Chapter 8
Marlena looked at the Great Room clock: 9:37. When she had taken the liberty of assuring Peggy that she could handle Tommy until John came, it had been 9 o'clock and she and Peggy both thought he would be home again in just a few minutes. But there hadn't been any word from him. Not that it was any burden to spend time with Tommy. She loved this little one so much already. Tommy was playing with his blocks close behind the couch (where he could easily raise himself if he wanted to) and Marlena was, at this point, wandering around the downstairs and keeping a close eye out for John's Bronco.
Just then she heard it drive past the house and she assumed John would drive it into the garage and come in that entrance. But she didn't hear the garage door open. Instead after a little delay, she could see the front of the Bronco through the front window. John had parked it on the street by the mailbox. She only got a view of the car, not John. And then there was fumbling at the front door. Thinking John had forgotten his house key, she went to the front French doors, unlocked them, and before she could open them, the person on the other side jerked the handle down and burst the doors open, propelling Marlena backward.
Marlena gasped.
The doors promptly shut again as Roman the Imposter virtually hurled himself inside, pointing a handgun, with a silencer screwed on it, at her.
Fighting shock and fear, she said in a lethal, low voice, "What are you doing here? How did you get John's car?" She didn't want Tommy to hear - and she didn't want this man to know there was another soul close by.
Roman sneered at her. "I'm here for you. And I stole it, obviously. Come on, Marlena, get the old gray cells working."
"Roman, or whatever your name is, I'm not going anywhere with you. Why did you show yourself again? You must know a lot of people are looking for you. Do you want to spend the rest of your days in some supermax prison?"
"Don't worry, DOC, I'm not going to get caught. You're coming with me. I've got orders to bring you to Stefano on one of his islands. You'll be stayin' for quite a while. Your bratty kids will grow up without you. Oh, and this time they won't have John either, I'm making sure of that."
Marlena felt icy cold as her fear ramped up exponentially. What had he done to John?
Roman held out a pair of metal handcuffs. "Put 'em on. NOW."
"And if I don't?"
"Mr. DiMera said to bring you to him. He didn't say I couldn't injure you to get you there. If you want a kneecap blown out, just keep resisting." He pointed his gun at her legs.
Marlena put on the cuffs and ratcheted them closed, although not too tightly. Desperately she tried to calm herself. She was a psychiatrist after all. She knew something about dealing with disturbed individuals. She had to keep him talking. But she didn't want to do it inside because she knew any moment Tommy would make enough noise that Roman would discover him. God knows what he would do with the child.
"Alright," she said heavily. "I give up. Let's go." She nodded at the doors.
The imposter obviously wanted to leave asap. But getting her out and across the open front lawn to the car with a gun in his hand would leave him vulnerable. He wished now that he had gone with his first thought - to park the car by the garage and then take her out the back way. But it was too late now.
Backing up, he slowly, cautiously opened one of the French doors. Then moved to the side and gestured with the gun. "Go ahead of me. But don't try to run, or I will shoot."
Tommy picked that very moment to raise himself up and make himself visible to the stranger. "Da ma gool ba!" he exclaimed in his loudest baby voice, almost as if he were challenging the invader of his home.
Roman was definitely startled by Tommy's cry. He grabbed Marlena's arm and said, "Go get the kid. He's coming too."
"No, Roman. He's not mine. He's not John's either. He belongs to the housekeeper. Maybe you saw her leave a while ago? I told her I'd keep an eye on him until she came back. And she is coming back. If we go before she does, you won't have to worry about another person. Leave the boy here." She tried to pull him toward the open door. She hoped to God this imposter hadn't come here better informed about John' life than she'd been. She hadn't known about Tommy. She gambled now that neither did Roman.
Making up his mind, the imposter abruptly dangled the Bronco's keys in front of Marlena. "You're going to drive." She grabbed them from his hands, and he shoved Marlena through the open door. He needed to make his get-away with her, and the kid, whoever he was, was a complication he didn't need. Stefano only wanted Marlena, no one else.
As Marlena stumbled out the door, she caught a glimpse of some kind of bulk to her left, hidden from inside view by the stone door framing and the clapboard siding.
As soon as she was clear, and Roman emerged hastily through the door, that bulk brought down with great force a hefty piece of firewood on the imposter's gun arm. The firearm flew from Roman's grasp. And then the bulk, who had become identifiable to Marlena as John, tackled Roman, the two of them falling to the ground like football players in the Superbowl. Their fists flew, both landing blockbuster blows. Marlena tried to pick up the gun, but the two men were struggling too close to it. There was no doubt that the two were trying to kill each other. John managed to get the gun, but he dropped it again when Roman smashed him in the side of his head. Now, both of them had a piece of the gun and were struggling madly for control. Marlena, terrified, danced around them and picked up the log. If she could just get a window of opportunity, she would bring it down on Roman and knock him out cold. But she just couldn't get that opportunity as the men rolled around chaotically. Marlena heard a muffled gunshot and stared fearfully at the fighting lump that oddly didn't still. The shot had gone wild, apparently. Their desperate struggle continued, and another shot whizzed right through the open door into the house! Marlena's blood ran cold. She scrambled and slammed the door shut, praying that the shot just fired had not hit Tommy. She again tried to find an opening to use the wood in her hand.
