Justice At Morgan Mesa. Jenna Night

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      She reached for the handle on the front door and tried to turn it. Of course, it was locked. It looked like there might be a security camera in the shadowy corner of the house on the other side of the front door, but she couldn’t be certain.

      She stepped back, grabbed a stone the size of a softball from the ground beside the front step and chucked it through a window. An alarm sounded. She quickly threw a couple more stones until the pane was nearly gone. She yanked off her suede jacket, threw it over the bottom of the windowsill and climbed over it.

      She dropped into the house, crouched down and turned to peek out the bottom of the broken window.

      She didn’t see anyone. The man chasing her was out of sight. She let out a sigh. The blaring car and house alarms must have scared him away.

      Something slammed into the front door beside her and she jumped. It hit again and again, and it didn’t stop. It was the guy who was chasing her. If the psychopathic creep took a second to look around, he’d see the window she’d just broken and climb through it right after her. If he just kept pounding with that stupid hammer, he was bound to eventually break through the wooden door.

      Either way, he had her.

      Vanessa leaped to her feet and ran farther into the house. She’d never been inside before and didn’t know which way to go. Just past the kitchen, she spotted an open door to what looked like a den and she ran for it. She slammed the door shut just as she heard the front door splinter and break open. There was no lock on the den door. She shoved a heavy end table in front of it as a barricade, fully aware it wouldn’t keep the attacker out for long.

      Then the hammer started pounding on the den door. It would break any second. And the psycho would get in.

      * * *

      Most likely a couple of bored high school kids had busted a window at the Heaton House and set off the alarm again.

      Normally, some fresh-out-of-the-academy patrol officer would have been sent to respond, but Lieutenant Levi Hawk of the Torchlight Police Department had been in the neighborhood. So when the call came in, he keyed his radio mic and let dispatch know he’d respond himself.

      He followed the main road across the back of Morgan Mesa as it wound through a stretch of forest dotted with modest houses and trailers. It wasn’t as bustling as the town, but there were plenty of employees from the nearby O’Connell ranch who chose to live up here, along with a few other people who preferred the quieter setting. Property inland and away from the edge of the mesa overlooking Torchlight was actually reasonably priced and normal people could afford it. Roughly eight miles ahead, the road angled toward the dozen or so elaborate homes built closer to the mesa’s rim, each one surrounded by a few acres of the homeowner’s private forest, which was also the neighborhood where the Heaton House was located.

      Dispatch contacted him again to add that they’d received a report of a blaring car alarm near the historic house. That was something different—something out of character for bored teens. Maybe this would turn out to be an interesting call after all. Levi sped up.

      When he arrived at the house, he saw a gold sedan with four slashed tires parked in the driveway. The car’s alarm was still blaring, but it sounded faint and gurgling, like the car’s battery was dying down. Meanwhile, the house alarm, loud and shrill, was still going strong.

      More important, the front door to the house was busted open and one of the windows was broken with some kind of cloth lying over the bottom of the frame. This didn’t look like the work of kids just fooling around. He called for backup and then got out of his police department SUV.

      Moving cautiously up the driveway, he scanned his surroundings. He didn’t see anybody there, but a couple of tours with the marines in Iraq had taught him never to assume any situation was safe.

      Continuing to move toward the house, he glanced into the sedan and saw a purse and a leather satchel on the front passenger-seat floor. Was the owner inside the house, injured or in danger? Had someone with bad intent broken down the door or climbed through the window after her? Levi drew his pistol and moved closer to the front door entrance.

      A couple of security lights shone on the outside of the house, but inside it was filled with shadow. Plenty of places for someone to hide.

      “Police!” Levi called out as he stepped past the broken door and crossed over the threshold. “Is anybody in the house?”

      “Here!”

      The shrieking house alarm made it hard for him to know which direction the shout had come from.

      He scanned the area around him. The little bit of light coming through the windows shone on fragments of glass atop the hardwood floor. There was a trail of them that led from the broken window over to a closed door. Maybe someone in trouble was behind the door. Or maybe a bad guy wanted his attention focused on that closed door so he could attack Levi from a different direction.

      “Police!” he called out again. “If anybody is in the house, show yourself!”

      Over the shrill sound of the alarm, he heard something crash at the far end of the sprawling ranch house, followed by the sound of a door being yanked open. He’d already started in that direction when he heard a woman screaming, “Help me!” from behind the closed door. Drawing closer to it, he saw there were dents and cracks on it, as if whoever had broken down the front door had beaten on this one, too.

      He wanted to give chase to the person who’d just fled, but he needed to check on the woman calling out for help first.

      Still wary of a trap, he moved toward the door. “Who’s in there?”

      “Show me your badge and police ID,” the woman demanded.

      He could tell she was terrified by the trembling in her voice, but he admired the gumption she showed by standing her ground.

      “You’ll see them when you see me.”

      He turned the handle and pushed, but the door didn’t move.

      “Wait a minute,” she called out.

      It sounded like she was shoving aside something heavy. And then the door opened a couple of inches. He saw a small woman with platinum-blond curls. There were pine needles in her hair. Her chin and part of her cheek were covered with mud. Her blue eyes, wide with fear, focused first on his face, then on the area behind him and then finally on the badge pinned to his chest.

      “It’s all right,” he said. “I’m here to help you.” He was in uniform but to make her feel safe, he quickly showed her his ID.

      She opened the door all the way.

      “Are you hurt?” he asked. There were reddish marks on her chin and cheek.

      She blew out a breath. “I’m all right.” She pulled a key fob out of her pocket and turned off the car alarm.

      “What happened?” He stepped back from the den into the dining area where he could have a better view of his surroundings. He’d been inside of the house before, but it had been a while.

      “Some lunatic chased me with a hammer.”

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