By the Book

By Eva Fischer-Dixon

Martha Masterson was a librarian in the small city of Giffords, Arizona, when she was brutally attacked and left for dead by five teenagers. Her life is mysteriously intertwined with the life of a dying billionaire, William J. Talbot. Talbot leaves the majority of his wealth to his aid, Jack Trades, a man with a much troubled past. While visiting Martha in the hospital, Jack finds himself falling in love with the seriously hurt woman. After Talbots death, Martha slowly recovers and learns the fascinating history of her benefactor, William Talbot. Through Jack, she learns the story of Talbots mother, Helena Talbotowicz, who survived the German occupation of her country, Poland, but could not escape the brutality of the liberating soldiers of the Red Army. Martha also learns about the everlasting love between the young Polish girl and her doctor, Colonel Matthew Collins, a love that remained alive for decades, through difficult decisions, unhappy marriages, and six children. Martha develops deep feelings for Jack, but she wonders that after the brutality that she had survived if she could she be a real partner to him. Before his death, Talbot instructed Jack to take revenge on those who harmed Martha. Will she be strong enough to prevent Jack for taking deadly revenge on those who committed their crimes on her person by the book?

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: Nov 7, 2014
• ISBN: 9781499077438

Eva Fischer-Dixon

I came into this troubled world during the early morning hours of June 17, 1950, in the city of Budapest, Hungary. I was the first and last child of my 41-year-old mother and my father who was 45 years old at the time of my birth. As I did not know any better, I could not possibly understand that we were living in poverty, as I was growing up with loving parents and there was always a bite to eat. My childhood was poor and saddened with tragedies. As a six-year-old child I witnessed the bloody 1956 revolution and received the first taste of true prejudice by those of whom I thought liked us, yet turned against my family. That tragedy did not match the untimely death of my beloved father when I was not yet seven years old, on February 14, 1957. My mother remarried in 1959 and our financial situation was upgraded from poverty to poor. After finishing elementary school I made a decision to earn money as soon as possible to ease our financial situation and I enrolled in a two-year business college (high school diploma was not required). I received my Associate Degree in 1966 and I began to work as a 16-year-old certified secretary/bookkeeper. During the same period I began my high-school education, which I completed while working full-time and attending night school. I discovered my love for writing when I was 11 years old after a movie that my childhood friend and I saw in the movie theater. We were not pleased with the ending and Steven suggested that I should write a different ending that we both liked. Voila, a writer was born. With my family’s encouragement, I entered a writing contest given by a youth oriented magazine and to my genuine surprise, I won second price. My desire to live in a free country and to improve my life was so great, that in 1972, leaving everything, including my aging parents behind, I managed to escape from Hungary during a tour to Austria, (then) Yugoslavia and Italy. I spent almost nine long months in a rat infested refugee camp, located Capua, Italy, while I waited for official permission to immigrate to the country of my dreams, to the USA. In 1975 I met and married a wonderful man, my husband Guy. Thanks to his everlasting patience, he assisted me in my task of learning the English language. He is truly my partner for life and I remain forever grateful to him for standing by me in some tough times. It is difficult for me to describe my love for writing. I cannot think of a bigger emotional joy for an author than to see a published novel in somebody’s hand and to see a story come alive on the screen. I yearn to experience that joy.

Book preview

Copyright © 2014 by Eva Fischer-Dixon.

ISBN:      Softcover      978-1-4990-7744-5

                eBook           978-1-4990-7743-8

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the copyright owner.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to any actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Thinkstock are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

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Rev. date: 11/03/2014

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Contents

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

Chapter Nineteen

Chapter Twenty

Chapter Twenty-One

Chapter Twenty-Two

Chapter Twenty-Three

Chapter Twenty-Four

Chapter Twenty-Five

Chapter Twenty-Six

Chapter Twenty-Seven

Chapter Twenty-Eight

Chapter Twenty-Nine

Chapter Thirty

Chapter Thirty-One

Chapter Thirty-Two

Chapter Thirty-Three

Chapter Thirty-Four

Chapter Thirty-Five

Chapter Thirty-Six

Chapter Thirty-Seven

Chapter Thirty-Eight

Chapter Thirty-Nine

Chapter Forty

Chapter Forty-One

Chapter Forty-Two

Chapter Forty-Three

Chapter Forty-Four

Chapter Forty-Five

Chapter Forty-Six

Chapter Forty-Seven

Chapter Forty-Eight

Chapter Forty-Nine

Chapter Fifty

Chapter Fifty-One

Chapter Fifty-Two

Chapter Fifty-Three

Chapter Fifty-Four

Chapter Fifty-Five

Chapter Fifty-Six

Chapter Fifty-Seven

Chapter Fifty-Eight

Chapter Fifty-Nine

Chapter Sixty

Chapter Sixty-One

Epilog

Dedication

I wish to dedicate this book to my dear, late friend Martha B. While you prevented your future suffering, you left many of us, especially me, heartbroken. As of today, there has not a single day that passes when I did not think about your intelligence, endless knowledge and our at times fascinating discussions. I do however; I miss your friendship the most.

