Dinner with the Blakemores (The Blakemore Files Book 5) (2 page)

Corpus Christie, TX

Ryanne Trodat Dobbins awoke with a start.  Her heart was racing, but as she tried to sit up in the bed, a heavy weight held her down. Fear and Uncertainty sat on her chest like a set of twins forbidding her to move.  Her arm slid out to check the other side of the bed for her husband, Dwight; he wasn’t there.  Her ears strained to listen for what she could feel was wrong in the air.  The mood of the space in which she resided felt thick.  Dense. Goosebumps formed on her arm as she grabbed a hold of Fear and pushed it off her chest. Uncertainty was holding her in the bed as she heard her husband’s voice speaking low. 
Is someone in our house
?  The inner dialogue that was playing in her head was at war with her reasoning as one cautioned her to stay in the bed while the other forced her legs to swing to the side and propel her body from the mattress.  Common sense held her hand as she bent to get on her hands and knees and retrieve the Ruger .380 automatic from under the side of the bed.

Her father had always taught her to keep one in the nightstand and one under the bed out of plain sight. “Pumpkin, if you have to hide under your bed, you will never be alone,” Big Sarge had told her.  His advice tonight was probably going to save her life. She slipped on her robe and dropped the piece into the right pocket.

The clock on the nightstand glowed with red numbers telling her it was only 3:30 in the morning. 
Who is he talking to at this time of the morning?  We don’t have State Farm and I know that is not Jake
. Dwight’s voice was low as he spoke into the cell phone. Caution held her leg as she came to the corner of the kitchen where he stood by the sink. The light from the stove hood was the only illumination in the room, casting an eerie glow on the side of her husband’s face.

“She’s sleeping. It’s the only time I get a break from that chatting mouth of hers,” he said low into the phone.

Ryanne blinked several times as her brain absorbed his words. 
Don’t let him know you are here. Listen. Learn
.

“Yeah, I should be paid extra for having to sleep with her. She is a dead fish in bed and it matches her personality. … No she is nothing like her sister, Odessa, that one, I would make love to for free,” Dwight said in the line.

It was as if the air had been sucked from the room and Ryanne found herself getting light headed.  Yet she was rooted to her spot.  Still listening to her husband.

“Not really much else to report.  Odessa is about six months along in her pregnancy.  We are scheduled to go to Dallas for Thanksgiving and I will once again be forced to be in their company,” he said to the person on the other end.

“Saxton … right now he is pretty happy about becoming a father. I think it would be poetic to poison him over dinner because Odessa can’t cook worth a shit. Letting her live with the guilt that her cooking killed her husband would probably destroy her,” he answered the unheard voice on the other end.

The room was quiet as she watched her husband standing there, taking instructions from an unknown voice in the middle of the night. “Yes, Seńor.” Dwight responded.  There was a lull in the conversation before her spouse responded, “It depends on how fast you want to move.  I could go into the bedroom and put a bullet in her head and call it a night, or do you want to wait until they are all together in a couple of weeks and come in and handle it yourself?”

The tears had started to roll down Ryanne’s cheeks.  Her husband was worse than a cheater, he was … he was … he was standing in front of her.

In the dimly lit room she was grateful she could not see his face. She hated him. He was a liar.  He had lied to her.  Their whole marriage was a lie.  He was a stranger in her house, in her bed, and in her life.

“How much of that did you hear, my wife?” he asked as he stood close.  His breath caressing her cheek like an unwanted lover.

“I just came downstairs to get some water,” she lied.

Dwight took his hand and pressed it into her shoulder, pinning her against the wall.  “And the idea of getting water made you cry, Ryanne?”

Her throat was cracking.  “Yes.  I am really thirsty.”

The man she was married to, as she refused to call him her husband any longer, threw back his head and actually laughed at her. “Wow!  All those book smarts and not an ounce of common sense. I sometimes have wondered how you have managed to feed yourself and walk at the same time,” Dwight said to her.  He used his left hand to flip open her robe.  A long index finger trailed down the front of the nightgown, his hand resting on her breast.  “Damn shame, really.  I was actually starting to warm up to sleeping with you.  You were progressing nicely, learning how to please me.”

There was more of Dora Trodat in her than the man realized as her knee came up fast and hard to his groin.  Dwight doubled over as Ryanne started to run.  She didn’t know where or which way to go. She could not make it to her car.  Her feet were bare and she was only wearing a nightgown and robe.  The moment of indecision was all he needed to regroup as he caught her in the hallway, tripping her up and landing heavily atop her.  The air was nearly knocked from her lungs as he crawled over her.  She could feel his excitement against her thigh as he pushed her gown up and groped at her underwear.

