Keeping Watch. Jan Hambright

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      Chills skimmed her bare skin and prickled the hairs at her nape.

      She pulled back the covers, climbed out of bed and walked to the window, determined to shut out the uneasy sensation clawing through her, right along with the torrent of rain she knew was coming.

      It was hurricane season on the Gulf Coast. An edgy time for the residents of New Orleans who instinctively turned their attention to the southern horizon, and their TVs to the weather channel.

      She brushed aside the billowing sheers, pulled up the blind and locked it in place.

      The sky lit up again, casting a white-hot glow like a net directly overhead.

      Her focus riveted on movement in a cluster of azaleas near the gazebo.

      The flash fizzled, but the image was burned on her brain. There was a man standing in her backyard.

      Shaken, she closed the window, locked it and stepped back, trying to pick him out in the gloom as her eyes adjusted. Follow-up thunder rumbled, its vibration churning up fear in her mind. What was he doing here?

      The answer came crashing into her consciousness with an explosion of shattering glass from somewhere in the massive house.

      The back door? He was breaking in.

      She stumbled forward, rushed the bedroom door, shoved it closed and locked it.

      Adrenaline pulsed in her veins, putting her senses in a state of hyperalert. Was he already inside? Making his way through her kitchen and up the stairs? Had he seen her standing in the window?

      The air was still, save the beginning tap of rain on the roof overhead.

      Footsteps? She heard footsteps on the stair treads.

      Determination pushed her to action. She wheeled around, looking for anything she could use to defend herself. Her gaze locked on a heavy candlestick perched on the corner of the dresser. She snatched it, sending the pillar candle crashing to the floor with a thud.

      Grabbing her cell phone from the nightstand, she hurried to the closet, opened the door and crept inside, careful to pull it closed without a sound.

      Shoving through the clothing, she pressed into the corner, turned her back to the wall and went to her knees.

      Her hand shook as she opened her cell phone and dialed 911.

      “Enhanced 911, what is your emergency?”

      “A man just broke into my house through the back door.” Her voice sounded muffled in the confines of the closet, but too loud in her own ears. “I think he’s inside my house.”

      “Are you Adelaide Charboneau, 1532 St. Charles Street?”

      “Yes.”

      “Stay on the line with me, Adelaide. I’ll dispatch an officer to your location.”

      Squeezing the candlestick in her hand, she strained to hear his footsteps over the hammering rain.

      “Please hurry,” she whispered, feeling the walls of the closet protecting and smothering her at the same time.

      She closed her eyes, trying to keep her fear in check. Help was on the way. Someone would come.

      The familiar groan of the floorboards outside her bedroom door intruded into the white noise around her.

      Her eyes flicked open in the dark. Her mouth went dry.

      It wouldn’t take him long to find her, pry her from her hiding place and—

      The last graphic thought in her head evaporated with the sound of splintering wood. The bedroom door slammed against the wall.

      He was coming for her.

      DETECTIVE ROYCE BECKETT turned the windshield wipers on high and squinted to see the road in front of him through the frantic flap of the blades.

      It was a torrential downpour, the sort he liked to watch from a well-worn chair, holding a bottle of imported beer. But not tonight, not in the middle of the personnel shortage plaguing the NOPD like a bad case of the flu.

      The light at the corner of Canal and St. Charles Street turned red. He braked to a stop at the same time the portable police radio attached to his belt broke squelch.

      He listened for the verbal traffic to follow, not that it mattered; he was off duty for the night, headed home to get some z’s.

      “All units in the vicinity of St. Charles Street, please respond to a break-in in progress. 1532 St. Charles, the Adelaide Charboneau residence. She reports point of entry is the back door of the residence. The intruder is inside. I repeat, the intruder is inside. Use extreme caution.”

      Royce mouthed the name. Adelaide Charboneau. He’d heard it somewhere, but he couldn’t place it.

      Yanking the radio off his belt, he pressed the call button. “Detective unit thirty-four. I’m three blocks from that location. I’ll respond. Send a backup unit.”

      “Copy unit thirty-four. Units forty-eight and thirty-two will be en route.”

      “Unit thirty-four clear.”

      Royce flipped on the lights, stomped on the gas pedal and shot around the corner onto St. Charles.

      Home invasions were dangerous. Unpredictable. They could ignite faster than gas and a match.

      He glanced at the house numbers every time the wipers cleared the windshield, but he didn’t have to look very hard to see a man dragging a woman across the front lawn at 1532 St. Charles Street.

      Adelaide Charboneau.

      Jerking the steering wheel hard to the right, he slammed on the brakes and flooded the duo in the car’s headlights. He unholstered his Glock 9mm, flung open the door and climbed out, using it for cover, as he leveled his weapon on the man holding a scantily dressed woman around the waist. Her feet dangled just above the ground, and she continually rammed her heels into the shin of his right leg.

      “Police! Let her go!” he yelled, noting the man’s description, and the ball cap obscuring his features. He didn’t appear to have a weapon, but it was the one he couldn’t see that was the most deadly.

      Royce stepped out from behind the door, taking a couple of aggressive steps forward. “Let her go!”

      The man staggered to a stop and turned to face him.

      Royce held his breath. The moment of truth. The instant fight-or-flight decisions were cast and irreversible.

      The suspect shifted his stance, lowered Adelaide onto the grass in front of him and locked her in a choke hold.

      Caution worked through his veins. She was on the verge of becoming a casualty if he didn’t do something.

      Royce took another step forward. “Don’t be stupid. Let her go.” He closed the distance. Close enough to see the blindfold СКАЧАТЬ