CHAPTER One

Martha Masterson stared down at the book in front of her and smiled. Both were rarities, her smile and the book, for different reasons. As the Librarian, the only librarian in the town of Giffords, Arizona, she knew every single book on the shelves under her charge. The majority of the town population’s names were familiar to her and she even knew the nicknames of the kids who attended both elementary and high school, not that there were too many local children. Some of the town folk, who preferred to live in the small town with the population of two thousand six hundred and sixty-nine, were willing to commute to their work place in the city of Tucson, some 50 miles away.

Strange as it may seem most of the kids attended their local school rather than being bused to the nearest city, or even into town to get their education. Their parents decided for them small town teachers paid more individual attention to their children’s learning than compared to the big city, mostly due to overcrowding. Some years earlier, during a heated townhouse meeting, the wealthy population voted and approved the building of a new school, a large one for that matter to accommodate both the elementary school aged children and the high school levels as well.

At the beginning, there were some concerns as how the teachers’ salaries would be paid. The state and the school boards had funny ways to determine that, when enrollment came around, to the amazement of the Giffords town’s folks, some nearby towns requested to have their children bused to attend the school located in Giffords. The problem of hiring more teachers was no longer an issue and the school became one of the best in the State of Arizona. Originally it was an oversight not to designate a place for the library inside the brand new school, but once again, the town’s Mayor, John Hamlin, came to the rescue. Yes, the school lacked the library, how about converting the old city hall next door into a larger facility than the old library. The old library was located blocks away from the school.

Mayor Hamlin’s plan worked and the library was moved from the old building into the two story high old city hall, which was an odd branding as it was built some thirty-five years earlier and was kept up very nicely. The solution pleased everyone, parents, teachers and the students, as all they had to do was go next door to borrow books, check on the Internet, use the Wi-Fi, or if they just simply wanted to hang out.

Martha was the sole Librarian to which the Mayor repeatedly apologized but did not do anything about adding personnel. He explained to her repeatedly that their options were limited; they either could add another needed teacher or a new librarian. Once again, Mayor Hamlin lived up to his reputation as a person who always found solutions to problems. He authorized some money for a library assistant who was a student and who would work in the library part time, after school. Martha was not entirely happy about that idea, but even she admitted that it was hard to control both floors by herself. While Martha agreed to a part time librarian position, she was displeased by the fact that she did not have a say in who was hired. All that happened a few months earlier, and a girl, Sharon Terrance, the daughter of a single mother who it was rumored, but never proven, to be a business woman working in the world’s oldest profession, was hired.

Sharon was anything but a good worker. Martha found books that were placed back in the wrong sections and Sharon consistently laid books on top of the others versus placing them in proper order as was indicated by catalog numbers. It irritated Martha more than anything else, even more than when she found Sharon on numerous occasions in situations where the young woman was engaged in kissing and heavy petting in the back area of the library with her undeniably handsome boyfriend named Scott Freeman, the son of an IBM executive who was hardly ever home.

Martha looked around but there were only a couple of high school students sitting by the clover shaped tables, reading without talking or looking up. The school was out as it was summer vacation time, and the place was much quieter than during the school season. Sharon was, well, Martha wasn’t sure where she was and she did not want to look for the girl, rather, she refocused her attention to what was in front of her. The book was one of the older versions of Mary Shelley’s book, Frankenstein, one of Martha’s favorite books. She opened up the book and moved her finger along the line of the author’s name and it was then that she smiled. Nobody, but nobody knew her secret, and when she saw the name Mary Shelley, she thought that perhaps she could write just like the 19th century writer. Shelley was a mild mannered young woman who wrote about unspeakable deeds, the creation of a monster. If people knew what she had done herself, what would they think?

Martha Masterson was a published author, yet nobody in her town knew it. To avoid any questions and curiosity, she used the pen name of Misty Monroe. She knew that under normal circumstances anyone in her situation would proudly announce the publication of a new book, but she just simply could not do that because of the book’s subject matter. There was no picture in the back jacket from the book’s author and the writer’s biography was a made up story as well. If people would have known what she wrote, they possibly would fire her for writing about rape, murder and just in general writing about mayhem.

The book, which she wrote was titled Jackie’s Ghost, and it was a story of a young woman who was brutally raped, tortured, and then murdered during a home invasion by two men, and about the revenge later on that her ghost taken. She even surprised herself at how she could even come to think about some of the gruesome scenarios that she described in great details in her book. Her life, her entire life was tranquil, and even seemed boring to many people in town.

Martha never married, not due to the lack of any suitors, more likely because she was a socially awkward teenager who had one friend in her entire life. Unfortunately for Martha, her friend promptly moved away in their junior year of high school, leaving her behind without anyone to talk to, anyone to share her limited but in some ways fascinating interests. She learned with great sadness that almost a year later, her friend was raped, tortured and murdered in Tucson, Arizona. Jenny’s parents settled in a wealthy neighborhood where evidently not even the tight security helped to prevent such a heinous crime.