“One last ride before I kill you sweetheart,” he told her as he ripped away her underpants.

Ryanne’s hands went up and scratched at his face, trying to gouge out his eyes. This was the turning point in the whole frightful affair, when Dwight Darrel Dobbins raised his hand and smacked her hard across the face.  The sweet, unassuming woman that he had been married to for six months changed before his eyes.  The fear that he had seen in the kitchen was gone and a very angry bitch was staring him in the face.

“You hit me?” she asked.  For a second, Dwight felt fear.  Ryanne repeated herself but this time she said it as a fact. “You hit me.”

Her knees came up and dumped him on the floor next to her as she popped to her feet, kicked him in the chest and lowered herself into a karate stance and socked him in the life givers. “My daddy ain’t never laid a hand on me and neither will you, you piece of …”

Dwight, groaning loudly, grabbed her ankle and flipped her back to the floor.  Ryanne scrambled to get back to her feet as she made a beeline for the bedroom
.  He knows where my gun is.  I have to get there before him
.

He was on his hands and knees, but he was moving quickly down the hall, trying to get to the bedroom before she got to that gun.  She burst through the door, stumbling, falling, rolling across the floor, but he was bent at the knee as he dove across the bed and reached into the nightstand, pulling out the weapon.  She had not been fast enough.

“Now, where were we?” he asked as he patted the mattress for her to come and join him on the bed.

The clip was loaded in the weapon but Dwight didn’t know the first round was a rubber bullet. Saxton had taught her that trick.  Even if he fired, he would only slow her, and not kill her.  She bolted for the door. 

“Shit!” he said as he jumped off the bed to run after her.  She almost made it out the front door when a heavy hand hit her again upside her head, sending her careening across the floor.  “Stop being so difficult, Ryanne,” Dwight said to her.

He moved like a panther coming towards her. The man was taking pride in watching his wife scramble backwards on the floor to get away from him.  It was probably a wise thing on her part considering what he was about to do to her. “Now, come to Daddy, and let’s get this over with it.”

Her face was without emotion as she pulled the .380 out her pocket. “You ain’t my damn daddy!”  She was sliding backwards as she pulled the trigger three times. One shot went wild and lodged into the ceiling as he ducked low, still charging at her.  The second shot wedged in the door as he grabbed at her leg, trying to pull her close enough to get the gun from her hand. The last shot landed in flesh as Dwight collapsed on the floor.

Dallas, TX

The burgeoning rays of a new morning penetrated over the horizon and peeked into the window of the Blakemore home signaling Saxton’s body that it was time to rise. It would be nearly an hour before his wife, Odessa, would awaken, but a kicking fetus had its own hours.  When dawn broke through the darkness, slapping at night’s oppressing hand, it too wanted others to awaken.  It appeared that someone else desired the same thing.

Saxton’s phone vibrated on the nightstand. Almost in stealth mode, he grabbed at the spot where he thought he had laid the black item, which was on the corner of a dark table in a near pitch-black room.
Grab it before it wakes her
.  Odessa had slept little in the past two weeks because no matter how hard she tried, either her mind or their son would not let her rest. Initially, they had believed she would be having twins, but it turned out the second heartbeat was only gas. She still had nearly three months to go before the pregnancy came full term, but the way the little fella was carrying on, you would have thought he was with his grandmother Dora at a towel sale.

The phone buzzed again as he located the mini idiot box and slipped out of bed.  In the bathroom he slid his finger across the screen and jammed the phone to his right ear.

“Blakemore,” he said in a hushed tone.

The voice on the other end was muffled through the sound of tears.  Saxton pulled the phone away from his ear to look at the caller information.  It was Ryanne.

“Ryanne, are you okay?”  Fear flooded his heart as he had a flashback to getting a similar call many years ago from his sister.  A call from Belva that also came in the wee hours of the morning. A cry in the darkness for help.… He changed his tactics and chose his next words carefully.

“Are you in immediate danger?”

The sobbing voice mumbled, “No.”

“Are you hurt, Ryanne?”  He wanted to know. Yes and no answers were easy, even to a person entering into the early stages of shock.

“I’m not hurt, but he is.…”

Saxton inhaled deeply, his mind slapping about ideas, scenarios, answers, and
what ifs
as he thought about flight times. It would take his brother, Connard, at least an hour and a half to get the plane to Dallas.  The flight from Dallas to Corpus Christie was another hour and some odd minutes. It would take the police that long to stop scratching their asses.

