Chapter 15: Awakened and Disturbed

A harsh knock on the front door jerked Stefan awake, and he sat up groggily. He blinked, waited a moment while the unknown stranger hammered on the door, and finally was able to see the clock.

12:25 in the morning, Stefan thought angrily, getting to his feet. He adjusted his eye patch and frowned. I wonder why the hell the police are here at this time of night.

He considered arming himself, but then he decided against it. Since the death of Officer Colette, Stefan had affected the guise of a mild-mannered accountant. Carrying a sidearm would quickly dispel that image and land him in an interrogation room far faster than he liked to think about.

Don’t make the mistake of thinking that they’re stupid, he chided.

The knocking increased, and Stefan let a worried expression settle onto his face. He wasn’t worried at all, but an accountant who had never even run a red-light before would be upset.

“Hold on, please!” Stefan called.

He shuffled loudly to the door, undid the safety-chain, released the deadlock and pulled the door open.

It wasn’t the police.

A disheveled, stinking man dressed in the stained and filthy uniform of a Boy Scout grinned stupidly at Stefan.

“Yes?” Stefan asked warily. His eye darted around the street, searching for the undercover police vehicle that had been parked outside since the death of Officer Colette.

The car was gone.

Shaking his head slightly, Stefan asked. “How can I help you?”

The man swung clumsily at him.

Stefan deftly dodged the blow, catching hold of the man’s wrist as it went past. With a sharp twist and a small amount of pressure, Stefan bent the arm back and out at an unnatural angle. It was a move designed to incapacitate an attacker, and it failed utterly with the assailant.

Stefan heard the shoulder and elbow joints pop almost simultaneously. A flash of pain raced across the attacker’s face, but it didn’t slow him down. The man seemed almost immune to the physical effects of Stefan’s attack as if he couldn’t allow himself to feel it.

Instead of cringing and shrinking away to nurse his sudden injury, the stranger tried to lash out with his free hand, but he was ineffective with that as well.

Yet despite his inability to fight, the stranger had managed to get a foot into the house.

Furious and fearful of what might come next, Stefan tried to shove the man backward, fully out of his home, and then she screamed.

Every window in the house broke. Each light bulb exploded in its socket, plunging the house into darkness.

Fear swept over Stefan and he stutter-stepped backward. He felt blood trickle from his nostrils and pool in his left ear. His entire chest throbbed with pain from the power in the scream, and Stefan knew one fact with utter and profound terror.

Anne Le Morte had arrived.

The stranger, Anne Le Morte’s new caretaker, pressed into the house, and Stefan struck out, smashing the man’s nose with the palm of his hand. He heard the cartilage break, smelled the sudden rush of blood, and heard Anne Le Morte’s high, sweet laugh fill the house.

The caretaker let loose with a wild swing, and it glanced off the side of Stefan’s head.

It was painful enough to bring his attention back to the problem at hand and strong enough to knock him backward.

In a heartbeat, Stefan recovered. He grabbed the caretaker by the collar of his shirt and jerked him into the house. Kicking the door closed behind him, Stefan turned on the man and delivered a series of rapid blows, driving the man back toward the kitchen. A cold, detached attention to detail settled down over Stefan, and he understood exactly what each punch, kick, elbow, and knee strike did.

He felt first the left, then the right orbital sockets break under his fists. An elbow destroyed the man’s jaw. A knee also crushed his genitals and brought forth a stinking stream of vomit. Two rapid forearm strikes cracked, then shattered ribs, sending at least one jagged end into a lung. Teeth were first loosened, then knocked out by repeated blows to the front of his mouth.

Stefan drove a knee into the man’s stomach, and the caretaker collapsed, unconscious to the floor.

Panting, Stefan listened, trying to hear if the police had noticed the attack.

Then a cold and terrifying thought entered his mind.

Why had she sent in the caretaker?

The ambient illumination of the street lights drifted in through the windows and Stefan stood rooted to the floor, listening. His body raced as he ran through scenarios and situations.

The ghost had lain in wait for him for months outside of the warehouse. In the end, she had been robbed not only of the pleasure of killing him but of the services of a skilled caretaker as well.

The man who lay on the floor seemed to have been nothing more than the bottom of the barrel. A tool that had the misfortune of stumbling across her path.

Regaining a small measure of control over his thoughts, Stefan straightened up, and then he felt a cool, uncomfortable breeze.

It wasn’t the harsh, unforgiving chill of the dead.