After the funeral of Jenny Mitchell, her only friend, Martha tried to find out some more about what had happened to Jenny but she encountered a wall of silence by her late friend’s parents. It took another year before a friend of her parents, who happened to be one of the two detectives who investigated Jenny’s murder, came to visit her parents at Giffords. Although she was told to go to her room, she overheard the man talking about the rape and what horrible torture poor Jenny, before she was strangled, had to endure by the two home invaders, who were later caught and sentenced to die. Martha had to cover her mouth to prevent herself from screaming out loud, something that her friend was unable to do so because she was bound and gagged by her assailants.

Weeks and months passed and she could not forget what she heard about the horrific death of her friend and she felt the desperate need to talk to someone, but there was not a single soul to whom she was able to trust enough. When one the students returned the book, The Diary of Anne Frank, an idea was born with Martha; she decided to write down her thoughts and feelings about Jenny.

As another year passed, her mother’s cancer condition worsened and eventually her frail body gave in and she passed away. At her funeral, Martha stared at her father as he lovingly and somewhat lost stood by the coffin. After her mother’s death, her life was never the same again, neither was her father’s, who fell into a deep depression.

Exactly six months after her mother passed away, when Martha went to wake her father before she left for work, she found him dead. The coroner informed her a week later that her father suffered a massive coronary that ended his unhappy life once and for all.

Martha was alone, without any family or friends. Some of the school faculty members who were frequent visitors at the library and whom were aware of the passing of her parents, offered their sympathy and any help she may need. She politely thanked everyone but turned down any gracious offer. She preferred to be alone and she already had her set ways of life. Not that Martha was old by any standards, she barely turned thirty-eight, despite the fact that she always thought of herself as an old maid, and she was sure others did too. However, she was not the kind of person who cared about what others said, and lucky for her, nobody could say a bad word about her either.

CHAPTER Two

Martha lived about a mile a half from the library and the school. She finished with her everyday routine that included walking through the entire building before closing up, checking doors and windows to make sure that they were secured so nobody could get in. As she walked along the long isles, she turned off the lights along the way. Satisfied that the building was safe and sound, she locked up the building and headed for home.

Outside the school she noticed some high school kids that called her M and M behind her back, but she did not take offense in it as her initials were M and M indeed. It was an everyday sight; they were sitting on the steps that led up to the main entrance door of the school. Normally, Scott would mimic her with Good evening, Ms. Masterson, as she walked by them. Sharon, her part time assistant usually sat on Scott’s lap with her left arm around the boy’s neck. There was another couple, she recognized them as Matt Simpson, one of the popular football players in the school and Jennifer Boyer, a girl whose reputation in the community was that Heidi Fleiss, the Hollywood madam may have a future competition on her hand. Any other day, when she saw Martha, she made a point to stick her tongue out and press it into her boyfriend’s mouth. The third boy, an odd one for that matter, liked to dress in Goth outfits, his real name was Russ whose parents were notorious of the lavish and at times loud parties in Giffords.

As Martha walked by the group on that particular night, they were acting differently. Despite the fact that it was getting somewhat dark outside, they were reading a book. Not just any book, it was her book, the one she wrote about her beloved and murdered friend, Jenny, "Jackie’s Ghost".

That night, when she first saw them reading the book that she published under the pen name of Misty Monroe, her heart skipped a beat. They were really into reading the book and they did not bother to look up as she walked by, they did not bother to mock her in any way at all. She did not know what to make of it but she was certain of one thing, she was not entirely happy that such young people were reading a book that described in great detail how poor Jenny was raped, tortured and finally murdered. She brushed her concerns away as she approached the walkway that led up to her home’s front door.

Martha did not own a vehicle at least that was bought by her. Her parents old fashioned Cadillac had some repairs done while they were still alive. When they died, strangely enough the car’s transmission also gave in and Martha did not see the need to have it fixed. The grocery store was on her way home from the library and because she seldom ever cooked, she admitted to anyone who cared to ask that she never did learn how to cook; she mostly ate frozen already prepared food that only needed some microwaving or baking in the oven.

When she was a little girl, her parents bought her a bicycle as a birthday present which she managed to destroy when its brakes failed to work properly and she ended up in a ditch outside the town, injuring herself in the process. That was the first and last time that she ever owned a mode of transportation. When her parents were still alive and the Cadillac was in working order, she would drive her father or mother to Tucson for a doctor’s appointment or some sort of treatment which her mother refused later on. Her mother did not want to go through anymore of the chemo and radiation therapy that made her severely sick after the first and second treatments. Martha raised concerns to her mother that she would die sooner if she didn’t receive the treatment but her mother stubbornly told Martha and her father, that she would rather die in the comfort of her own home than in a hospital room among strangers. So she did, a year later after refusing the treatment.

