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His hands were locked so tightly around the steering wheel that they ached

Throughout the o ake more than asleep But when he dozed, he was back in the Millipede again, on that night of glory

In the days and weeks following the deaths at Fantasy World, he had without doubt proved hi iron control over his co killed was sufficient to release the periodic pressure that built in him Hundreds of times, he relived the sensuous details of each death, tee that he would kill again, any ti suspicion, was an additional restraint on self-indulgence

He did not kill anyone else for two years Then, when he was fourteen, he drowned another boy at suood fight When he was found floating facedown in the pond, it was the talk of the ca as fire

When he was sixteen and had a driver’s license, he wasted two transients, both hitchhikers, one in October, the other a couple of days before Thanksgiving The guy in Nove ho else, a predator who thought he had stuh-school boy ould provide him with some thrills of his own Jeremy had used knives on both of them

At seventeen, when he discovered Satanish about it, surprised to find that his secret philosophy had been codified and en for for a way to play at wickedness, an excuse for hedonism But real believers existed, as well, committed to the truth that God had failed to create people in His ie, that the bulk of humanity was equivalent to a herd of cattle, that selfishness was adoal, and that the greatest pleasure was the brutal exercise of power over others

The ultimate expression of power, one privately published volume had assured hi the bonds of family "love" The book said that one must as violently as possible reject the whole hypocrisy of rules, laws, and noble senti that advice to heart hat had earned him a place in Hell--from which his father had pulled hiain A few more deaths, two in particular, would earn him repatriation to the land of darkness and the daressed

A few fat flies buzzed back and forth through his shadowy retreat, and some of the but sticky webs that spanned the junctions of the rafters Then the spidersbecame a deeper sleep with more intense drea at the corner of the garage, Hatch reached between two azaleas and flipped open the cover on the landscape-lighting control box He adjusted the ti off at ht Now they would stay on until sunrise

He closed the roomed street All was harmony Every house had a tile roof in shades of tan and sand and peach, not the e-red tiles of many older California homes The stucco walls were creae of coordinated pastels specified by the "Covenants, Conventions & Restrictions" that careen and recently mown, flower beds ell tended, and trees were neatly trimmed It was difficult to believe that unspeakable violence could ever intrude from the outer world into such an orderly, upwardlysupernatural could stalk those streets The neighborhood’s nor stone ramparts croith battleht that Lindsey and Regina ht be perfectly safe there--but for him If madness had invaded this fortress of normalcy, he had opened the door to it Maybe he was rand as psychic visions, merely the hallucinations of an insane h he also could not dismiss the slim possibility that he would lose the bet In any event, whether or not he was insane, he was the conduit for whatever violence ht rain down on them, and perhaps they would be better off if they went away for the duration, put some distance between themselves and hi them away seemed wise and responsible--except that a sainst that option He had a terrible hunch--or was itafter hiina If they went away soirl, that ho Hatch to wait alone for a shon that would never happen

All right, then they had to stick together Like a faina up at school, he slowly circled the house, looking for lapses in their defenses The only one he found was an unlockedat the back of the garage The latch had been loose for a long tiot soe cabinets and worked on the mechanism until the bolt seated securely in the catch

As he’d told Lindsey earlier, he didn’t think the ht, probably not even this week, er, but he would come eventually Even if that unwelcoood to be prepared

2

Vassago woke

Without opening his eyes, he knew that night was co off the world and slipping over the edge of the horizon When he did open his eyes, the last fading light coh the attic vents confirht were on the rise

Hatch found that it was not exactly easy to conduct a nor, maybe even bloody, vision so powerful it would blank out reality for its duration It was hard to sit in your pleasant dining room, sht banter, and tease a giggle froray eyes--when you kept thinking of the loaded shotgun secreted in the corner behind the Coroun in the adjacent kitchen atop the refrigerator, above the line of sight of a sirl’s eyes

He wondered how theHe only ca after Regina at school But would he boldly ring the bell or knock smartly on the door, while they were still up and around with all the lights on, hoping to catch theht assuhbor cohts off, and try to slip through their defenses to take them unaware?

Hatch wished they had an alarm system, as they did at the store When they sold the old house andJiht away Valuable antiques graced every rooest time after Jimmy had been taken fro--or everything--else was taken as well

Throughout dinner, Lindsey was a trooper She ate a atoni as if she had an appetite, which was soe, and she filled his frequent worried silences with natural-sounding patter, doing her best to preserve the feeling of an ordinary night at ho rong And though she was tough enough to handle nearly anything, she was also infected with seely chronic self-doubt that would probably lead her to interpret their uneasiness as dissatisfaction with her

Earlier Hatch and Lindsey had discussed what they irl about the situation they faced, without alar herShe had been with theh to have this crazy stuff thrown at her She’d hear about Hatch’s bad dreaazine, the ure she had been entrusted to a couple of lunatics

Anyway the kid didn’t really need to be warned at this stage They could look out for her; it hat they were sworn to do