Chapter 6 - The Sound of Breaking GlassThe wind screamed through the pine trees, masking the crunch of my boots against the frozen snow.
I crept along the cedar-shingle exterior of the lodge, keeping low beneath the wrap-around porch. Through the frosted glass of the dining room window, I could see Kenneth.
He looked frantic.
The calm, collected corporate executive was gone. His hair was disheveled, his expensive navy blazer was discarded on the floor, and he was frantically tossing stacks of paper into the roaring stone fireplace. Orange flames leaped hungrily upward, licking at the financial ledgers and offshore bank statements that proved his guilt.
On the mahogany table beside him sat an open metal suitcase filled with banded stacks of hundred-dollar bills and three dark blue foreign passports.
He was preparing to vanish.
I quietly climbed the porch steps, my heart hammering against my ribs like a trapped bird. I didn't knock. Instead, I raised the heavy iron fireplace poker leaning against the exterior stone wall and brought it down with all my strength against the side window.
CRASH!
Shattered glass exploded inward across the hardwood floor.
Kenneth spun around with a violent curse, his hand diving into his jacket pocket. The color drained entirely from his face as the swirling snow blew in through the broken frame, revealing me standing in the shattered window like an apparition from a nightmare.
"Victoria?" he breathed, his voice cracking with sheer disbelief. "No... that's impossible. The brake lines..."
"You forgot to check which car I drove today, Kenneth," I said, stepping over the jagged shards of glass, my voice steady and cold. "I took my father's sedan to the hospital. My SUV was sitting in the driveway waiting for a ghost."
Kenneth backed away, his eyes darting wildly toward the open suitcase of money, then toward the front hallway where the police were undoubtedly closing in. The panic in his eyes curdled into a dark, desperate rage.
"You ruin everything!" he screamed, his voice turning shrill as he lunged forward, snatching a heavy hunting knife from the mantelpiece. "I spent six years building this life! I molded you! I made you! You were nothing before me!"
"And you were just a parasite waiting for a host to die," I replied, standing my ground.
He charged across the room, the blade catching the firelight, gleaming with a lethal, cruel edge.
I didn't run. I waited until he was two paces away, right over the thick Persian rug where the ice from my boots had left a slick puddle of water.
Just as he lunged, I dropped flat to the floor.
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Kenneth’s momentum carried him forward over my back. His foot caught the slick puddle on the rug, his legs flew out from under him, and he crashed violently into the edge of the heavy oak coffee table.
The hunting knife flew from his hand, skittering across the floorboards and coming to a stop near the fireplace.