Martha often thought about her late parents, especially during dinner time when she set the table for three, than two, and later on, just for herself. She took a deep breath and put a Marie Callender’s roast beef dinner into the microwave and went to take a shower. By the time she was finished, the food was ready and the microwave beeped in thirty seconds intervals to remind her about her food.

She ate slowly while she watched CNN news and then she grabbed a book and made herself comfortable on the sofa. Around ten o’clock she turned off all the lights and went to bed. As always before she went asleep, she thought about her good fortune to live in a peaceful place such as Giffords. She loved her community with its manicured streets with its manicured lawns. She thought about it each and every day how could people in the community afford such expensive homes? Martha was not jealous by any means, she just wondered about it. She could have understood it much easier if she would see an expensive home here and there, but that was not the case in the town of Giffords. With the exception of some of the people, such as herself and the teachers at the school who commuted in, all the other people in the community were extremely wealthy.

Martha came from a blue collar family; her late mother always had been a housewife who dedicated her life to raise her child, Martha. She tried to grow vegetables in her backyard garden which the town folk thought was an odd but tolerable activity. Her father was a railroad engineer who suffered a major and deliberating injury that put him in a wheelchair for a long time at the young age of thirty-five, an injury that left him with constant back pain that prevented him from doing anything at all. Each move, even the simplest task caused immeasurable pain, therefore he was never able to hold another job. The Department of Labor Workers Compensation Program Administrator put up a long and hard fight, but after they hired a lawyer, who proved without a shadow of doubt that Martha’s father did indeed live in permanent pain, he was finally compensated and his monthly income was also secured.

When her parents passed away, they left Martha the house which was located at the outskirts of the city. The house almost stood alone, unlike the huge homes in Giffords that were built within a sneezing distance in much later years, long after her parents built theirs. That is how Martha called them because if someone sneezed in one house, they could hear it next door. She did not judge anyone and she was pleased to live in a community where the citizens proudly said that Giffords was a zero crime community.

CHAPTER Three

Martha woke without the sound of the alarm clock at the usual time. She tidied the bed and after a quick shower she got dressed. While her coffeemaker brewed her Mocha Java coffee, she buttered her two pieces of toast that she ate with strawberry jelly. She glanced out toward her backyard and made a mental note that she needed to do something about the stubborn weeds that kept popping up from under the gravel that covered the small, still good size yard. There was no fence around the house, any house in Giffords for that matter, as it was against the city ordnance and which always kept her somewhat uncomfortable. Having no burglaries reported in Giffords, she always reminded herself that the town was one of the safest in the State of Arizona and she did not have anything to worry about.

By seven thirty she was ready to leave her house to be at work on time. Martha walked around the house and made sure that all windows and doors were secured, and then picked up her purse and a bag in which she carried her neatly packed lunch in a small cooler. It was a necessity as she could not afford the time to take lunch in one of the two restaurants located in Giffords without closing the library, an impossible task indeed. She could have asked Sharon, Lord forbid, she thought. She firmly believed that her young temporary assistant who was hired by the city’s Mayor, Mr. Hamlin, and whom she could not argue about her dislike of Sharon, who may burn down the building that was Martha’s home away from home. She was not entirely unhappy that she couldn’t go out, it would have been a boring experience and people would talk about her venturing out. She didn’t want that and she didn’t need it, so to avoid any complications, she packed her own lunch and ate it when things quieted down at the library.

The newspapers and some magazines, as usual, were delivered for her at the entrance. Opening the front door she made sure that all of the small pamphlets on the shelves that stood nearby the door were in order. They were advertising cultural events in Tucson and the newest book additions to the Giffords’ Public Library. She walked the floors of the building and turned on all the lights to assure that the patrons have plenty light to see the book titles that they may be looking for. Each floor had a reading area with comfortable couches and armchairs that surrounded large square tables. She immediately headed toward the magazine shelves which were supposed to be taken care of by Sharon, of course, the magazines and newspapers were left all over the tables, the couch and on the shelves. She arranged them again and folded the older newspapers and made sure that the pages were in proper order, then placed the most recent newspaper alongside the old ones.

Martha walked back and forth among the book isles to assure that all of the books were placed in their proper places and not laid on the top of each other, like Sharon usually did it if for no other reason, just because she was simply lazy. Martha could hardly wait for the school to start so she could say goodbye to the girl who did not show any motivation or initiative other than entertaining boys and her girlfriend. Especially those friends with whom she usually hung out with on the steps of their school after her work ended. This whole procedure took her about forty-five minutes, that was the reason that she always arrived at the library earlier than the nine o’clock opening. Not that anybody was there that early in the summer months though. Most of the kids and their families left the area to go somewhere cooler than the town that was built in a sun baked desert. It was the time frame when she did her inventory of the books on the shelves that followed isle after isle. Martha actually loved this part of her job and it pained her to tell Sharon that she could start the inventory on the second floor while she worked the first floor and tended the registration and exchange desk as well.

