Practically out of breath, Mary reached for it again, with both hands this time. Shaky fingers or not, Mary had just managed to dial 911 when Quaddra kicked the kitchen door open, and if she was scared of him before, the sight of what he looked like then petrified her soul.
Quaddra’s face was completely covered in blood, which was still oozing from his facial wound – running down his cheeks, over his lips, and dripping down from his chin onto his chest and the floor. His hands were also covered in crimson red. The fire inside his eyes was still there, but it had joined forces with rage and specks of blood to create some kind of hell furnace, and since his face, hands and torso were bathed in plasma, Quaddra looked like some blood-thirsty psychopathic killer straight out of a horror movie.
Mary dropped the phone again, this time, onto the floor.
‘That was a cheap shot, Mary.’ Even his voice sounded different – deeper… darker… but at the same time, controlled.
‘Stay the fuck away from me,’ Mary yelled, as she hopped back a couple more steps.
‘Oh, what’s the matter, honey?’ Quaddra asked, blood spitting from his lips and dripping from his chin as he spoke. ‘Did you hurt yourself?’
‘Stay the fuck away from me,’ Mary told him again, but there was no conviction in her voice… just fear.
‘I’m afraid I won’t be able to do that, my love.’
What was really terrifying Mary right then, was that Quaddra seemed to be in no rush. He knew that he could get to herwhenever he wanted. This was now a game to him. One that he knew he couldn’t lose.
For just a split second, Mary’s mind wondered if this was what Quaddra did to all his victims – play some crazy cat-and-mouse game… chasing them around… making them believe that they had a chance of escaping, when the truth was they were already dead – they just didn’t know it yet. Mary pictured Denise fighting Quaddra with every molecule of strength she had in her body, because she knew that Denisewouldfight him.
You better concentrate on the here and now,the voice inside Mary’s head said, bringing her back to the kitchen.
Quaddra wasn’t blinking so much anymore. Blood was still cascading from the wound on his nose, but it wasn’t spilling into his eyes.
‘You don’t have to kill me,’ Mary said, her head shaking at him, her heart beating in her throat. She had no idea if her 911-call had connected or not. She had no idea if an operator was on the line or not, or even if the phone was still working after it hit the floor, but she wasn’t really talking to Quaddra right then. She was talking to the phone… she was talking to hope. ‘In the same way that you didn’t have to kill any of those women.’
‘But I did,’ Quaddra said back. ‘In the same way that I now have to kill you.’ He took a couple of unrushed steps in Mary’s direction, rounding the kitchen island through the right side.
Mary hopped back once again, but this time she tentatively placed her right foot on the floor. The pain was still there, on her knee and shooting up her leg, but the ‘fight or flight’ adrenaline that was still flooding her system had anesthetized enough of it for her to be able to stop hopping on one leg. She took another step back, and as she did, her eyes made contact with the knife-block that Antonia always kept on the kitchen counter – six laser-sharp Japanese knives that could slice through almost anything with tremendous ease.
Without missing a beat, Mary reached for one of the knives, grabbing a six-inch blade with a thick wood handle.
‘Stay the fuck away from me, Quaddra,’ she yelled again, extending her right arm at him.
Quaddra chuckled. ‘What do you think that you’re going to do with that, Mary?’
‘Come closer and you’ll find out.’ The blade did not look steady in Mary’s hand.
Quaddra allowed his lips to break into a smile that scared Mary because it didn’t look like a smile. It was just a meaningless gesture – muscles pulling skin over his skull – which made the smile look creepy and lifeless, as if his whole face was being operated by a puppet master. Add the fact that most of his body was, by then, a crazy mess of smeared blood, and Quaddra looked like a creature who had been summoned from the depths of hell.
‘Oh, c’mon, Mary,’ Quaddra said, lifting his left hand to his face again, as if he was going to wipe some of the blood away, but that was just a distraction tactic.
As Mary’s attention moved to his hand, Quaddra launched himself at her, right arm extended, aiming for her throat.
This time, Mary was the one who was caught completely off guard, especially by how fast Quaddra had moved. Somehow, he had managed to bridge a six-foot gap in a fraction of a heartbeat, as if he really was some creature from beyond.
Instead of stabbing the knife at him, all that a terrified and desperate Mary was able to do was to reflexively angle the knife up, trying to protect her face. Out of pure luck, she managed to place the knife just between her throat and Quaddra’s hand, and as he closed his fingers around it, the laser sharp blade sliced through his palm, almost down to the bone.
‘Arghhhh!’ Quaddra’s hand immediately recoiled back, the sudden jerking movement sending more blood flying up into the air before splashing down over Mary’s face and naked torso.
‘Fucking bitch!’ Quaddra yelled, taking two steps back. His left hand shot to his right one to try to contain the bleeding.
Mary also wobbled back a couple more steps, her eyes blurred by tears, her whole body shivering from fear and adrenaline, her face, hair and torso splashed with Quaddra’s blood.
‘I told you to stay back.’ Her voice came out one octave higher than normal.
If adrenaline had anesthetized some of Mary’s knee, it seemed to have done the same to Quaddra’s hand, because despite how deep the cut to his right palm was, he launched himself at her again, with even more power this time, but this time, Mary was a little more prepared for it and she managed to swing the blade from left to right and top to bottom.
Quaddra, once again, covered the distance between him and Mary in a flash, which completely shortened Mary’s defensive movement, taking most of the power away from the stabbing. The knife entered Quaddra’s front a few inches below his left shoulder. The wound was deep enough to cause a lot of pain and bleeding, but far from enough to be able to stop him from smashing into Mary, sending both of them crashing to the ground – Mary falling backwards and Quaddra falling on his stomach.
