She had dropped her cell phone into her purse. It rang again just then, startling them both.
“Don’t answer it,” he snapped. “Let it ring.”
She did as she was told, but the flashing light on the screen of the ringing phone provided an amazing amount of light inside her otherwise pitch-black purse-enough to see her car keys. Enough to see the gun.
Then something else happened. From far away down the mountain, Ali heard the faint wail of a siren. Witherspoon was standing right next to her, close enough that she felt him tense at the sound. Knowing this momentary distraction was her only chance, Ali wrapped her shaking hand around the handle of her Glock. Whirling, she spun around and faced him. She didn’t even try removing the weapon from her purse. Instead, holding the gun inside, and with the leather of her Coach bag touching his belly, she pulled the trigger.
Nancy Drake’s voice droned in her head. “Once you’ve made the decision to stop someone, you’d by God better carry through. Use hollow points. They’re the ones that do the damage. And forget about target shooting. Go for the gut. Take out a guy’s pelvis and he’s going down.”
With the first shot, Ben Witherspoon’s eyes bulged as much in outrage as surprise, but despite Nancy’s predictions, he didn’t fall. “Why you…” he screamed.
In the aftermath of the shot, Ali’s ears rang. She couldn’t hear what he was saying, but she read his lips. And his mind. He was enraged, and with the knife still in hand, his intentions were absolutely clear. So she let go of the purse and pulled the trigger again. This time the bullet found its mark and he did go down. Hard.
When Ali could hear again, she realized that her phone was still ringing. Or maybe it was ringing again. It lay where it had landed, a yard or so from her feet. Next to it, barely visible in the pulsing light, she caught the gleam of the car keys.
Just then, to her dismay, a steel-hard grip, like the jaws of a trap, locked around the base of her ankle. Witherspoon was down, all right, but he wasn’t out. Ali reached for the door handle, trying to hold on to something to keep from falling. In the process, she slammed the Glock against the car door. The gun bounced out of her grip, fell to the ground, and then spun out of reach.
Ali hit the ground, too. When she landed, the jolting pain from her broken ribs was so excruciating it took her breath away. She felt a sharp stab of pain in her leg, too, and knew he had cut her at least once and that he’d do it again if she didn’t get away. She kicked him then, hard, with her other foot. She felt the gratifying blow as her heel connected sharply with the bottom of his chin. The kick took him by surprise. His head jerked back and she heard his teeth knock together in his mouth. His grip loosened only slightly but it was enough. She squirmed away from him, scrabbling along the ground like an ungainly lizard, desperate to escape his reach.
The wailing sirens were much closer now, coming up the mountain, but they weren’t nearly close enough or fast enough to satisfy her. If he came after her again, there was no guarantee anyone would reach her in time.
Nearby she heard the murmuring voices of worried neighbors who had emerged from their various houses in search of an explanation for the real-life gunfire that had suddenly drowned out the cops-and-robbers sound effects of their nightly police drama fare.
But Ali needed armed police officers right then far more than she needed well-meaning or curious neighbors. When her fingers chanced to encounter the familiar shape of her car keys, she did the only thing that made sense.
She grabbed them and pressed hard on the panic button and kept right on crawling.
The next thing she knew, Dave Holman was there beside her, kneeling on the ground.
“He tried to kill me,” Ali heard herself blubbering. “He was waiting inside the house and…”
“Hush,” Dave said, covering his lips with one finger. “Don’t say another word. You’re hurt. Let’s get you to the ER.”
cutlooseblog.com
Monday, March 21, 2005
First, please let me apologize for the long silence, especially after that post that said it was my “last” post. I know many of you have been terribly concerned. Some of you are already aware of what’s happened. The rest of you are about to find out.
Twenty-two years ago, when I was pregnant with my son, I decided that when it came time to choose an OB-GYN to deliver my baby, I’d go looking for a woman. My reasoning was simple. Since men don’t have babies, maybe a female doctor would be more in tune with what I wanted and needed. And I have to say, even all these years later, that Dr. Winona Manchester was perfect in every way. She had two children of her own. She was sympathetic and realistic. When she told me what I should or shouldn’t do, I believed her. She’d been there and done that.
Since most of you know Tank is now twenty-two, you must be wondering why I’m telling you all this old news. I’m getting to that. And since this is a blog, and I don’t have to say my piece in the forty-five seconds before the next commercial, I’m going to say it my way.
For years, in my role as a “public person” I’ve helped out with various social events. I’ve spent a lot of time raising money for cancer research for the simple reason that’s what my first husband died of. I’ve also done a good deal of work for various women’s groups, including organizations that deal with helping victims of domestic violence. But I did that more as a good citizen than because I really knew or cared that much about the issue. I was interested. I was involved. But like those male OBGYNs that I dismissed so long ago, I hadn’t been there or done that-until now.
My last regular message was posted on Friday morning, the day of my friend’s funeral. The night before I had received a second threatening e-mail from the estranged husband of one of my readers. You may remember the woman I advised to take her baby and run. I posted her husband’s comment that if she left him, he’d come looking for me. She did run, and he made good on his promise. He found me. He broke into my home while I was attending Reenie’s funeral and was waiting for me when I got back.The cut screen and the broken window have both been replaced, and my new security system is being installed right this minute.)
Before Friday night, I never knew what it felt like to be kicked hard enough to break bones. (Two ribs, currently taped.) Or to be sliced by a kitchen knife. (Eleven stitches. Tetanus shot.) I also never knew that a life-and-death battle is just exactly that. In newscasts I’ve often been critical of “trigger-happy cops.” But while I was spouting those views, it turns out I’d never been there or done that, either. I didn’t know what it means to have your life turned upside-down in a him-or-me scenario.
I spent two nights at the hospital in Flagstaff, the same hospital where my father had his surgery last week. (My mother was there again, bless her.) I still hurt all over from the kicks that found their intended targets, and I’m grateful for the one that missed. One of the blows left a clear shoe-print-style bruise on my backside. Having that photographed for forensic purposes was not a high point of my existence, but I’ll live.
I’m home now, and I’m alive. My assailant isn’t. That’s due primarily to the California concealed weapon permit I carry in my wallet and the Glock I had in the bottom of my purse when he attacked me. (If you are someone who thinks all handguns should be outlawed, you’re more than welcome to write to me here, but I think you’re going to have a hard time changing my mind.)
There’s a lot more I’d like to say right now, but my lawyers (yes, that would be plural) won’t let me. I’ve hired a local defense attorney in the event (unlikely, I’ve been told) that the county attorney decides to press charges against me. Arizona seems to be one of those states where people still have the right to defend themselves in their own homes and on their own property. The second attorney is due to the fact that the dead man’s estranged wife, the abused woman who read my column and fled for her life, is now considering filing a civil wrongful death suit against me. (No good deed goes unpunished!)