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When she slowly sat up and with her left hand groped toward the nightstand la softly Floorboards creaked, perhaps because the intruder had reacted to the noise she ers found the laht

She saw no one in the first flush of light At once, however, she sensedher head, bringing the pistol to bear, she found no one

At one , draperies billowed For a moment she attributed that movement to the air conditioner Then the billows subsided The draperies hung liainst theot out of bed and crossed the room When she pulled the draperies aside, she found theclosed And locked

Maybe she hadn’t awakened as instantly as she’d thought Maybe sleep had clung to her, and the dreaed clothes, and felt fresh but slightly disoriented Having slept away the afternoon, she rose to the night, inner clock confused, lacking purpose

In the kitchen, she scooped a serving of curried chicken salad fro on the move, she went to Arnie’s room

The castle glorious, fit for King Arthur, seeher towers

For once, Arnie was not at work upon this citadel Instead he sat staring at a penny balanced on his right thuer

"What’s up, sweetie?" she asked, though she expected no reply He met her expectation, but flipped the penny into the air The copper winked brightly as it turned

With quicker reflexes than he usually exhibited, the boy snatched the coin froht fist

Carson had never seen hi

Half a minute passed while Arnie stared at his clenched fist Then he opened it and frowned as if with disappoint on his palht it in ht pennies on the drawbridge to the castle

Arnie had neither an understanding of et the pennies?"

Opening his hand, Arnie saw the penny and frowned as before He flipped it again He seemed to have a new obsession

At the open door, Vicky Chou peered in from the hallway "How’s the chicken salad?"

"Fabulous Every day, you esture "We all have our special talents I couldn’t shoot anyone the way you do"

‘Anytime you need it done, you knohere to find et the pennies?" Vicky asked

"That’s what I was gonna ask you"

Having flipped the penny again, having found it in his pal it froet the pennies?"

Fro at it in silence

Aware that her brotherit to her, Carson gently plucked it froers

"What?" Vicky asked

"It’s a pass to someplace called the Luxe Theater One free otten this?"

Arnie flipped the penny again, and as he snatched it out of the air, he said, "Every city has secrets--"

Carson knew she had heard those words somewhere--

"--but none as terrible as this" --and her blood chilled as she saw in herat thein Bobby Allwine’s apartment

CHAPTER 49

TWO HUNDRED YEARS of life can leave a enius, like Victor, his intellectual pursuits lead him always on new adventures The ed as it confronts and resolves increasingly complex problems

On the other hand, repetition of physical pleasures eventuallythe second century, a ly toward the exotic, the extreme

This is why Victor requires violence with sex, and the cruel huuilt that coht spawn in others Brutality is an aphrodisiac; the exercise of raer thrills hirows boring long before favorite dishes grow bland to the tongue Only in the past decade has Victor developed a periodic craving for foods so exotic that they must be eaten with discretion

At certain restaurants in the city, where the owners value his business, where the waiters value his generous gratuities, and where the chefs admire his uniquely sophisticated palate, Victor froes special dinners in advance He is always served in a private room, where a ht seenorant multitudes He has no wish to explain these acquired tastes to the boorish diners--and they are virtually always boorish--at an adjoining table

Quan Yin, a Chinese restaurant na rooht Victor had reserved it for himself

He frequently ate alone With two hundred years of experience that no one of an ordinary life span could match, he found that he was virtually always his own best co tian with a si drop soup

Before he had half finished this first course, his cell phone rang He was surprised to hear the voice of the renegade

"Murder doesn’t scare me anymore, Father" With a note of authority that always secured obedience, Victor said, "You must talk to me about this in person"

"I’m not as troubled about et this nuiven to members of the New Race, did not transfer calls to Victor’s cell phone

Instead of answering, the renegade said, "Murder just makes me more human They excel at murder"

"But you’re better than their kind" The need to discuss this, to debate it, annoyed Victor He was master and co his people "You’rethey have"

This was an intolerable lie This was heresy

"The help you need," Victor insisted iive"

"If I just cut open enough of them and look inside, sooner or later I’ll discover what makes them … happier"

"That isn’t rational Coirl I see sometimes, she’s particularly happy I’ll find the truth in her, the secret, the thing I’ up