Chapter Three
Dear Lord!
She trembled, her teeth chattering as she waited and tried to collect her thoughts.
She was nude. She felt vulnerable. She could barely breathe. Hardly think.
Where had she put her robe? Her cell phone? Where were her truck keys? She kept the key to her gun box on her keychain. Where was the key to her rifle case?
Okay, okay. Where was her purse?
Shit! Shit! What if someone was outside? Or had come inside?
She’d heard the vehicle take off, but someone could have been left behind.
Her teeth wouldn’t stop chattering. Sickness roiled in her tummy.
Oh God, now was not the time for a puking festival.
Breathe! Breathe! Slow down. Calm it down!
Man, it was so hot and stuffy in this house. And too damned noisy as the wind zipped through the smashed window, making the curtains flutter like a ghost.
Her racing heart pounded in her ears as she listened for footsteps inside the house. She stood there for so long, she wondered if hours had passed. But she heard nothing except that damned wind.
She needed to call for help. Just in case someone was around.
Shoot! Who was she going to call? 911? The nearest town was an hour drive. Her nearest neighbor, Sam, was away.
Any other neighbors were at least half an hour away.
She would call a cop friend of hers. He’d get someone here sooner.
She’d use her landline phone in her kitchen, then she’d search for her purse.
It was nights like these that she was glad she’d had the foresight to close all the curtains before turning in for bed, but she wished she’d remembered to keep her purse close by.
She’d let her guard down since being back. Just because she’d taken a leave of absence didn’t mean she wasn’t a target. She’d stepped on many toes over the years as the acting director of Cowboys Online and she’d made enemies.
Early releases for prisoners convicted of murder and other severe sentences didn’t sit well with many of the families of the victims. The pain of loss and their desire for justice meant that news of these prisoners walking free, even though conditional, reopened old wounds, stirring up resentment and anger.
Her actions as the owner of the early release program, also provoked powerful figures in the justice system.
The most recent was a judge who she’d found incriminating information about.
Using that knowledge she’d pressured him, well blackmailed for lack of a better word, into signing off on paperwork that prevented a woman ex-convict from returning to prison allowing her to stay on the working ranch she’d been placed.
These decisions, though they were made with intention and purpose, placed Jenna squarely in the crosshairs of some who disagreed with the method of giving hope and a second chance to prisoners that had little to no risk of reoffending.
The fallout from her choices lingered, and tonight, it seemed, the consequences of her actions had followed her home.
Her mouth was so dry, and despite the heat, her teeth chattered uncontrollably from the shock of what had just happened.
She remained paralyzed, the tension in her body making it hard to move. At last, summoning every ounce of courage, she forced herself to take a step forward.
Quietly, she made her way down the dark hallway and into the bathroom where she remembered leaving her bathrobe.
She took her garment from the hook on the door and hurriedly put it on.
Then she tiptoed into the kitchen and using the light reflecting from the microwave clock, she swooped up the phone receiver and thanked God there was a dial tone.
She had her friend’s number on the speed dial, and she was so grateful when Ben sleepily picked up on the second ring. When she told him what had happened his voice sounded instantly alert, and he told her to remain inside, and that he’d have a chopper here within fifteen minutes.
She thanked him and reluctantly hung up, so he could call whomever he was going to call.
She was all for staying inside, truly she was, when she suddenly spied her purse tucked away in the corner on the kitchen countertop, exactly where she’d left it several days ago after a trip into town for groceries.
Whispers of courage breathed through her, and she cautiously moved to her purse, withdrew her cell phone and the keychain that held the keys to her handgun and rifle cases.
Her fear, however intensified as she crept back into her bedroom, fully expecting to see a face illuminated in the smashed window.
The ghost-like fluttering of her curtains almost freaked her out but then she carefully navigated across the room, using the light from her cellphone to illuminate the path before her.
She was determined to avoid the shards of glass scattered on the floor, and with deliberate steps, she managed to reach her closet without cutting her bare feet.
