Page 109 of The Accomplice
I told him I was alone.
What he said next frightened me.
‘Do you still have the taser I gave you ?’
A cold feeling spread across my back.
He said he was on his way to my house. Stacy and Tobias Nielsen had been murdered. His investigator had heard about it through a police contact. Otto was sure Danny had killed them.
He told me not to answer the door until he arrived, to get the taser and then find somewhere to hide.
He hung up.
That’s when I heard the front door opening.
I leapt off the bed and ran into my closet. My purse was hanging on the coat rail behind the door. I opened it, took out the taser Otto had given me. I switched off the light and sat on the floor in the dark.
And I waited.
The stair with the loose floorboard creaked. He was coming up.
Sweat made my grip on the taser gun slip. I had to keep switching hands, my breath catching in my throat, and pointing it into the hallway. My hands shook, and I couldn’t aim it properly.
A figure, in shadow, stood in the doorway.
‘Carrie, we need to talk,’ he said, and came toward me.
I yelled at him to stay back, but he kept coming.
I pulled the trigger.
A blue flash of electricity shook the air and Daniel collapsed to the floor. His body shook violently like he was having a terrible fit, his limbs thumping against the floor with such force that he was at times lifting off the ground. A bloody red foam erupted from his mouth.
I dropped the taser and the convulsions stopped. He lay still. Then, his hands spread out on the floor and he began to lever himself up. I was in the closet. He was right there in the doorway. I pulled one of the drawers out, a heavy, solid oak drawer. As I raised it up, socks spilled out, and I threw it down on top of his head. He lay still and I stepped over him and ran, down the stairs, and there was Otto coming through the open front door.
I told him Danny was upstairs.
I’d shot him with the taser.
Otto told me to go outside. He said not to call the police, not yet. Just to wait for him and if he wasn’t back in five minutes then I should call the cops.
Tears streaming down my face, my hands shaking, I stepped out into the cold. Daniel’s car was in the driveway. The driver’s door lay open. I went to sit down on the driver’s seat just to take a moment and try to calm the fuck down, but then I saw it.
A knife and a pistol sat in the door pocket. I didn’t dare touch it or go near it. In the backseat were a set of black clothes, shiny with blood. I went around the back of the car and opened the trunk. Inside were two sandbags, rope, screwdrivers and a leather bag. With trembling hands, I opened the bag. Inside were women’s necklaces, rings, watches. There was something else in the bag that made it heavy. Two jars. At first, I didn’t know what they were, but one rolled over as I tilted the bag.
I clasped my hands over my mouth to stop the scream.
A pair of eyes stared out of the dark liquid in the jar.
I heard Otto calling me.
I ran toward him and hugged him tightly. It was right then Otto told me my husband was dead.
I’d killed him.
I couldn’t say anything. It felt like a hole opened in my chest. My legs gave way, but Otto held me.
He looked in the car, and then he half carried me inside. He was so pale and shaken-up. He told me we had to think about what to tell the cops, because right now it didn’t look like self defense.
