Through the glass panels that flanked their mansion’s front door, Mary could see red and blue flashing lights approaching the house.
The 911 call had connected. An operator had been on the line and heard everything that was going on in that kitchen.
In tears, half naked and covered in blood, Mary opened the front door and ran outside, straight into freedom… or so she thought.