Sharon made a comment on the third day of the inventory that it was a waste of time and instead of scolding the young woman, she told her if the she did not want to follow her instruction, she may leave without pay for the day. Sharon mumbled under her nose "Such a bitch" which Martha acted like she did not hear, nevertheless, Sharon went upstairs and slowly made her way down on the isles.

By noon Martha finished with three isles, it was an easy task for her as she knew where all the books were and where they belonged. Inventory was more than just keeping track of the books; it gave her an opportunity to make certain that the books were placed by the correct catalog order. She was interrupted several times as kids and adults returned books that they had finished or half read, and they said so.

Martha always asked the patrons if they liked particular books and the answers were usually mixed. She loved all the books. They were her children and she took care of them as well as a good parent was supposed to. Basically, Martha considered the library not only her second home, but the books themselves as her companion; they actually talked to her and told her stories in their own special way.

It was too bad, she thought, that Misty Monroe’s book would never make it to the library because of its mature subject matter. The loyalty check that she received quarterly from her publisher showed that people were buying her book. At first her checks were only for a few dollars, but later for hundreds and lately, there were five digit numbers on them. She put the money in her savings account that she saved for possible rainy days.

Around noon she paid a visit upstairs and Sharon was nowhere to be found. Eventually she found her in the second floor’s magazine section sitting on her boyfriend, Scott’s lap, next to them on the love seat sat their friends, Matt, Jennifer and the kid who always dressed in black, Russ. She was surprised to see them as she did not noticed them entering the library, but it wasn’t the first time that it happened, so she did not gave another thought to their presence. As Martha came around the corner of the isle to discover the five high schoolers, they were still reading her book, now they had three copies of the books; Russ was reading his very own. It was an unusual scene as she was used to them being rowdy, but it seemed that her book was captivating them and they read in silence. Before they could notice her, she pulled back behind the shelf and made her way back downstairs.

After a brief lunch she continued the inventory in intervals, and despite the fact that she was interrupted by customers, at the end of her day, by five o’clock closing time, she almost finished an entire section, with the exception of the reference library, which was located behind the glass covered section of the first floor. It had to wait for the following day, she thought as she made her way upstairs to turn off the lights and check on the windows and doors. Martha had to admit to herself that she actually felt rather tired going up and down the ladder all day long.

Satisfied that everything was in order, she locked up the library and headed home. Passing the school, she found the same five teenagers sitting on the steps that led up to the high school’s front entrance, as they did practically every night. They were no longer reading, they actually watched her as she passed by them. Scott Freeman, as usual, called out to her. Good night, Ms. Masterson. Since she did not hear any sarcasm in his voice, she turned to him and replied.

Good night, Scott, Martha said and continued her mile and half walk home which she considered her only exercise for the day, in addition to the morning walk to work.

CHAPTER Four

Martha rushed with cleaning up her kitchen even though she did not really cook a real meal, only microwaved her frozen entrée. She took the food on a tray alongside with a tall glass of water into the living room and carefully set the tray down on the coffee table. Once she felt comfortable in her favorite arm chair, she reached for the television controller and clicked on the TV, turning the channel to PBS to watch her favorite show, a Masterpiece Classic presentation titled Downton Abbey.

She loved that show that took place at the beginning of the twentieth century, 1912 to be exact. Martha loved those genre shows and she just wished that the episodes were longer than they were. After the show she took the tray back into the kitchen, washed the utensils and the glass, and then she turned off the lights.

During the shower she thought about the show that she had just watched and about the perfect writing of each character by Julian Fellowes. She walked around the house, just as she did in the library to assure that all windows and doors were closed and locked, and just then she retired into the large bed that for a long time was shared by her now deceased parents.

Martha was more tired than usual due to the inventory in the library, and perhaps it was the reason why she had difficulty falling asleep. Around one o’clock in the morning she got up and made her way into the kitchen to get a glass of water when she thought that she heard some noises coming from the back. Her kitchen was the backside of the house, facing the yard, so she switched the outside nightlight on to investigate the cause of the noise. Living in Arizona it was not unusual that some lonely coyote made his or her way to people’s backyards or front yards, looking for cats or dogs that were doing their business outside to become an easy meal for them.

The light did not come on and she made a mental note to change the light bulb first thing in the morning before she left for work, and before she forgot about it. She finished her glass of water and returned to bed.

Wakey, wakey, Martha heard a voice that was familiar to her. She opened her eyes and while it was still dark in her bedroom, she could feel the sharp edge of a knife pressed against her jugular vein.

Sharon? She asked in a form of a question that sounded a request for a confirmation. What are you doing here?

The light came on in the room and Martha’s heart began to race in an irregular manner. There were five teenagers in the room, all five of them well known to her. What are you doing here? She repeated her question. Russ, the Goth kid pulled out her book, Jackie’s Ghost and flipped the pages.

