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It had see The silence in the house was unnatural He rapped one knuckle against the newel post, just to hear a sound The tap see it was deeper than before

"Jesus, that dream really spooked you," he said aloud, and the sound of his own voice was reassuring

His bare feetsound on the oak floor of the downstairs hall, and even rowing more acute by the second, he took a can of Pepsi froerator, popped it open, tilted his head back, closed his eyes, and had a long drink

It didn’t taste like cola It tasted like beer

Frowning, he opened his eyes and looked at the can It was not a can any more It was a bottle of beer, the same brand as in the dream: Corona Neither he nor Lindsey drank Corona When they had a beer, which was rarely, it was a Heineken

Fear went through hih a wire

Then he noticed that the tile floor of the kitchen was gone He was standing barefoot on gravel The stones cut into the balls of his feet

As his heart began to race, he looked around the kitchen with a desperate need to reaffirm that he was in his own house, that the world had not just tilted into soaze travel over the faranite countertops, the dishwasher, the gleahtravel floor reht hand He turned toward the sink, intent on splashing cold water in his face, but the sink was no longer there One half of the kitchen had vanished, replaced by a roadside bar along which cars were parked in a row, and then--

--he was not in his kitchen at all It was entirely gone He was in the open air of the April night, where thick fog gloith the reflection of red neon froraveled parking lot, past the row of parked cars He was not barefoot anyrubber-soled black Rockports

He heard a woman say, "My name’s Lisa What’s yours?"

He turned his head and saw the blonde She was at his side, keeping pace with hiht away, he tipped the Corona to his mouth, sucked down the last couple of ounces, and dropped the easped as cold Pepsi foamed froravel had disappeared A spreading pool of cola glistened on the peach-colored Santa Fe tiles of his kitchen floor

In Redlow’s Pontiac, Lisa told Vassago to take the San Diego Freeway south By the ti-filled surface streets and eventually found a freeway entrance, she had extracted capsules of what she said was PCP from the pharmacopoeia in her purse, and they had washed them doith the rest of her beer

PCP was an animal tranquilizer that often had the opposite of a tranquilizing effect on hu the to watch the i on Lisa, who seemed to have the conscience of a snake, to whom the concept of morality was utterly alien, who viewed the world with unrelenting hatred and contempt, whose sense of personal power and superiority did not preclude a self-destructive streak, and as already so full of tightly contained psychotic energy that she always seemed about to explode He suspected that, with the aid of PCP, she’d be capable of highly entertaining extremes of violence, fierce stor to watch

"Where are we going?" he asked as they cruised south on the freeway The headlights drilled into a white mist that hid the world and made it seem as if they could invent any landscape and future they wished Whatever they i and appear around them

"El Toro," she said

"That’s where he lives?"

"Yeah"

"Who is he?"

"You need a name?"

"No, ma’am Why do you want him dead?"

She studied him for a while Gradually a s carved by a slow- and invisible knife Her small white teeth looked pointy Piranha teeth "You’ll really do it, won’t you?" she asked "You’ll just go in there and kill the guy to prove I oughta want you"

"To prove nothing," he said "Just because it ether, then make so and ly at ease with him, he said, "Does he live in an apartment or a house?"

"Why’s it hbors aren’t as close"

"It’s a house," she said

"Why do you want him dead?"

"He wanted me, I didn’t want him, and he felt he could take what he wanted anyway"

"Couldn’t have been easy taking anything from you"

Her eyes were colder than ever "The bastard had to have stitches in his face when it was over"

"But he still got what he wanted?"

"He was bigger than azed at the road ahead

A breeze had risen froh the night It churned across the highway like s off a vast fire, as if the entire coastline was ablaze, whole cities incinerated and the ruins s that he could go with her to El Toro and see how deep in blood she would wade for vengeance Then he would have liked to convince her to coive herself, of her own free will, to his collection Whether she knew it or not, she wanted death She would be grateful for the sweet pain that would be her ticket to daainst her black clothes, filled with hatred so intense that it made her darkly radiant, she would be an incoo’s collection and accepted the killing bloilling sacrifice for his repatriation to Hell

He kneever, that she would not accede to his fantasy and die for him even if death hat she wanted She would die only for herself, when she eventually concluded that teran to realize what he really wanted from her, she would lash out at hie--than Neon He preferred to take each new acquisition to histhe life froaze of the funhouse Lucifer But he knew that he did not have that luxury with Lisa She would not be easy to subdue, even with a sudden unexpected blow And once he had lost the advantage of surprise, she would be a fierce adversary

He was not concerned about being hurt Nothing, including the prospect of pain, could frighten him Indeed, each blow she landed, each cut she opened in him, would be an exquisite thrill, pure pleasure

The probleet away from him, and he could not risk her escape He wasn’t worried that she would report him to the cops She existed in a subculture that was suspicious and scornful of the police, seething with hatred for therasp, however, he would lose the chance to add her to his collection And he was convinced that her tre that would win hi yet?" she asked, still looking ahead at the fog, into which they barreled at a dangerous speed

"A little," he said

"I don’t feel anything" She opened her purse again and began ru stock of what other pills and capsules she possessed "We need soood"

While Lisa was distracted by her search for the right cheo drove with his left hand and reached under his seat with his right to get the revolver that he had taken off Morton Redlow She looked up just as he thrust the , she showed no surprise He fired two shots, killing her instantly

Hatch cleaned up the spilled Pepsi with paper towels By the time he stepped to the kitchen sink to wash his hands, he was still shaking but not as badly as he had been

Terror, which had been briefly all-consu, made some room for curiosity He hesitantly touched the rim of the stainless-steel sink and then the faucet, as if they led to understand how a dream could continue after he had awakened The only explanation, which he could not accept, was insanity

He turned on the water, adjusted hot and cold, puan to lather his hands, and looked up at theabove the sink, which faced onto the rear yard The yard was gone A highway lay in its place The kitchenhad beco and only partially revealed by two headlight bea over it at sixty miles an hour He sensed a presence beside hi but the double ovens When he turned his head he saw the blonde clawing in her purse He realized that so was in his hand, firmer than mere lather, and he looked down at a revolver--