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The house was so still that he would have to lanced back at the girl on the bed, able to see her better in the darkness than he could see ht hallway She was still unconscious, one of her own scarves wadded in herin place Strong lengths of cord, which he had untied frohtly bound her wrists and ankles

Control

Leaving Regina’s door open behind hi close to the wall, where the plywood sub-flooring under the thick carpet was least likely to creak

He knew the layout He had cautiously explored the second floor while the Harrisons had been finishing dinner

Beside the girl’s roouest bedroom It was dark now He crept on toward Lindsey’s studio

Because the main hallway chandelier was directly ahead of him, his shadow fell in his wake, which was fortunate Otherwise, if the wo toward the hall, she would have been warned of his approach

He inched to the studio door and stopped

Standing with his back flat to the wall, eyes straight ahead, he could see between the balusters under the handrail of the open staircase, to the foyer below As far as he could tell, no lights were on downstairs

He wondered where the husband had gone The tall doors to the hts were on in there He could hear s froured she was at work If the husband ith her, surely they would have exchanged a feords, at least, during the ti the hall

He hoped the husband had gone out on an errand He had no particular need to kill the erous

From his jacket pocket, he withdrew the supple leather sap, filled with lead shot, that he had appropriated last week from Morton Redlow, the detective It was an extreood in his hand In the pearl-gray Honda, two blocks away, a handgun was tucked under the driver’s seat, and Vassago alht it He had taken it frouna Beach a couple of hours before dawn that irl Even if he just wounded and disabled theot them back to his hideaway and down into the ed And if he used a gun to remove the husband, he could risk only one shot, hbors and the source located In that quiet co over the place in two ht hand, getting the feel of it

With great care, he leaned across the doorjamb Tilted his head Peeked into the studio

She sat on the stool, her back to the door He recognized her even froirl had struggled and passed out in his ar board, charcoal pencil in her right hand Busy, busy, busy Pencil ainst the paper

No matter how determined she was to keep her attention fir paper, Lindsey looked up repeatedly at theHer creative block cruan to draw theThe uncurtained fralass Her face like the countenance of a ghost engaged in a haunting When she added the spider web in the upper right-hand corner, the concept jelled, and suddenly she becaht title it The Web of Life and Death, and use a surreal series of symbolic items to knit the theme into every corner of the canvas Not canvas, Masonite In fact, just paper now, only a sketch, but worth pursuing

She repositioned the drawing tablet on the board, setting it higher Now she could just raise her eyes slightly froe to look over the top of the board at the , and didn’t have to keep raising and lowering her head

More elements than just her face, the , and the ould be required to give the painting depth and interest As she worked she considered and rejected a score of additional ilass above her own reflection: the face that Hatch had described frolasses

For an instant she thought it was a supernatural event, an apparition in the glass Even as her breath caught in her throat, however, she realized that she was seeing a reflection like her own and that the killer in Hatch’s drea around the doorway to look at her She repressed an impulse to scream As soon as he realized she had seen hie she had, and he would be all over her, slashing at her, pounding on her, finishing her off before Hatch even got upstairs Instead, she sighed loudly and shook her head as if displeased hat she was getting down on the drawing paper

Hatch ht already be dead

She slowly put down her charcoal pencil, letting her fingers rest on it as if she o on

If Hatch wasn’t dead, how else could this bastard have gotten to the second floor? No She couldn’t think about Hatch being dead, or she would be dead herself, and then Regina Dear God, Regina

She reached toward the top drawer of the supply cabinet at her side, and a shiver went through her as she touched the cold chrome handle