She MUST Go! (2nd book) WIP excerpt

“Yes, this is Joe Thames. I think I killed my ex-wife. I need an ambulance as fast as you can get one here.”

I flipped my long hair out of my eyes. With trembling hands, I lit a cigarette. After looking around at the crappy apartment, I saw her laid out cold in the kitchen. I walked in and turned the overhead light on painting Lee a garish white.

“Lee, Lee! Wake up. I didn’t mean to hurt you! I only wanted to protect myself. You make me so damn mad. My God, what have I done?

“Sir, stay on the phone. An ambulance will be there shortly. Is she breathing? Does she have a pulse? How did she hurt you? Do you need any medical care?”

“No.”

“Sir, is she alive?”

“I don’t know. Wait a minute. Let me check.” Afraid to check on Lee, I was about to panic. I lay my head on Lee’s stomach and listened for a heartbeat, sat up and watched to see if her rib cage moved.

I felt so sorry for her. Her glazed, blue eyes stared at the ceiling. I looked up curious to see what she was looking at before she went down. Just a bunch of spider webs that had dust bunnies in them.

“Yes, she is. I saw her breathing. Hurry up.” I shouldered the cell phone and started cracking my knuckles.

“Please, Lee, don’t die. I just wanted to stop you. You hurt me with all your lies in that book you wrote. Yeah, you called it a novel, but everyone knew it was about us.”

The sound of an ambulance siren blared and lights pulsated. I sat down and rested Lee’s head in my lap. I rubbed her face as a tear formed in my eyes. We couldn’t live together, but I still loved her.

I’d left the front door unlocked so the EMTs could get into my apartment. Soon I heard them opening the front door.

“Yes sir. She’s right back here in the kitchen.”

“Tell me exactly what you did.”

“Well, she came into the house ready to attack me and I punched her. I underestimated my strength. I never expected to knock her out.” My heart was racing by now, which made me breathless.

“How long has she been unconscious?”

“About fifteen minutes.”

I watched them work on Lee. She never came to. Man, was I in trouble! I heard more sirens and knew the cops were coming to arrest me. I went to print out those e-mails that showed her threatening me.

God, I hope they’ll believe me. I’m scared. I don’t want to go to jail. Not over hitting a woman like Lee. She made my life hell the past five years. How would I ever explain this to our college age daughter, Jolly? She would be devastated.

I was on my third cigarette when they loaded Lee on a stretcher. I felt the need to empty the full ashtray into the garbage. I looked around at my ordered apartment that was neat and clean. A pentagram ring was the only jewelry I wore. I’d bought it right after we had split up. I wasn’t a warlock, but I dang sure wasn’t a Christian. How could I have messed up all of our lives like I’ve done?

“You’re going downtown with us. Put out your hands. Don’t give us any trouble and we’ll make things easier for you.”

When I held my hands out, I noticed the dried blood on my knuckles. The cops did too.
“Sunny boy, you’re in deep shit. Why did you hit a woman?”