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I followed the wide, paved road that leads to a e, with a roo, where David and Inez live It’s twenty-five hundred square feet, renovated and decorated to their taste, with a separate outdoor entrance to ensure their privacy There’s a pool house to go with the Olyht room and exercise equipment put in there My rent includes use of the pool and exercise facilities if I want to I swim every day--in the pool or the ocean--and use the pool house to do ht training, so thosedust if David hadn’t decided to drop that extra ten pounds he’d been carrying
My place is the guest cottage It sits a couple of hundred yards back fro brick path that passes through beautifully landscaped bloo plants and shade trees and over a tiny e isn’t large, as those things go, probably eight hundred square feet, with one bedroom, one very ordinary bathroo claw-footed tub … and a back deck that is only a few hundred yards froe onto the ocean It’s too rough and rocky for good swi But it’s beautiful When I’o there and sit on one particular rock, listening to the ocean as I watch the gulls dive-bomb each other as they compete for tasty tidbits When I want to swio a little farther down the beach All the residents here have unlimited access to the private beach
This secluded spot has been my home for several years now, since before Vicki went into Birchwoods Whenmore paperwork I pay month to month, direct to the attorney What ot read I had no clue I o to David and Inez, or charity Most likely it would go to Vicki’s folks
I didn’t want to think about things like "inheriting" It was too soon, and I would rather be as poor as I’d been growing up than have lost Vicki I’d give just about anything to have her back But all the ic or no, dead is still dead
I draggedof practical things--pri as Edgar considered me useful he wouldn’t kill me himself I believed that The same couldn’t be said for his associates And I wouldn’t want to betto keep them in line Then, of course, there was my sire--whoever he was--and the folks who’d set me up in the alley I’d been supposed to die Instead, I was alive and a witness to whatever the hell was going on They wouldn’t like that Not one little bit
Oh, and let’s not forget the de else could do that perfect of an ie and cliline of people anted me dead Worse, they weren’t nor hts as I roceries There was a note in Inez’s handwriting pinned to the door with a strip of duct tape
Dawna brought by a pot of her grande I was afraid if I didn’t bring it down here David would eat it all Hope you are okay We’ll talk in the rand the Vietna back with hih, and one hell of a cook Her pho is legendary I h the new blender, but by God I would eat it In fact, I could smell it already, if ever so faintly
I proot et it all inside The weapons bag ca on ht the wards would hold But better safe than sorry
In the course of hauling everything out of the car I found the new cell phone The light was flashing I hadn’t set up my voice es The texts were probably froiven the number out to everybody Which she would
I didn’t really want to talk to anyone But I could text I sent a couple of quickeverybody knoas safely ho condolences back and forth about losing Vicki It didn’t take long, and my friends really did need to hear froe" isn’t as large as David and Inez’s place, but it’s bigger than the house I grew up in, bigger thanroo out onto a deck and skylights that let in sunlight or ht dappled with the shadows froed in the slow cooker with the pho, cranked the dial, then headed outside I’d put everything away later Right noanted the kind of solace I can only seem to find next to the ocean
I made my way down the familiar path that led to that rocky little stretch of beach,Just as well, I supposed Any one offroht that shone bright silver off the water’s surface, I sighed in relief Pale stars winked like diae rock, scraping an to heal I watched the flesh knit itself together It was eerie and deeply disturbing
"What are you thinking?"
I jumped and whirled, silver knife drawn, to face the source My skin began gloith power "Crap! Kevin, you scared ?"