Fidelity

14

The man was gone. Emily lay on the bed with the cords from the blinds cutting into her wrists and ankles. She bent her knees to bring her ankles closer to relieve the pressure, but the effort quickly tired her legs.

She heard the doorbell again, so loud in the empty house. She tried wriggling her wrists out of the cord, but the man had tied them too tightly. She fought against the cord, but it seemed to tighten the knots. She knew that the next part was not going to feel good, but she began to rock. She rocked until she was sitting on one haunch with her knees bent and her feet beside her.

In this awkward position, the weight of her body kept her knees bent as far as they could be, and let some of the rope go slack. She could reach the knot around her ankles with her fingertips.

The doorbell chimed a third time, and she tried to shout, but the gag was tight, and the scream she had intended was muted to a small squeal through her nose. She worked harder on the knot.

And then she had it. Her legs straightened, the cord lashing out from around the ankles quickly as she pulled.

Emily swung her legs off the bed, ran to the door, then sidestepped quickly down the stairs to the front door. She kicked it to let Dewey know she was in here. She turned away from the door and tried to turn the knob. She was barely able to reach it with her hands tied behind her. She strained to turn it and, after a couple of tries, succeeded.

Dewey pushed the door inward.

“Emily!” He pulled the gag down so it was like a scarf around her neck, and she leaned to spit the cloth out on the floor. He was behind her, untying her wrists. “What happened? Who did this?”

“A man. I didn’t know him. I woke up and he was there in my bedroom. He had a gun, and a ski mask. He was trying to kidnap me, but you got here.” As she spoke, she felt as though she were conjuring the man, and her words might bring him back. She pushed herself away from Dewey and stepped cautiously to the entrance to the living room, looking for a place where the man might still be hiding.

Dewey had his cell phone out, and he was dialing. “My name is Dewey Burns. I’m going to put Mrs. Emily Kramer on. She’s been assaulted by a man with a gun and ski mask at 9553 Sunnyland Avenue in Van Nuys. The man just left. I’ll let her describe him.” He put the phone in Emily’s hand, pulled a gun out of a holster under his coat, and slipped past her to the big sliding door in the living room. He slid it open and moved outside, the gun held ready in his hand.

Emily said, “Hello?”

“Yes, ma’am.” The woman’s voice was distant, as though she were talking into a speakerphone. “Officers are on their way, but right now you need to give me a description.”

“He was about six feet tall, maybe one eighty or so. He was muscular, but not really big. He wore a ski mask, but I could see he was white, with blue eyes.”

“Hair color?”

“I couldn’t see it.”

“What else was he wearing?”

“A jacket that was blue, like a windbreaker, nylon. It made a sound like a whisper when he moved fast. Black jeans. Not blue, black. And a dark blue shirt.”

“Did he wear glasses?”

“No.”

“Did you notice his shoes?”

“They were black leather, with rubber soles.”

“Was there anything else that was distinctive about him?”

“He had a gun. It was big, an automatic. Kind of a dull gray color.”

“Did he hurt you?”

“He hit me a couple of times with his hand, but I think I’m okay.”

“Was there a sexual assault?”

“Not exactly.” Emily looked for Dewey Burns, feeling embarrassed to talk in front of him, then realizing she was being ridiculous. “He made me take my clothes off, but he didn’t do anything to me. I think he was just trying to make me scared and keep me from making trouble. He didn’t-you know-touch me that way.”

She saw Dewey Burns slip in through the sliding door again. Something began to work in her mind; an idea began to form. Dewey Burns met her gaze, shrugged, and shook his head to tell her that the man was gone.

The woman said, “Can you give me your full name, please?”

“Emily Jean Kramer, with a K.”

“That’s K-R-A-M-E-R.”

“Yes.”

“And the address is 9553 Sunnyland Avenue in Van Nuys.”

“Yes.”

“Your phone number?”

She gave the woman the information she asked for and stood waiting in the foyer while Dewey went from room to room with his gun in his hand checking doors and windows. He went into the kitchen, turned toward her with the dim predawn glow behind him, and the idea that had been forming in Emily’s mind suddenly became clear. She said, “Miss, please tell the officers the man seems to be gone, and my friend is here with me. I’ve got to go now.” She disconnected the call and walked into the kitchen. She watched Dewey Burns as she walked, never moving her eyes from him as he tested the back door, then went to the door of the laundry room to turn on the light, then came back.

He saw that there was something odd about the way she was staring at him. “What?”

“I see it now.”

“What do you mean? Who?”

“You. Just now when I was on the phone and I was so scared and confused that I must have been half crazy, I saw you come in from outside, and I thought I was having a hallucination. When you pushed that sliding door open and kind of leaned to the side to close it after you were in, it was just like seeing Phil do it. It was exactly like him. You move just like him.”

Dewey avoided her stare, and appeared to ignore what she was saying. He stepped past her into the dining room, but she followed. “Maybe it was because you held me when you came in and untied me, and it felt familiar. At first I thought it was just that you were both big and tall, but it wasn’t just that, was it? You’re his son.”

He showed no reaction, no surprise or denial. He kept moving, checking the French doors that led from the dining room into the garden.

She said, “I don’t know why I never noticed, it’s so obvious to me now. Maybe even letting myself notice a slight resemblance would have been too dangerous. It would have made me think of the possibility that he was with other women.”

He stood still. “Are you expecting me to say whether you’re right or wrong?”

“I’m sorry, Dewey. No, I’m not. I just realized the truth, and I blurted it out because-I don’t know. I’ve just been through something horrible, and I wasn’t thinking at all, and then looked at you and I knew, and I said it. I honestly never knew until yesterday afternoon that Phil hadn’t been faithful.”

She sat down at the kitchen table. After a moment she realized that she was shivering. Dewey sat down across from her and put his hand on hers. “Can you tell me what happened to you?”

“He scared me. He hit me a couple of times, and I thought he was going to rape me. But what he wants is some kind of information. He thinks Phil had some information-maybe papers or something-that some powerful man wants. He thought I would know about it and he could scare me or hurt me enough so I would give it to him. And all this time, I’ve been trying every day to find something like that-anything that would explain why Phil isn’t here with me.” She paused, then looked into Dewey’s eyes.

“I don’t know what it is,” he said. “He didn’t confide in me. All we had was that one secret.”

They could both hear the sound of the police cars moving fast up the street, then stopping. There were a couple of door slams, then the noise of the police radios.