Chapter Ninety-Four
Ninety-Four
As soon as Mary opened the door and stepped outside the house, spotlights from several police cars homed in on her.
‘SFPD… freeze,’ the first police officer yelled.
‘He’s in there,’ Mary yelled back, throwing her left thumb over her shoulder. The lights were too bright for her to be able to properly see. ‘He’s in the kitchen.’
‘Put down the knife,’ a second police officer called. ‘And get on the ground… NOW.’
‘He’s in there,’ Mary yelled again, as tears overcame her, her voice breaking. ‘He’s in the kitchen.’
‘Lady,’ the first officer yelled again. ‘I need you to put down the knife and lay down on the ground. I need you to do that now.’
It finally dawned on Mary what that scene would’ve looked like from their point of view – some hysterical woman, running out of the house, semi-naked, with her face, torso and legs covered in blood, and carrying a bloody knife in her hand – ‘psycho killer alert’.
It was actually surprising that she hadn’t been gunned down yet.
‘OK…OK.’ Mary threw the knife on the ground and lifted her hands, partially shielding her eyes from the bright spotlights. Only then could she see that there were three police cruisers in front of her house, and six handguns pointed straight at her.
‘OK. Now slowly get down on your knees then lay flat on the ground… belly first.’
Mary hopped down onto her left knee. Her right one was still too tender for her to be able to bend it properly.
‘Now lay flat on the ground, keep your chin pressed against it, and place your hands behind your back. Do it now.’
Mary did as she was told.
In seconds, a police officer was kneeling on her back before placing a pair of handcuffs around her wrists.
‘Who else is in the house?’ the officer asked.
‘My husband,’ Mary replied, her voice rushed and drowning in tears. ‘Who was trying to kill me. He’s a serial killer.’
‘Your husband is a… serial killer?’ the officer asked, a lilt of sarcasm in his voice.
‘Yes,’ Mary said, as the officer grabbed her by the arms and helped her to her feet. ‘Check the basement in his office. The evidence is all there. He’s murdered nineteen women.’
The officer locked eyes with Mary, and he must’ve seen the fear in them because he frowned at her.
‘Go check,’ Mary urged him. ‘Please, go check.’
‘First, I need to place you inside a cruiser while we check the house for any more occupants, perpetrators or victims, OK? You said that your husband is in the kitchen?’
‘That was where he was… yes.’
‘Anyone else?’
‘No.’
‘No more attackers… only you?’
‘I’m not an attacker.’ Mary’s voice was desperate. ‘I was defending myself.’
‘OK.’ The officer nodded. ‘And your husband, what’s his name?’
‘Quaddra… Quaddra Buckner… but you have to check the basement… you have to.’
‘Trust me,’ the officer said, as he walked Mary to one of the police cars before helping her onto the backseat.
‘We’ll check everything. Don’t worry, OK?
’ He paused and nodded at her. ‘Give me a second.’ He closed the door, without slamming it, and retrieved something from the cruiser’s boot before opening the back door again.
‘Here. Let me put this over you.’ He was holding a police high-visibility coat.
Mary had been so terrified and confused that she’d forgotten that she was almost naked. She leaned forward on the seat and the officer placed the coat over her shoulders before zipping it up at the front.
‘Are you hurt?’ he asked. ‘Do you need medical assistance?’
‘No.’ Mary shook her head. ‘It’s not my blood.’ As soon as she said those words, she realized what they would sound like to a police officer.
The officer looked back at her with concern. ‘So, I’m guessing that the blood on the knife that you were holding isn’t yours either, right?’
‘I was defending myself.’ Mary began shivering again, but this time it wasn’t fear, or cold. The shock of everything that had just happened to her was beginning to settle in.
‘OK, you just sit tight,’ the officer said, with a half nod. ‘I’ll be back.’
Mary had no idea of how long she sat on the backseat of that police cruiser, but it felt like an eternity.
She saw one of the police cars leave and an ambulance arrive, closely followed by a new police car.
This one wasn’t a black and white unit. Its red and blue lights flashed from its front grill and from inside its windshield.
Mary had seen enough movies to know that that was a detective’s car, and she breathed out relief.
The officer had probably found the basement and radioed it in.
The two men who stepped out of the unmarked police car would be homicide detectives.
Mary was sure of it. This nightmare was finally coming to an end.
Mary sat back on the seat and began concentrating on her breathing when she saw Quaddra, seemingly passed out, being wheeled out of the house and into the ambulance on a patient transport stretcher.
‘What the fuck!’ Mary’s eyes followed the stretcher all the way from the house until the ambulance. ‘Did Quaddra hit his head when he slipped on his own blood, or what?’
All of a sudden, the back door to the cruiser was pulled open again, startling Mary. It was the same police officer who had placed her on the backseat and covered her with the high-visibility coat.
‘Did you find the basement?’
‘Nope,’ he replied, his eyes widening at her while he nodded. ‘But I found a pretty battered and bloody victim in the kitchen. Stab wounds, funnily enough.’
‘But it’s there,’ Mary practically yelled at the officer. ‘The basement is there. Take me back inside and I can show you how to get…’
‘I’m arresting you on suspicion of attempted murder,’ the officer cut her short.
‘What?’ Mary’s eyes ballooned up in their sockets. ‘Attempted murder? I wasn’t trying to kill him. He was trying to kill me. Didn’t you hear the 911 call?’
‘No,’ the officer shot back. ‘We don’t listen to emergency calls. We respond to them.’
‘So go listen to it. You’ll see that…’
‘Listen,’ the officer interrupted Mary again. ‘You have the right to remain silent. Anything you say can and will be used against you in a court of law…’
‘Look,’ Mary said back, her voice, once again, going up a pitch. ‘You need to go back in there and check the basement. This is all wrong.’
‘All I need to do is take you in to the station, lady,’ the officer said, once he was done reading Mary her rights. ‘Which I’m going to do right now.’ He closed the door on her.
Seconds later, the officer and his partner got into the driver and passenger’s seats.
‘If I were you,’ the driver said, addressing Mary again, as he started the cruiser, ‘I’d start thinking about a lawyer… and a very good one.’