Free The Devil's Water: Scenic City Murder Series #1 by Amanda Swafford Page B

grandmother would sometimes play for her when she had been a good girl. She could see a small hand, her hand, reach up and press down on one key after the other. Four notes in all. Bumm..ba….Bumm…ba. One, two, three and four. Now Carol had a melody in her mind. One, two, three and four. She hummed the notes over and over and over. Somewhere, she had read that this was a type of hypnosis and it probably was. It seemed to soothe her during the very lonely times. She continued humming for minutes which seemed like hours. Finally, she felt herself drifting. She reached and touched her stuffed animal and brought it as close to her as possible. Bumm…ba…bumm…ba. One, two, three and four. Within seconds, Carol Shipley was asleep.
    She awoke with a start at the sound of the bedroom door opening. She was a little bit fuzzy headed but, when he came over and touched her with a cold hand, her mind came to. She released the stuffed animal which she had clutched in her sleep. He was beginning to unfasten her legs and Carol knew that he would rape her again. First the legs and then the arms. Then he would crawl on top of her. Carol didn’t want this to happen again. She knew she would have to fully commit to making it stop. Now was the time. As he unfastened her arms, he reached up to her head and stroked her hair. Of course, he was wearing the night vision goggles and that would be an advantage for him. Carol would have to overpower him without the benefit of sight. She heard him unzip his pants and in a second he was climbing on top of her, his knees on both sides of her waist. With all the power Carol could muster, she brought her knee up and drove it into his crotch. She heard him scream  . Then, Carol brought both hands up and tore at his goggles ripping them off his head. Finally, she used both hands and punched at his face and stomach. She felt him fall off the bed. That was her cue. No time to waste. She lunged off the bed and ran for the door in complete darkness. Reaching out for it, she felt the knob and turned it opening the door. More darkness. She was in the hall now and she could hear him getting up from the floor beside the bed. She felt along the wall trying to see where it ended and the stairway began. He was cussing her and she knew that if he caught her, there would be hell to pay. “I’m right behind you, you bitch!” he screamed as Carol found the corner of the stairway and started up the stairs. She took them two at a time. As she climbed higher and higher, she noticed a stream of light coming from the bottom of the basement door. “I’m gonna get you, cunt!” He was at the stairwell now and coming ever closer. At the top of the stairs, Carol pushed on the basement door and stumbled into the upstairs area of the house. She was almost blinded by the shock of the bright light. She couldn’t stop though. She shut the door behind her and locked it. Then she moved through the house, trying to find the front door. She made it to the foyer just as she began hearing banging on the basement door. He was going to bust the door down. She had to get out of there. Faster, Faster. She managed to get to the front door as she heard wood cracking from the basement. He was leaning hard on the door, trying to get it to break. She swung open the front door of the house and ran out into the night. It was dark but her eyes adjusted quickly having been in complete darkness for so long. She ran along a large field toward a cluster of tall pines. As she reached the pines she could hear him on the porch. He wasn’t giving up the chase. She darted into the woods and continued running. Her feet were hurting from stepping on the pine cones but she had to soldier on. It hadn’t even occurred to her, until now, that she was nude. “I’m right behind you!” He kept screaming. She was running on pure adrenaline now. Her body had long before given out. It seemed as though he was gaining ground on her. His shouting sounded closer