Let’s see what Jackie’s visitors replied, he said and chuckled. Oh, here it is, he said and read it out loud. We came to pay you a visit bitch. I like that, he said and lowered the book.

Please leave, Martha said calmly despite the fact that she felt a large lump in her throat. Nobody has to know that you were here. She suggested.

Scott stepped to her bed. You are right M and M, nobody will know, he said to her in a voice that made Martha’s spirit of hope shatter within seconds.

This is not happening to me, this is not happening to me, she repeated the words in her head.

Scott grabbed her left arm and hand and with a heavy duty duct tape he tied her hand to the left side of the headboard and her right hand to the right side of it. Martha tried to fight but her neck was punctured by the knife that Sharon was still pressing against her. In the meanwhile, Matt, Sharon’s friend was doing the same thing to her ankles, assisted by his girlfriend, Jennifer, who had a reputation in the community of being wild. Russ, the Goth dressed boy was standing there and watching them as they spread eagled her, as if he was a production director.

As Martha looked at him hoping slightly that he may take mercy and ask the others to stop what they were doing, or planning to do, she noticed that Russ was holding a large crucifix in his hand. She never thought of those young people who dressed in Goth like clothing and wore that dreadful make up that they were bad. She always considered the whole thing as an act, perhaps a cry for attention, but it didn’t seem that way in those minutes.

Scott pulled off the comforter from Martha and climbed on the bed, sitting down on the top of Martha. Please Scott, I always liked you, and I always thought of you as a good person, please leave, she pleaded.

You are going to like me even more Ms. M and M, he said and laughed, and so did the others with the exception of Russ who lifted the book up again.

This is the time when we all take off our clothes, he said and his words were followed by their actions. Martha recalled that in her book that Russ was holding in his hands and which she wrote, that the home invaders who found Jackie, in real life Jenny, in her bed, took off their clothes so it would not be stained with blood in case there was bloodshed. Once all five of them were completely nude, Jennifer took their clothing out of the room, possibly into the living room, Martha guessed.

Scott positioned himself between Martha’s legs. Oh, my God, please, Scott, don’t do it, I am begging you, Martha pleaded again and began to cry. Scott, who was a quarterback at the high school’s football team and who was a very strong eighteen year old, hit Martha’s jaw so hard that it immediately dislocated and the second blow was so hard that knocked out her front teeth. The pain was excruciating and she tasted blood and it dripped down on her chin.

Martha looked up at Scott’s face, and what once she thought was a handsome face changed into cold and merciless. His blue eyes were like ice and he lifted his fist again to strike her, but he changed his mind, instead he inserted himself inside her and with great thrust he penetrated her with such violence that her entire body began to tremble. She had never been with a man, she was still a virgin at age thirty-eight, and it was something that nobody expected, including her rapist.

Sharon’s eyes were fixated on the blood as it spread underneath Martha’s buttocks and she began to laugh. The bitch was still a virgin, she said and petted Scott’s shoulder. The way to go lover.

Scott pounded her mercilessly and his sweat dripped down on Martha’s exposed breasts. While Scott was raping her, Martha felt additional pain and when she glanced up with swollen eyes, she noticed that Sharon was cutting circles around her nipples, causing her the pain on her chest. When Scott finally climaxed inside her, he hit her face on the left and on the right as if he was mad at her for whatever reason.

Martha was in pain from the top of her head down to her toes and she was praying that her ordeal was over until she heard Russ, the Goth’s voice as he read from the book, her book about the brutal killing of her friend Jenny. "It says that the second intruder took turns raping Jackie. He told them.

Well then, Matt said and laughed sarcastically. We wouldn’t want to change the story. Scott and Sharon helped Matt to remove the tapes from Martha’s hands and feet and they tossed her on her stomach as if she weight nothing and as if she was a rag doll. They pulled her arms behind her back and taped her hands together once again. With the cuts there were bleeding, some rather heavily, the position she was forced in was incredibly painful, Martha began fidgeting right away, trying to get off the bed. Her action was punished with several blows to the head which made her lose consciousness for several minutes.

She came back to the sound of laughter in the room and to the voice of Russ, the Goth kid as he was reading passages from "Jackie’s Ghost". It began to appear to Martha that what was happening to her was a form of punishment for writing the book. When she turned her head, she realized with newly arisen horror that each of the teenagers were holding individual copies of her book in their hands. It immediately became obvious that they had discovered the copies of her book that were complementary copies from her publisher and which were on the book shelves in her den.

They noticed that she regained consciousness and with the exception of Russ, they put the book down and four of them returned to the bed. Matt climbed on the bed and to her sheer panic, he pulled her buttocks apart. The pain that struck her like a sharp knife when it cut into the flesh that is what she felt when Matt began to sodomize her in a violent way. Because she tried to move away from the pain and his brutal attack, he began to hit her wherever he was able to reach. It seemed forever for Matt to finish raping her and just as a thin shade of hope were slipping back into her brain, Scott climbed on the top of her and raped Martha again. He and Matt were taking turns while Jennifer made sandwiches in the kitchen and brought them into her bedroom. After the third round of rape and Sharon’s tiny but extremely painful cuts on Martha all over, the five of them took a break and ate the sandwiches that Jennifer prepared from the ingredients she found in Martha’s refrigerator.