John, still heavily incapacitated from the blow he'd received in the office building, could not fight at full power, and this was elongating their struggle. Apparently he had not - as he'd hoped to - broken Roman's arm when he'd sent the handgun flying. Now, he was just trying to do anything he could to knock the other guy out. Suddenly, he had full control of the gun, and he swung it with all the strength he could muster at Roman's nose. As the sound of a big crack was heard, the imposter let go of John. John pulled himself to his knees and leveled the gun at Roman's midsection.
"Freeze!" commanded John in a sharp bark that cost him all of the little air he had in his lungs.
Roman, holding his profusely bleeding nose with one hand and propping his upper body up a little with the other, glared malevolently at John and taunted. "Go on. Kill me, John. You know you want to. Go on. Do it. You know if you don't, I'll come back again some day."
John was barely holding on to consciousness. Marlena saw him rocking a little. Fearing that the imposter might see it too, she moved up behind Roman and smacked him on the top of his head with the log. That put him out.
Dropping the firewood, she ran to John and dropped down on her knees. She couldn't put her arms around him because of the handcuffs. "John, John, are you alright?"
He said vaguely, "Yeah, Doc, yeah. Are you?" He lowered the gun to his side.
"Yes!" she said. "But we have to check on Tommy. He's inside."
John managed to stand up and even helped Marlena up. He gave her the gun. "Stand back and watch him, just for a second. I'll get Tommy and something to tie him with."
She nodded and he went inside, looking like a drunken sailor. In less than a minute he returned with a drapery cord and securely trussed up Roman.
"Tommy's fine," he croaked. "Just a little scared. I'll go comfort him more in a minute."
He stood up and produced the handcuff key he'd found in Roman's pocket. He unlocked the cuffs for Marlena, and they hugged mightily.
They went inside. John, to pick up Tommy and reassure him. Marlena, to call the police. She also called an ambulance. "Let the police take care of getting him treated, Doc." John said. He had put Tommy down on the couch and sat down himself. He still felt terribly dizzy.
"The ambulance isn't for him, it's for you, John."
"I'll be okay. Just need to catch my breath."
Marlena was nervously flitting between keeping an eye on her attacker outside and on her knight in shining armor inside. "No, John. You need to go to the hospital. You probably have a bad concussion." She had felt that big bump on the back of his head. "In fact, let me check you out. She took off his leather jacket that served him well in early morning coolness and had protected him somewhat in the fight. Then she saw some blood seeping through his shirt about where his arm met his chest. "And," her voice wavered, "You've been shot, John."
"What?" he said. "No." He gingerly shook his head. He really didn't feel any pain in his body except his driving headache.
"Yes," she said. Marlena got him to sit again and she carefully pulled away the bloodied shirt from that area. There was a wound, but it wasn't bleeding much. She found a clean tea towel in the kitchen and put it over the wound, pressing.
Meanwhile Tommy was quite confused. When John sat down again, Tommy climbed on his lap and laid his body against his dad's.
Marlena heard sirens and told John to hold the tea towel. She rushed outside and made sure the emergency vehicles came to her. Roman had just regained consciousness and he was swearing a blue streak at being tied up. Marlena had also put the handcuffs on him for good measure.
Soon the imposter was scooped up by the officers, and the EMTs came in and put a protesting John on a stretcher and loaded him into the ambulance. Marlena didn't know where the hospital was. She wanted to go with John in the ambulance but they said she couldn't take Tommy. Tommy was crying because his daddy was being taken away. "Marlena," John said, "call Peggy, please. She can get you to the hospital and watch Tommy."
Marlena did that immediately after they wheeled John out. Peggy only lived about five minutes away by car. She appeared in three. She did drive Marlena to the hospital, and she stayed in the waiting area with Tommy while Marlena went into the emergency room to find out what was happening.
It seemed like forever before a doctor came. "You are Mrs. Black?" he asked.
"Yes, Doctor. I'm also a physician. Please tell me exactly what you found."
"Of course. We took x-rays of his head injury. He does have a concussion. He did drop into unconsciousness in the ambulance. However, once here, he woke up and was able to carry on a limited conversation. And his pupils were not dilated. So, you'll need to see if he has any danger signs before you let him go to sleep tonight. But I think the symptoms will go away pretty quickly if he takes it easy."
The doctor continued, "He has a lot of bruises and contusions. He's going to have at least one black eye. His right hand sustained a couple of sprains that will be painful for a few days. And then, he was shot in the pectoralis major. The reason there was so little blood was that the bullet entered on its side and did not penetrate far at all. In fact, we were able to remove it in the emergency room with just local anesthetic. His arm should be in a sling for a few days, maybe a week, but as long as the bandages are changed often to avoid any infection, he should be fine."
"Does that mean you'll release him today?"
The ER resident, whose name tag she could clearly read, nodded and smiled. "Yes, we will."
Marlena beamed at him. "Thank you, Doctor Amaso. Thank you so much."