The Hostage He Refused to Believe

My husband, Carter, had a first love named Jessica.

Once, Jessica got into a shouting match with a guy over a minor biking accident. To help her vent her frustration, Carter abused his power as a police captain and threw the man in a holding cell on bogus charges.

That petty act of favoritism left the man with a criminal record and a heart full of venom.

Sometime later, that same man kicked down the door to my in-laws' house. He held Carter's parents and his younger sister hostage with a hunting knife, demanding that Carter show up and apologize.

Panicking, I called Carter. But he was too busy picking up Jessica's son from kindergarten.

Not only did he refuse to believe me, but he also cursed me out, calling me a vicious, jealous bitch. He said my lies were pathetic and asked who I was putting this show on for.

In desperation, I dialed 911. The emergency dispatcher who answered the call was none other than Jessica.

Over the line, she laughed at me. She called me a lunatic, accused me of cursing Carter's family, and labeled me a psycho. She warned me to never call again, threatening to have Carter arrest me for making a false report.

Eventually, the intruder lost his mind waiting for Carter. Right in front of my eyes, he brought his hunting knife down on my in-laws and my sister-in-law.

I went to visit my husband's parents for our usual weekly dinner. The moment I pushed the front door open, I froze. A stocky man in his fifties was standing in the living room, clutching a serrated hunting knife. His wild eyes locked onto me.

"Do not take another step! You walk in here, and I kill them all!"

On the living room floor, my father-in-law Arthur, my mother-in-law Helen, and my sister-in-law Sarah were bound tightly with thick rope. The man had his heavy work boot pressed firmly against Arthur's head.

Seeing me, Arthur struggled to lift himself up. The man immediately delivered a brutal kick to Arthur's stomach. "Don't move! You twitch again, and you are the first to die!"

He pointed the bloody tip of the knife at my chest. "Stay back! Who are you? Where is that bastard Carter?"

"He locked me up. Because of him, my son got rejected from the military, and my daughter lost her college scholarship. He ruined my entire family. If he does not come here and fix this today, I am going to slaughter his."

It hit me. This was Gary.

Jessica had gotten into a minor scrape with him while riding her bike. To play the hero for his ex-girlfriend, Carter used his badge to charge Gary with assault and locked him up. Carter had even bragged about it to me at home.

Now Gary was out, and he had come for blood.

His screaming echoed down the hall. Neighbors began creeping out of their apartments, crowding the stairwell in absolute shock.

Seeing Gary's hand shaking with rage, I held my hands up slowly. "Gary, please. I am Carter's wife. Do not do anything stupid. I am calling him right now. I will make him come here."

My hands trembled violently as I pulled out my phone and dialed Carter's number. When he finally answered, I frantically explained the nightmare unfolding in his parents' living room, begging him to get there immediately.

Instead of panic, Carter's voice dripped with absolute disgust. "Rachel, are you mentally ill? I am helping Jessica pick up her kid for one afternoon, and you invent a horror story like this?"

"Jessica has a shift at the dispatch center today, so I promised to take Tyler to the amusement park. Stop annoying me."

Click. He hung up.

Because my phone was on speaker, Gary and every neighbor in the hallway heard every single word.

Whispers broke out behind me.

"What kind of son is that? He is a cop, and he won't even save his own family?"

"Did you hear him? He is busy playing daddy to another woman's kid."

"He is worse than an animal. Arthur raised a monster."

Gary's face twisted into something demonic. Seeing him grip the knife tighter, I dropped to my knees on the hardwood floor.

"Please! I am begging you, please do not hurt them!" I slammed my forehead against the floor, ignoring the sharp pain. "I will get him here! Give me a few more minutes, please!"

Carter wasn't answering anymore. I had no choice but to call the station.

I dialed 911. The line clicked open.

"911, what is your emergency?"

The voice belonged to Jessica.

Carter had pulled strings to get her a temp job at the emergency dispatch center.

I didn't care who it was. I screamed our address and told her a man was holding Carter's family hostage with a knife. "Get Carter here now! If he doesn't come, his parents and sister are going to die!"

A cold, mocking laugh echoed through the receiver. "Rachel, have you completely lost your mind? Just to stop Carter from spending time with my son, you are cursing his own parents to die? You really are a wonderful wife."

"The emergency line is not your personal drama hotline. If you fake another report, I will have you thrown in a cell."

The line went dead.

The neighbors behind me saw what happened and immediately pulled out their own phones to call 911. Every single one of them was met with Jessica's threats and hung up on.

Realizing Carter was never coming, Gary completely snapped.

"Fine! He ruined my family, so nobody gets to live!"

Gary grabbed a fistful of Arthur's gray hair, yanked his head back, and dragged the hunting knife across his throat.

Blood coated the living room.

Gary ran.

After slashing Arthur's throat, he drove the blade deep into Helen's chest. Both of them died on the floor. I only managed to throw myself in front of Sarah.

In his psychotic rage, Gary wanted to make Sarah suffer. He slashed her face open, then drove the knife straight through her hand, pinning it to the floorboards.

He ran out the door waving the bloody knife. The terrified neighbors scattered, completely powerless to stop him as he disappeared into the busy city streets.

By the time I got Sarah's bleeding body into the emergency room, the local police finally showed up at the hospital.

Deputy Blake walked up to me. He looked at the harsh red light of the operating room, his face pale with horror. "Rachel, what the hell happened? Why didn't you call us?"

I sat slumped in the corner of the hallway, shivering uncontrollably. "I did. The dispatcher said I was making a fake report."

"I called your captain. He was too busy picking up a kid."

Blake looked confused. "A kid? What kid? You and the Captain don't have kids."

I looked up, meeting his eyes. "Not mine. Jessica's kid."