In the closet she found her handgun case, jammed in the key, and palmed her loaded gun. Making sure the safety catch was off, she quietly and cautiously moved through her dark house, toward the back door.
Now that she was armed, that son of a bitch intruder or intruders better think twice about coming into her home. That is, if they were still out there.
Keeping her shaking gun glued to the back door, she fully expected the door to crash inward as she moved toward it.
Nothing happened.
Near the door, she bent over and slipped on her running shoes. Once her shoes were on, she blew out a tense breath, unclicked the door lock and slowly cracked open the door.
The shrieking sound of the wind blasting against her house greeted her. It was so gusty, the door was almost ripped out of her hand. She held tight to the doorknob and managed to stumble outside.
The wind whipped her hair around and tried to rip open her bathrobe, but she ignored it as she stared across her yard. It was dark and spooky out here and there was no moon tonight.
Good, if someone was out there, they couldn’t see her. But she couldn’t see them either.
With her back against the log walls of the cabin, she kept her gun down to her side, and cautiously moved toward the front of the house, where it overlooked the parking lot.
She stopped at the corner, waited, and listened.
Above the roar of the wind, she heard the crickets. Crickets wouldn’t be singing if someone was lurking around out that way.
She stood there for several minutes and listened for anything out of the ordinary, but there was nothing. She dared to peek around the corner at the parking lot but saw nothing in the darkness.
Then she moved in the direction she’d come from and went back inside.
She was still trembling as she returned to her kitchen which would give her a good view to the road in case headlights came barrelling in.
Standing by the sink, she placed her gun onto the counter, pushed aside the curtains, and kept staring into the darkness.
If someone dared to come, she’d shoot first and ask questions later.
She grew tense when she heard another sound. Thankfully though, she recognized it as a helicopter, and she found all her fear disintegrate. Help had arrived.
Her landline phone rang making her jump and curse. She swept the receiver off the cradle and was glad to hear Ben’s voice telling her the chopper had her place in sight and they would land, leaving one officer with her while the other one left with the helicopter to search along the road.
Jenna almost cried when she thanked him for his help. Usually she was pretty cool under pressure but ever since getting pregnant, her emotions were all over the place.
Moments later, strong search lights cast white beams across the parking lot.
It appeared they were looking for a place to land and moments later, the chopper put down in the nearby field.
A lone figure dashed out of the chopper and ran toward her home and carefully avoided her parking lot where Jenna knew they’d investigate for tire tracks.
She doubted they’d find anything because the wind had probably already whipped around the dirt, destroying evidence.
In order to avoid any problems with the police, Jenna locked the gun’s safety and slid her weapon into her purse and stuffed her purse into a kitchen cupboard.
She didn’t want the cops questioning her as to why she was carrying a gun.
She was legally allowed to have the gun but not concealed on her person and only used for protection in her home.
It would take time to explain a handgun, where in most instances they were illegal in Canada unless one had a special license, which she did, but she needed their focus to be on why they had been called here and not on the gun.
Jenna flicked on the porch lights, and moments later, a thin woman made her way up the stairs, one hand hovering near her holstered gun at her waist.
She was a tall woman. Younger than Jenna. Maybe in her mid-twenties. Her dark brown hair was pulled professionally back into a lone ponytail and her light blue eyes shone with seriousness. She had little makeup, and she wore a dark blue aviation suit with an insignia that stated OPP Aviation Unit.
“Jenna Donnelly? I’m Constable Frannie Bracken from the Ontario Provincial Police Aviation Unit. Officer Ben McFadden sent us. Said you had an intruder.”
Jenna swallowed, her pulse still thudding in her ears from the adrenaline crash.
“Yes, they smashed my bedroom window, and they took off in a vehicle. I haven’t checked how they broke the window. Figured I should stay out of the room since it is a crime scene. I was asleep so I don’t know if they’d been lurking around before coming in with their vehicle.”
Her voice wavered despite her best effort to sound steady.
“And you heard them leave by the road? You said they? How many did you see?”
Heat crept up her neck as she answered. Why she was embarrassed she didn’t know, given she’d done nothing wrong.