Martha fell in and out of consciousness and she felt that every part of her body was either in pain or as if it was set on fire. While conscious, she wondered if they were going to let her live, a hope that was smaller than a drop of water. Scott noticed that she was watching them through her almost completely swollen eyes and got up from the armchair that was her favorite and which she kept in the large bedroom. The chair stood by a small table with a light that she called her reading table.

Do you want some water? He asked almost politely. Martha shook her head ever so slowly as every movement was hurting. I want you to have some, he said not caring about her answer one way or another.

Sharon appeared at the other side of the bed and she held two one gallon plastic containers filled with water that she kept in the refrigerator. Matt stepped to the bed and Scott told him to open Martha’s mouth. When Matt touched her mouth a scream left Martha’s lips because her jaw was dislocated and it caused immeasurable pain just to move her lips slightly. Matt did not care and he pried her mouth open for Scott to pour the water down on Martha’s throat. She swallowed as much as she could and she thought about her book how those men who tortured Jenny did the same until her friend almost drowned.

Martha could not take it any longer and with all her power, that little energy that she had left she rolled on her side and fell to the floor. Matt kicked her as hard as he could and Jennifer and Sharon joined him in the kicking, furthermore, Sharon even jumped on Martha’s stomach so hard that she blacked out from the horrendous pain. Her last thought before blessed darkness fell upon her was that she was going to die that night and there was no one to help her at all.

When she came to yet again, her nightgown that by then was in strips around her bruised and battered body was soaked with blood and from the water that was poured into her mouth and which she was unable to swallow. She was back on the bed and with the exception of Russ; the Goth kid was sitting by her feet while the others were sitting around in her bedroom floor and in the two chairs. For a brief moment Martha thought that Russ was giving her the last rights because he held a fairly large crucifix in his hands. I am ready, he told the others.

Are you sure you want to do this? Sharon asked Russ.

I don’t think that some extra activities would hurt the story, do you? Russ asked not taking his eyes off from Martha’s face that was swollen twice its normal size. By then she could barely see out her left eye as the right eye was completely swollen shut.

I thought we are going by the book, Scott remarked.

Almost, Russ replied and motioned to his friends who stepped to the bed. I shall baptize you M and M, he said and shoved the crucifix inside Martha’s vagina. The pain she felt was indescribable and it came in waves, her body trembled and she shook uncontrollably.

She heard laughter but she was not sure which of the two girls were laughing, it didn’t really matter. She raised her head slightly, it was truly only inches that she managed to do and took all her might to ask them. Why? Why?

Sharon bent over her and she could smell pickles on her breath. Why not? She replied with her own question.

I will tell the police who did this to me, Martha whispered so quietly that Scott bent over and asked her to repeat it. It took her another couple of minutes but somehow she managed.

Scott left her side and went to talk to his friends. Martha’s eardrums were ringing from the kicks she received while she was on the floor and was unable to hear their discussion. Russ, the Goth kid climbed on the bed and while she could not see him, she smelled his body odor that came from not as much from him not taking showers, but from his clothes that he wore each and every day without being washed.

Russ sat across Martha’s chest which caused her even more difficulties to breathe. She felt fingers forcing her painful swollen eyelids open and an unimaginable panic swept over Martha. This is not happening! Please dear God, don’t let this happen, she prayed in her thoughts.

The Goth dressed kid with the heavy black make up on his face and with the black crucifix around his neck did not hesitate and brought sharp knife down on Martha’s blood shot eyes. Good luck, if there was any with her that night, brought her relief in the form of unconsciousness.

The five teenagers finished their handy work a short time later, took turns of taking a shower and wiping off all fingerprints by retracing their steps. They did not take anything from Martha’s house that would not have been part of their plan. After all, almost everything what they had done was done by the book.

CHAPTER Five

Jack watched as the nurse changed the IV bag that hung from the tall pole with the electronic setting that controlled the number of drips. When she finished, she took the patient’s vital signs and punched them into the small portable computer that contained all the medical information pertaining William Joseph Talbot. Satisfied that everything was in proper order, she nodded toward Jack and left the room.

Jack looked at Talbot as he was neatly tucked in under a pure white comforter, his eyes closed, he was still asleep. Not a day passed by without Jack thinking about the unfairness in life having such a man as Talbot, merely forty-six year old struck down with a fast spreading cancer that virtually took over all of his major organs. It all began only four months earlier when they returned from a business meeting in South Africa and from a safari at the Serengeti National Park in Tanzania. After arriving back to the United States, Talbot began to complain about getting tired way to easily which prompted him to call his seldom ever seen physician who never made house calls, making an exception in Talbot’s case only.