The next question was critical. “Ryanne, is Dwight dead?”

More sobs.  A gasp of air. “No …” she mumbled into the phone. “He is bleeding a lot....”

Saxton the big brother went into overdrive like he had when Belva had called him years ago with a similar plight.  He spoke slowly. “When you hang up, take the chip out of the phone and crush it.  Call 911 from the house phone and try to stop the bleeding.  Do not open your mouth when the police arrive and pretend like you are in shock.  Do not say a word until we get there. We’ll be there in three or four hours.”

She was still sobbing.  Saxton’s tone was firm. “Ryanne, repeat what I just told you.”

Odessa was standing in the doorway listening to his voice as her sister mumbled back the words in the phone.

“Ryanne, three hours, we will be there in four hours max,” he told her.

The muted rays of November light broke through the curtains in the bedroom, shining fresh new light into the room and the current situation. Odessa was scrambling to find a pair of pants, shoes, and throw some water on her face. Saxton was calling his brother.

“Connard, I need the plane sent to Dallas with a continuing flight on to Corpus Christie. Four going out, five returning,” he told his very groggy little brother.  Connard did not ask any questions as he could count on two fingers the number of times Saxton had requested the use of his private plane.

As he dressed he asked Odessa, “Have you awakened your parents?  They need to be dressed with full bellies and ready to go in 45 minutes.”  He looked at her stomach. “The same goes for you two.  Food, water, snacks in a bag.  We have wheels up in less than two hours.”

Odessa wanted to ask questions, but if Saxton was calling for the plane, it had to be bad.  How bad, she didn’t know and she wasn’t sure she wanted to know. However, in her condition, surprises were not welcomed.

Curiosity and fear for her sister pushed her to ask the question, “Saxton, is Dwight dead?”

“Not to my knowledge,” he responded to his wife.  He gave the same response again fifteen minutes later after he spoke with his friend and lead agent in the CIA, Marecus Roget.

“What do you need from me, Blakemore?” Agent Roget asked into the line.

Saxton understood how the justice system worked.  The more money you had the better lawyer you could afford. The better lawyer you could afford, the less likely your chances were of ending up in a dark cell fighting off predators in the wee hours of the morning.  Dark cells filled with greedy predators who intentionally sought to abuse and destroy your self-esteem, reducing the strongest being to a pile of nothing.

“I need the best defense lawyer you can get for me in Corpus Christie. I need them up, dressed and headed over to the house to meet Ryanne,” he told him before swallowing a cup of decaf, gnawing into a whole wheat bagel with reduced fat cream cheese, as he stuck the keys into the ignition, turned over the engine, and backed out of the driveway. Odessa was riding shotgun and holding on to the
oh shit
bar as he yanked at the gearshift, putting the truck into drive and heading towards her parents’ home. He slowed the truck for a minute and placed his hand over her belly. His son was awake and moving about. “Everything is going to be okay,” he said to his wife and it also calmed the child.

After only two years and six months of marriage, Odessa’s parents, Big Sarge and Dora Trodat, understood the type of man their daughter, Odessa, had married.  Saxton Blakemore was a stand up type of man who fought for the little person and enjoyed taking out the bad guy.  Their eldest daughter, Ryanne, they were certain, had married everything that Saxton Blakemore was against. A bad guy pretending to be a loving husband. As much as they wanted to scream at the top of their lungs that something wasn’t right about Dwight, time, patience, and the choices of their children were things over which they had no control.

Only six months into the marriage and they all dreaded the worse – that Ryanne had killed her husband; something each member in the family feared would happen. It really wouldn’t be that big of a shocker because changes in Ryanne’s behavior became noticeable after only two months of marriage.  Her phone calls became fewer.  Face time ceased after Dora commented on how haggard she was looking. The fire that used to be in her eyes was a dull gaze. Four months into the marriage, a concerned Odessa traveled to Corpus Christie to spend a weekend with her big sister, but had to leave early.  It was too uncomfortable for everyone involved. Ryanne was on pins and needles and Dwight was rolling up the welcome mat.

“She’s my sister and I will visit any damn time I feel like it, Dwight,” she told him and sat firmly in the chair.  Even pregnant, Odessa dared him to make a move towards her. She knew the man was a cunning snake, but Big Sarge had taught his daughters well.

No man was going to rule them, least of all a weak one like Dwight.