"She was the one on the 911 line. She told me I was crazy and threatened to arrest me."

Blake slammed his fist into the hospital wall. "This is completely insane! I am calling him right now."

He pulled out his radio phone and dialed Carter's personal number.

When Carter picked up, Blake didn't hold back. "Carter, where the hell are you!"

Carter's tone immediately turned hostile. "Blake, remember your rank. I am the Captain. You don't get to interrogate me."

"I am at the airport terminal. Make it quick, I am busy."

"The airport? What the hell are you doing at the airport?"

"I have been working too hard, and the station is quiet. Jessica and Tyler have been begging to go to the Bahamas. I took my annual leave to take them on a vacation to relax."

Blake let out a hollow, furious laugh. "Carter, your mother and father are dead. Your sister is currently bleeding out in an operating room. And you are taking a vacation? Is your brain rotting?"

Carter scoffed over the line. "Blake, I thought we were friends. I can't believe you are teaming up with my psycho wife to play this sick joke."

"Do not think I don't know you guys orchestrated this. What did Rachel promise you to make you curse my family like this?"

"I am spending the next few days with Jessica and her boy. Do not call this number again."

The call disconnected. Blake tried calling back immediately, but it went straight to voicemail. The phone was off.

At that exact moment, the red light above the operating room flicked off.

The surgeon pushed through the swinging doors, peeling off his bloody gloves. "Family of Sarah Winston?"

I scrambled to my feet. "I am. I am her sister-in-law."

The doctor looked utterly defeated. "We saved her life. But the laceration on her right cheek was extremely deep. It is going to leave a severe scar. As for her right hand... the tissue and nerve damage was catastrophic. We had no choice but to amputate at the wrist."

"She lost a massive amount of blood. She is in a coma and being moved to the ICU."

In a fraction of a second, every ounce of strength evaporated from my bones. The fluorescent lights blurred, the room spun, and I collapsed backward.

A couple of nurses caught me under the arms and guided me to a plastic waiting chair.

Sitting there, the tears finally broke loose.

Carter and I had been married for five years. I had moved across the country for him, leaving my own family behind. Whenever Carter and I fought, Arthur and Helen always took my side. Sarah treated me like her own flesh and blood. Whenever Carter made me cry, Sarah would literally point her finger in his face and scream at him.

They never let me feel alone in that house. I loved them far more than I ever loved Carter.

And now, because of Carter's pathetic ego and his obsession with another woman, he had personally handed his parents a death sentence and mutilated his own sister.

I dragged my exhausted body to the billing counter and paid for Sarah's ICU room.

Standing behind the thick glass pane, looking at the vibrant, college-graduated girl reduced to a broken body covered in bandages and tubes, my chest caved in. She didn't even have her right hand anymore.

Blake called Carter's phone until his battery died. It stayed off. He tried calling Jessica's number. It rang twice and then went to voicemail.

They were fully committed to their romantic getaway.

I didn't have the energy to care about his affairs anymore. Aside from giving statements to the detectives, I had to arrange a funeral for my in-laws and keep a 24-hour watch over Sarah.

The gruesome double homicide had already made the local news. The rumor mill was working overtime.

I stayed awake for two days straight until Sarah finally opened her eyes.

When she saw me through the ICU glass, tears poured down her bandaged face. The doctors warned me to keep her stress levels low, so I lied and told her to focus on healing, hiding the truth about her parents.

Three days later, the medical examiner released the bodies. I arranged the cremation.

Walking out of the crematorium, I placed two wooden urns on the back seat of my car.

I started the engine, looking at the polished wood in the rearview mirror. "Dad, Mom, we are going home."

Sarah was young, and her physical recovery was fast. By the fifth day, she was moved to a regular room.

When I finally broke the news about her parents, she didn't scream. She just stared at the wall and gave a slow, numb nod.

I was terrified the shock had broken her mind. "Sarah, please cry. Do not hold it in. I am right here. I am not going anywhere."

She slowly turned her head. She stared into my eyes with a chilling emptiness. A long minute passed before a gut-wrenching wail tore from her throat.

I wrapped my arms around her trembling shoulders, holding her tight. "Let it out. I've got you."

Because she was sobbing so violently, the stitches on her face tore open. I had to run to the hallway and scream for a doctor.

As the doctor methodically re-stitched her torn cheek, Sarah laid there perfectly still. Her calmness was terrifying.

"Rachel, where is my brother?" she asked bluntly the moment the doctor left.

"Sarah, he..." I stammered, completely lost on how to explain the disgusting truth.

"Forget it. You don't have to say it." Sarah let out a ragged sigh. "When that guy kicked our door down and tied us up, screaming about my brother, I knew Carter had ruined someone's life."

She covered her eyes with her remaining hand, her body shaking. "I just never thought he would let Mom and Dad die for it."

I had temporarily placed the urns in my home office. I was waiting for Sarah to be discharged so we could bury them together. She was their daughter; it was her right to be there.

As for Carter, I truly did not care if he lived or died.

Even if you ignored the two dead bodies and the severed hand, his blatant affair was enough to make my skin crawl. I could never sleep in the same bed as him again.

Now, every time I heard his name, all I saw was the gaping wound on Sarah's face, the ocean of blood on the floor, and the absolute despair in Arthur's eyes before the knife fell.

I sat in silence, holding her shoulder.

"Rachel," Sarah whispered into the sterile hospital room. "After all this, do you still consider me your family?"

I nodded hard. "Yes. I will be your sister for the rest of my life. Once you are healed, I will take you to the best plastic surgeons in the country. We will fix your face."

"Rachel, I heard you on the phone that day. I heard everything he said."

Her voice turned to absolute ice. "I want him and that bitch to burn in hell."