Chapter 6 The Night He Didnt Answer
The Night He Didn't Answer
Maren
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The house is quiet in the way I used to love.
Staff have the evening off, regular schedule, nothing unusual.
Rosa left enchiladas in the warming drawer with a note reminding me about the salsa verde in the fridge.
The crew is working the east property tonight, moving cattle ahead of the vet's visit tomorrow.
Jackson drove out to check on them after dinner, said he'd be back by ten.
I'm not worried. This is how ranches work. People come and go, tasks overlap, and sometimes you end up with a whole house to yourself and a novel you've been meaning to finish since April.
I settle into the bedroom with the windows cracked open. June bugs tap against the screens. The ceiling fan turns slow circles overhead, and I can hear coyotes somewhere in the distance, their calls thin and wild across the pasture.
This afternoon, my husband stood up in front of the county fair committee and told Shay her attack on my qualifications was unacceptable. He demanded she apologize. He didn't change the subject or wait for someone else to handle it.
I keep replaying that moment. The scrape of his chair. The edge in his voice. The way everyone in the room went still because Jackson Wilder doesn't raise his voice, doesn't make scenes, doesn't pick sides in public.
He picked mine.
It doesn't erase the anniversary. It doesn't undo the weeks of missed dinners and dismissed concerns. But it was real. I watched his face when he said it, and there was nothing calculated there, no performance for the crowd. He was angry on my behalf, and he let people see it.
I turn another page without reading it. The words blur together because I'm not really here, I'm still in that parking lot with his hand in mine, still driving home with his palm warm on my knee, still feeling like maybe we turned a corner.
I want to tell him that I noticed. That it mattered. Maybe when he gets back, I'll put the book away and ask him to sit with me. No arguing tonight. I'd like to have my husband to myself for a while.
The coyotes go quiet. I glance at the clock on the nightstand. Not yet ten. Jackson should be back soon.
I'm reaching for my bookmark when glass shatters downstairs.
The sound is wrong. Not a picture frame falling, not a dish slipping from the drying rack. This is violent, deliberate, the crack and spray of a window being broken inward.
I'm in the hallway before I finish thinking. My bare feet hit hardwood and the security system starts screaming, that high piercing wail that means breach, the signal the monitoring company is supposed to respond to. Someone is in my house.
Three figures on the stairs. Flashlight beams cutting through dark rooms. Masks. Gloves. Moving fast.
The safe room.
Jackson's father built it after a kidnapping threat in the eighties, back when the Wilder name started meaning the kind of money that attracts the wrong attention. Steel door, reinforced walls, independent phone line that doesn't run through the main system.
I run.
The hallway stretches longer than it should. My heart is slamming against my ribs and my lungs are burning and I can hear boots behind me, heavy and fast, someone shouting something I don't process because all I can think is door, code, door, code.
I hit the panel. My fingers shake so badly I miss the first number and have to start over. The footsteps are closer now. I can hear breathing that isn't mine.
The code accepts. The door swings open. I throw myself through and slam it shut behind me and the locks engage with a heavy clunk.
Steel between me and them. Steel between me and whatever comes next.
I'm shaking so hard I can barely hold my phone. The safe room is small, maybe eight by ten, with emergency supplies on shelves and a landline mounted on the wall and nothing else. No windows. No other exits. Just me and my racing pulse and the muffled sound of boots moving through my house.
I call Jackson.
One ring. Two. His voicemail picks up, that familiar recording I've heard a hundred times. "You've reached Jackson Wilder. Leave a message."
No. No, not now. Not tonight.
I hang up and call again. He defended me this afternoon. He held my hand in the parking lot. He drove home with his palm on my knee and his fingers threaded through mine.
Voicemail.
I stare at my phone like it's betrayed me. He always answers. Even when we're fighting, even when he's busy, he picks up. He knows I don't call unless it matters.
The boots are on the second floor now. I can hear them in the hallway, in our bedroom, drawers being yanked open and furniture being shoved aside. Someone laughs, short and sharp, and the sound makes my stomach turn.
I grab the wall phone and dial 911. I keep my cell in my other hand, waiting for it to light up with his name.
A voice answers through the wall receiver. I hold it so tightly against my ear that it hurts. "911, what's your emergency?"
"There are intruders in my house." My voice comes out steadier than I feel. "At least three. I'm locked in a safe room." I give the street address, then repeat it when my voice catches. "Wilder Ranch. The main house."
The dispatcher stays calm while I fight to catch my breath. "Ma'am, we're already showing an alarm activation at that location. Units are en route. Can you confirm you're in a secure location?"
I watch the door as I answer, needing it to be true. "Yes. Steel door, reinforced walls. They can't get in."
Her voice gives me something to follow besides the sounds outside. "Stay on the line with me. Help is coming."
I sink down with my back against the cold steel wall and pull my knees to my chest. Through the door, I can hear my bedroom being torn apart. Closet doors slamming. The crash of something heavy hitting the floor.
They're taking things. My things. Our things.
I think about my grandmother's opal necklace, the one Shay picked up without asking on her first day and held to the light while asking what it was worth.
I left it in the jewelry box on the vanity with the lid closed.
I had started closing it after Shay handled the necklace. Such a small precaution. Useless now.
The 911 operator keeps talking, calm and professional, telling me the deputies are on their way. I answer when she asks questions. I stay on the line like she told me to.
My cell rests against my knee. Its screen goes dark without a call from him.
Did he see the calls? His phone is always in his pocket, always on, always ready.
Why didn't he answer?
The sirens come screaming up the drive and the boots scatter. I hear running, doors slamming, engines revving. Tires tear through gravel and then fade into distance and then there's nothing but the alarm still wailing and my own ragged breathing in this steel box.
The dispatcher speaks over the alarm still sounding through the house. "Ma'am? Units are on scene. Stay where you are until an officer makes contact."
I press the receiver closer. I don't want her to hang up. "Okay."
I wait. Minutes pass. The alarm cuts off, leaving silence so sudden it hurts my ears.
A knock on the steel door. "Mrs. Wilder? Deputy Ellis, sheriff's department. The dispatcher can confirm who I am before you open up."
I keep the door locked and ask the dispatcher to confirm his identity. She checks with the deputies before telling me it is safe to open.
I end the call and punch in the code. The locks disengage. The door swings open.
Deputy Ellis is maybe fifty, with a weathered face and kind eyes and a hand resting on his holster like he's ready for anything. Behind him, I can see my hallway, can see the mess they made, can see broken glass glittering on the hardwood floor.
"You're safe now, ma'am." He holds out a steadying hand. "You did everything right."
I take his hand. My legs feel like they belong to someone else. "Can you call my husband? He didn't answer me." Saying it to a stranger makes my throat close up.
The house is wrecked. I can see it from here, furniture overturned and drawers pulled out and things scattered everywhere. My home, the place I've built with Jackson over five years, torn apart by strangers in masks.
I protected myself. The alarm worked. The police came.
Jackson never answered.
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