Chapter 10 - The Shattered Threshold
"Declan! Call 911!" I screamed, backing away toward the center island.
"I’m calling!" Declan pulled out his phone, his thumb flying across the glass, but he stared at the screen in disbelief. "No service. She’s using a portable cell jammer. They sell them online for five hundred bucks."
Vesper raised the iron bar and tapped it lightly against the center of the patio door. *Tink. Tink. Tink.*
"Sloane!" she sang out from the darkness, her voice muffled by the heavy double-paned glass, but horribly clear. "Come outside, Sloane! Come tell me how much I hurt your little head!"
"Get away from the doors!" Declan roared, drawing a compact handgun from his waistband holster—a weapon he had retrieved from the safe the moment Frank called. He leveled it straight at the glass. "Vesper! Drop the weapon and step back! I will shoot!"
Vesper didn't flinch. She laughed—a high-pitched, warbling sound that cut through the thunder.
"You won't shoot me, Declan!" she yelled through the glass. "You’re an Avery son-in-law! We protect the family, remember? Daddy paid Arthur! Daddy paid the doctors! Daddy always pays!"
Then, with blinding, explosive speed, she swung the heavy iron bar with both hands.
*CRASH!*
The outer pane of the tempered glass shattered into a spiderweb of thousands of tiny fractures. Declan fired a warning shot into the ceiling plaster above the door. The gunshot was deafening in the enclosed kitchen, the smell of cordite filling the air.
Vesper screamed in manic delight, swinging the bar a second time. The entire glass door caved inward, collapsing in an avalanche of sharp, crystalline shards onto the hardwood floor.
Wind and rain tore into the kitchen, blowing the curtains wildly. Vesper stepped over the broken threshold, the iron bar raised, her drenched clothes dripping water and mud onto the pristine floor.
"You ruined my life!" she shrieked, her voice suddenly morphing from playful madness into pure, feral rage. "You took my sponsorships! You turned Mom against me! They’re sending me to prison, Sloane! Do you know what they do to pretty girls in prison?"
"Drop the bar, Vesper!" Declan shouted, stepping directly between me and her, the gun trained squarely on her chest.
Vesper didn't drop it. She lunged forward, swinging the iron bar straight at Declan’s head.
Declan ducked, the metal whistling inches above his ear, smashing into the granite countertop and chipping a massive chunk of stone. Declan tackled her around the waist, slamming her down onto the hardwood floor amidst the broken glass.
Vesper fought like a wild animal, clawing at his eyes, biting his forearms, screeching obscenities in a language that sounded barely human. "I should have killed you when you were eight! I should have thrown you down the well! You were always in my way!"
I grabbed the heavy cast-iron skillet from the stovetop. As Vesper managed to roll Declan over, raising a jagged shard of broken glass toward his neck, I stepped forward and brought the flat of the skillet down hard against the side of her temple.
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Vesper went limp instantly, collapsing face-first into the puddle of rain and broken glass.
Declan shoved her off him, gasping for air, bleeding from deep cuts across his hands and neck. Outside, the piercing wail of police sirens finally echoed through the neighborhood. A neighbor had heard the gunshot and called the emergency dispatch from a landline.
