Free Beyond Suspicion by James Grippando Page B

world, not Cindy.
    And
that
was something for which he could never forgive himself.
    Jack started out of the kitchen, then froze at the sight of some broken glass on the floor. He dropped the frozen yogurt on the kitchen counter and ran to the French doors in the family room. One of the rectangular panes had been shattered. Jack didn’t touch anything, but he could see that the lock had been turned. Someone had paid them a visit.
    “Cindy!”
    His heart raced as he grabbed the cordless telephone and ran to the stairway. He was gobbling up two and three steps at a time and was about to call her name again when he heard her scream. “Jack!”
    He sprinted down the hallway. Just as he reached the bedroom door, it flew open in his face. Cindy rushed out. They nearly collided at full speed, but he managed to get his arms around her. He saw only terror in her eyes.
    “What is it?” he asked.
    She grabbed him but never stopped moving, her momentum dragging him back into the hallway. Her voice was filled with panic. “In there!”
    “What’s in there?”
    She pointed inside the master suite, in the general direction of the bathroom. “On the floor.”
    “Cindy, what is it?”
    She fought to catch her breath, on the verge of hyperventilation. “Blood.”
    “Blood?”
    “Yes! My God, Jack. It’s-there’s so much of it. Back by the tub.”
    “Call 911.”
    “Where are you going?”
    “Just call.”
    “Jack, don’t go in there!”
    He dialed 911 and handed her the phone. “Just stay on the line while I check this out.”
    He hurried across the room to the dresser and took the gun from the top drawer. He quickly removed the lock and started toward the bathroom. Jack didn’t think of himself as a gun person, but one attack against your wife has a way of making you forever mindful of self-defense. Cindy called his name once more, a final plea to keep him from doing something stupid, but she was soon in conversation with the 911 operator.
    “My crazy husband is going in there right now,” Jack heard her say. But that didn’t stop him. Too many weird things had happened in the last two weeks. He wasn’t about to let something-or
somebody
-bleed to death in their bathroom while they waited for the cops.
    He stood in the bathroom doorway with arms extended and both hands clasped around the gun. He was aiming at nothing but at the ready. “Who’s in here?”
    He waited but got no answer.
    “The police are on their way. Now, who’s in here?”
    Still no answer. He stepped inside and checked the floor. He saw no blood, but he’d ventured no farther than the first of two sinks-his sink. It wasn’t quite far enough inside their bathroom to see into the back area by the big vanity mirror and Roman tub-the place where Cindy had seen the blood.
    He took two more steps and froze. He was standing at Cindy’s sink. Her medicine cabinet was half-open, and in the angled reflection he saw it: a glistening, crimson line of blood on a floor of white ceramic tile.
    His pulse quickened. Jack had seen plenty of blood before, visited many a crime scene. There was nothing like seeing it in your own house. “Do you need help?”
    His voice echoed off the tiled walls, as if to assure him that no answer would come. He took two more steps, then a third. His grip tightened on the gun. His steps became half-steps. Weighted with trepidation, he turned the corner. His eyes tracked the bright red line to its source. He faced the Roman tub and gasped.
    A bloody hand hung limply over the side-a woman’s hand. For an instant Jack felt paralyzed. He swallowed his fear and inched closer. Then he stopped, utterly horrified yet unable to look away.
    She was completely unclothed, only blood to cover her nakedness. An empty bottle of liquor rested at her hip. It was literally a bloodbath, her life seeming to have drained from the slit in her left wrist. Red rivulets streaked the basin, the thickest pool of blood having gathered near her