“It’s not what I am,” Mort said, grabbing another fistful of my pant leg. “It’s what you are.”
I howled when he went for the scissors again, gripping the handle and wobbling the blade back and forth to get it out of my leg. The pain was phenomenal and I was hit with another wave of nausea, a crash of blinding pain.
“Lawson!” Alex’s voice was closer now. “Where are you?”
“Kitchen!” I wailed
The crack of the gunshot was so surprising that Mort lost his bloody grip on the scissors and they flopped from the wound, disappearing in the sea of muck. My fingers found something heavy and solid and I gripped it, threw my entire weight into pulling it over my head and cracking it dead center on Mort’s forehead as he lunged for me.
The stuffed owl made an impressive thud, its talons slicing from the top of Mort’s head all the way through his eyebrow. Mort howled and clapped a hand over his forehead, the blood spattering between his fingers. He sputtered and stepped backward and I surged forward, clobbering him one more time with the bird, then throwing my entire body weight at him. He flopped onto his butt and I cleared him, gritting my teeth against the groaning ache in my calf.
“Alex!” I screamed again, kicking aside heaps of Mort’s stuff. “Where are you?”
I swam my way toward the back of the house just as Alex was able to smash through what remained of a solid door and kick his leg through the fallen stash of eyeglasses. I yanked on his shoulders and Alex wriggled his way out.
“I was pinned in here by this crap?”
I tossed aside a soiled Care Bear and grabbed Alex’s hand. “And don’t think the entire police department isn’t going to hear about it. Let’s get out of here.”
“Lawson, you’re covered in blood.”
“Let’s go!”
The explosion of movement in the house caused every stacked item to stir and walls started sliding, giving up puffs of dust as magazines teetered and flopped from the tops of stacks, sailing to the floor. I heard Mort yelling as Alex and I took the obstacle course at record speed, finally stumbling through the cluttered foyer and over the front porch.
“Are you okay?” Alex said, slowing down.
“In the car!”
My heart was still thudding, adrenaline still racing through me. I had positioned myself in the front seat by the time Alex kicked the car in gear, was gripping the end of my seat belt when we flew in reverse, dust coughing up to the windows.
“What the hell happened to you?” I yelled the second our wheels hit paved road.
“Me, what the hell happened to you? That asshat shoved me in his ‘library.’” Alex made air quotes around the word. “And kicked down three piles of shit to pin me in there. What about you, Vidal Sassoon?”
“What are you talking about?”
Alex jerked the car off the road with a squeal and pulled down the visor in front of me.
I gaped.
“That fuck!”
“You didn’t notice that?”
I narrowed my eyes at Alex. “No, I was a little busy trying not to have him slice my head off.” I glared at myself in the mirror. “I had no idea he sliced my hair off.”
Though I’ve never been incredibly crazy about my mane of unruly red curls, I did have at least the minor pleasure of an even haircut.
Not so now, thanks to hoarder turned hairdresser, Mort Laney. His scissors of doom had lopped off a fist-sized chunk of hair just over my left eyebrow that left my scalp oddly naked all the way to my left ear. Baby sprigs of inch long hair shot up around my newly exposed scalp.
“He couldn’t have just attacked my car like everyone else?”
I heard Alex stifling a laugh and I smacked the visor shut, then slumped back in my car seat. “I suppose you think this is hilarious.”
“Hey, I was neck-deep in stuffed animals and wrapping paper. I’m not judging. But Lawson, I saw blood.” He leaned over and awkwardly patted my new buzz cut. “Are you sure he didn’t get you?”
I looked at my hands, then down at my blood-spattered jeans. “He stabbed me.” It was matter-of-fact, and I waited for the surge of pain.
Nothing.
I moved my leg.
And there it was.
Another stab of nausea-inducing pain. “Shit! He stabbed me in the leg!” I touched the wound gently and recoiled.
“You were running on adrenaline.” Alex leaned forward, his palm resting gently on my thigh as he fingered the tear in my jeans. “That’s going to need stitches. Are you okay?”
“It hurts,” I said miserably. “It hurts, I got a shitty haircut, and you got bombarded by an avalanche of crap, all for nothing.” My eyes started to burn and my throat tightened. The tears started, burning hot tracks down my cheeks. I sniffed. “I’m sorry.”
Alex pushed the car into drive again and pulled onto the road. “You really think I’d let a crazy-ass half-breed hoarder stab you for nothing?” He grinned at me with that cocky half smile, which seemed strangely comforting, and flopped a heavy sheaf of papers onto the console between us.