The nurse, who accompanied Dr. Schiff took blood and urine samples and not waiting for her boss, she rushed off to a nearby private lab to have the samples analyzed right away. It still took two days despite the urgent nature of the tests to come back with the results and they were devastating. Talbot refused to believe that he had cancer and he underwent a biopsy of his liver just to confirm that he indeed had cancer of the liver that spread to his stomach. The fast moving cancer also reached his lungs which made his breathing difficult, forcing him to be on oxygen at all times.

Soon, he became too weak to get out of the bed and the once robust man became heavily reliant on Jack, who began as his bodyguard and who eventually graduated to become his right hand man. He wanted to move out of the big house and into the large pool house which he loved. Next door was the room where his beloved orchids grew. His bed was setup in such a way that he was able to see the flowers, a view that he treasured, that is when he was conscious.

Jack, he heard his name.

Yes, Mr. Talbot, he replied immediately.

Would you please read the newspaper to me, he asked. It was a daily task for Jack as Talbot had difficulties even holding a newspaper up for a period of time.

Certainly, he answered and reached for the copy of the Arizona Republic on the small table next to his armchair. First, he read all the headlines to Talbot and he selected which articles he wanted Jack to read. One of the article’s headline read "Librarian, brutally attacked, fighting for her life" and it was the article that Talbot wanted to hear.

Jack began to read how the savagely beaten body of Martha Masterson, librarian at the Giffords’ Public Library in Arizona was found by sheriff deputies when she did not show up for work, and when the library was found vandalized. She was airlifted to the University Medical Center in Tucson where she was immediately placed on a life support system due to the extensive injuries that she had suffered. Doctors expressed skepticism about the possibility of her survival, but they emphasized that they were doing everything that was possible to save her life. The police said that they didn’t have any solid leads in their investigation, but they were certain that the attack was accomplished by more than one intruder. The investigation was on-going.

Jack noticed that Talbot lifted his hand, stopping him for reading any further. I want you to get the police record, the information that they already had and contact the hospital. I want reports on her condition twice a day. He instructed Jack.

Right away, Jack replied and went into the small library next door where he had a desk. He knew exactly who he had to contact at both places, at the Sheriff’s Department and at the University Medical Center, UMC for short, having been around with Talbot for over ten years. He learned that Talbot developed influence by donating millions of dollars for charities, and also he expressed kindness for those who were less fortunate. He personally could thank Talbot for simply saving his life when he was only minutes away from dying.

After the phone calls were made and promises were given to him, within seconds his fax machine began to hum and the sheriff department’s letterhead appeared on the top of the printed page. There were already over fifty pages forwarded to him, it included the medical assessment of Martha Masterson’s injuries. He would grind his teeth when he read the long report. He wondered if he should tell about them to Talbot, not wanting to upset him. On the other hand, he knew him too well, even on his death bed; Talbot could not be misled by lies, or misled by leaving things out from the reports. When all the pages were printed, he returned to the room where Talbot’s bed was set up and took his seat in the armchair next to the bed.

How bad is she? Talbot asked and looked at Jack. He actually did not need an answer, it was written all over on Jack’s face. It had to be extremely bad because Jack was a soldier-of-fortune and he served five years in the French Foreign Legion, he seldom ever showed any emotion on his scarred, yet still relatively handsome face, as he did when the question was addressed to him.

Very bad, Jack said and flipped through the pages. The police, more like the sheriff’s reports are sketchy, evidently all fingerprints were wiped clean at the crime scene, and there are no leads at all. From the medical report, they drew a conclusion that there was more than just one intruder, possibly even three or four.

Read me the medical findings, Talbot directed him.

It’s very graphic, Jack said giving his boss a fair warning.

I can only imagine, he replied and turned his head toward Jack, waiting to hear what the woman’s injuries were.

She had ruptured eardrums, a broken jaw; several of her teeth were missing. Her chest had 33 cuts, including circular cuts around her nipples. A cross was carved across her abdomen. Her lower legs were cut in multiple places; the doctor gave up counting the cuts after 40. She was also raped and sodomized multiple times; someone raped her with a crucifix that was still inside her when she was found. Her reproductive organs had to be removed due to the extensive damage. Her kidneys were bruised and her spleen was damaged as well. There were several broken ribs on both sides. Apparently she was blinded in both eyes with a sharp instrument, possibly with the tip of a knife. Evidently they tried to strangle her and the doctor’s guess is that her attacker thought that she was dead, or just left her for dead. She is in coma and breathing with the help of a ventilator. Jack stopped and looked at the next few pages.

A deep sigh left Talbot’s lips; Jack looked at him thinking that he had difficulties taking a breath. Moments later Jack realized it with surprise; Talbot had tears rolling down on his face. Poor woman, he whispered. Is there anything else in that file?

It says that they found several copies of a book titled Jackie’s Ghost", written by Misty Monroe, in Ms. Masterson’s house. According to the investigator, what was done to Ms. Masterson was almost identical what was written in the book. They have received a report from the Tucson