Deadline (Sandra Brown)

preschoolers, which sometimes frazzled her, was now what she craved. She wanted to hear their laughter, inhale their little-boy smells, feel the pressure of their warm bodies against her chest and the damp smear of their kisses on her cheeks.
    She went to the sink, turned on the faucet, and took a drinking glass from the open shelf. She filled the glass with water and drained it thirstily. Thinking that surely the headmistress had had time to get there by now, she glanced at the clock on the stove, then, thinking she heard a car on the street, turned.
    When the glass slipped from her hand, it shattered on the floor, spraying her feet and legs with shards of glass.
    Willard Strong was standing not three feet from her. He held a double-barrel shotgun crosswise against his chest, from shoulder to hip, one hand on the stock, the other on the barrels. “You scream and I’ll kill you.” Her back door was standing ajar. Calmly, he reached behind him and pushed it closed.
    *  *  *
     
    Amelia rolled her lips inward and took a deep breath through her nose, held it for several seconds, then released it slowly.
    Jackson regarded her with concern. “Do you need a moment, Ms. Nolan?”
    She shook her head, then murmured, “No, I’m fine.” She wasn’t, but hopefully no one in the courtroom would call her on the fib. She wanted no more delays in the proceedings. She wanted to get through this, past this, so she could get on with the rest of her life.
    She barely remembered a time when she’d had complete control of her life and could make decisions without factoring Jeremy into them in one way or another. He’d been out of her life for more than a year, and still he was dominating her thoughts and dictating how her days were spent. But once she got through this—
    “Mr. Strong used those exact words?” Jackson asked. “‘You scream and I’ll kill you?’”
    Refocusing her thoughts, she answered yes.
    “Did you feel that you were in imminent danger?”
    “I did, yes. The threat seemed real. He was glaring at me, breathing hard. He was flexing and contracting his fingers around the barrels of the shotgun. He looked distraught. Furious. I was afraid for my life.”
    Jackson let that sink in as he walked over to the table where evidence, which had already been introduced, was exhibited. “Is this the shotgun he brought with him into your house?” He carried the weapon back to the witness box for her inspection.
    “It looks like it. I remember the design carved into the stock.”
    He asked that the record note that she had identified Exhibit A, the shotgun with which Darlene Strong had been shot in the chest.
    As he replaced the shotgun on the table, he asked, “Did the defendant say anything else to you?”
    “He asked if my husband was there. I told him no and reminded him that Jeremy was no longer my husband. He said, ‘But she’s still my wife, and he’s’”—she darted a glace toward the jury box, then finished—“‘he’s fucking her.’ I told him that I knew nothing about it, that it wasn’t my business to know, and that whatever was happening between them, Jeremy wouldn’t come to my home.”
    “What did he say to that?”
    “He laughed. With contempt. He called Jeremy a coward and said, ‘He might, now he knows I’m on to them. Let’s see.’” She paused to wipe her moist palms on the lap of her skirt. “He took me by the arm.”
    She went on to describe how he had roughly propelled her through the house, searching the rooms on both stories for Jeremy, all the while deaf to her denials that Jeremy would seek refuge in her house. “By the time we got back downstairs, he was even angrier and more frustrated than before. He was sweating profusely, swearing with every breath.”
    She paused, expecting an objection from Strong’s lawyer, who was sitting perfectly still, staring at her as though contemplating his counterattack. Strong’s stare was malevolent. Quickly she shifted her gaze back to Jackson.
    He asked, “Was he still restraining you?”
    “Yes. I thought this was the point where he would kill me. But then…” She swallowed, remembering the fear that had gripped her. “Then we heard the car pull up out front. Car doors slamming. My boys laughing and shouting excitedly, calling my name as they ran toward the townhouse. I heard Mrs. Abernathy cautioning them to be careful on the steps.”
    “What did Mr. Strong do when he heard them?”
    “He started moving toward