But dumbass wasn't done. He went on, saying, "I see I hit a nerve. So Samantha Moon is a mom."
"Did you just threaten my kids?"
"You catch on quick."
I opened my eyes and saw red. In fact, I couldn't really see at all. All I could see was a blurred image of the man behind the bulletproof glass. And I heard pounding. Loud pounding. In my skull.
The sun, I knew, had set thirty or forty minutes ago. I was at full strength. I sat forward in my chair and leaned close to the thick Plexiglass that separated us. I motioned with my index finger for Ira Lane to come closer, too. He grinned, cocky and confident, and as he leaned forward, something very dark and very twisted danced disturbingly just behind his dead eyes.
His face was inches from mine when he said, "Is there something you want to tell me, you stupid bitch? I bet you're wishing right about now you never fucked with - "
I punched the bulletproof glass as hard as I could. My hand burst through in a shower of glass and polycarbonate and whatever the hell else these things are made out of.
Bulletproof but not vampire-proof.
Ira screamed and would have fallen backward if I hadn't grabbed him by the collar through the fist-sized hole in the thick glass. In one motion, I yanked the motherfucker out of his chair and over the counter and slammed into the clear glass barrier. His nose broke instantly, spraying blood over the glass, and two or three of his front upper teeth had broken back into his mouth. His lips were split clean through.
He flailed at my hand, struggling to free himself, but I wasn't done with him.
Not by a long shot.
Still holding him by the collar, as his warm blood spilled over the back of my hand, I proceeded to slam his face again and again into the glass, breaking more teeth, breaking his face, his skull, his cheekbones, anything and everything, and I kept smashing him into the now blood-smeared glass until I was finally tackled from behind.
Chapter Twenty-seven
I nearly killed a man tonight.
Tell me about it.
And so I wrote it up for Fang, telling him everything from my first impressions of Ira Lang, to the bastard being hauled off on a stretcher. It took three huge blocks of text to get the whole story written, and when I had posted the final segment, Fang answered nearly instantly. How he could read so fast, I had no clue.
Were there any cameras in the visiting room? he asked.
No.
So there is no visual record of what you did?
Not that I'm aware of.
Don't most prisons have surveillance cameras in the visiting rooms?
Not all of them. It's up to the discretion of the warden.
So no one saw your little, ah, outburst?
No.
When you broke the bullet-resistant glass, did you leave behind any of your own blood?
That was a good question. I had cut my arm while reaching through the shattered glass. However, I hadn't bled at all, as far as I was aware. I explained that to Fang.
So you don't bleed?
Maybe, I wrote. But apparently not from cuts along my forearm.
Did the medical staff look at you?
They tried to, but I had wrapped my sweater around my arm, and since there wasn't any blood, they assumed, perhaps, I wasn't in need of any medical attention.
Was he in need of dire medical attention?
According to the warden, with whom I had had a long meeting after the incident, the prison doctors had determined that I had broken Ira's jaw, nose, right orbital ridge, his sinus cavity, and broken out seven teeth. He was going to need countless stitches in his mouth and hours of surgery. I related all this to Fang.
There was a long pause. I looked over at my hotel bed where Monica lay sleeping contentedly on her side. It had, of course, been a long and emotional night for her. She had visited her abusive and murderous ex-husband's prison. She had waited for me anxiously while the warden pieced together what had happened. She had been given snippets of news from the prison staff, and, she told me later, could hardly believe what she was hearing - that I had put the son-of-bitch in the hospital...even more than that, I had nearly killed him. Later that night, she sat staring at me during the entire ride home from the prison. At one point she reached out and held my hand tightly. She didn't ask me how I punched through the glass. Or how I had the strength to grab a grown man and bash his face repeatedly against the glass. She simply held my hand and stared at me, and I held hers for as long as I could before I became self-conscious of my cold flesh and gently released my grip. I saw that she was crying, but she didn't make a federal case of it. What those tears were for, I didn't know, but I suspected this had been a hell of an emotional night for her. I didn't tell her the bastard had threatened my kids. She had enough to deal with.
So what did the warden say? asked Fang.
He asked me why I didn't kill the bastard?
Was he joking?
I don't think so.
And what did you say?
I told him he should have given me another few seconds.
Jesus. What else did he ask?
He asked me how did I punch through bulletproof glass?
And what did you say?
That I was a vampire, and that if he asked me any more questions, I was going to suck his blooood. (Insert cheesy Bela Lugosi impression.)
Not funny, Moon Dance. You have put yourself at grave risk. There's going to be legal implications to this. He can press charges. There's going to be an investigation.
Maybe, I wrote.
What do you mean, maybe?
The warden heard Ira Lang threaten me.
Still, it's only a threat.
A threat from a known murderer. A threat from a man who has also been known to do anything he could to carry out such threats.
So his threat is much more than a threat.
Yes, I wrote.
So if Ira Lang did press charges, a DA may likely decide not to prosecute.
Right.
So what did you really say when he asked how you punched through the glass?
I reminded him of all those stories of mother's lifting cars off their injured children and such.
He bought that?
Probably not. He was in a state of shock himself. Everyone was.
So is that the end of the case? asked Fang.
No. Ira Lang made it perfectly clear that he wouldn't rest until his ex-wife was dead.
I could almost see Fang nodding, as he wrote: Not to mention he could still try to carry out that threat on you and your kids.
Exactly, I wrote.
So what's the plan? asked Fang.
If he won't rest until he's carried out violent crimes against his wife, or even me and my kids, then I think there's only one answer.
Don't tell me.
I went on anyway: Perhaps I should hasten his rest.
Chapter Twenty-eight
The backyard to my old house abuts a Pep Boys.
When I say old house, I mean my house of just over a month ago, where I had lived with my kids and husband. A house, by some weird turn of events, I had been kicked out of, even though my husband had been the one caught cheating.