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Anna Denise Ironheart-Boca Raton, Florida Found a live alligator in her fawriter No of the year
Valerie Ironheart-Cedar Rapids, Iowa Gave birth to healthy quadruplets
The last of the five was Ja The story caister April 10, and was one of scores of pieces on the same story that had been published statewide Because of her instructions, the co her sheafs of similar articles on the sauel California Southern California The Southland
The piece was not accoraph, but the reporter’s description of the man included a reference to blue eyes and thick brown hair She was sure he was her James Ironheart
She was not surprised to have found him She had known that with determined effort she would locate him sooner or later What surprised her was the subject of the piece in which his full name appeared at last She expected it to be yet one rasp, and she was not prepared for the headline: LAGUNA NIGUEL AlAN WINS SIX MILLION LOTTO JACKPOT
Having followed the rescue of Nicholas O’Conner with his first untroubled night of sleep in the last four, Ji three hours on the cross-country trip, he arrived at John Wayne Airport by 3:10 PM and was home half an hour later
He went straight into his den and lifted the flap of carpet that revealed the safe built into the floor of the closet He dialed the combination; opened the lid, and removed five thousand dollars, ten percent of the cash he kept there
At his desk, he packed the hundred-dollar bills into a padded Jiffy envelope and stapled it shut He typed a label to Father Leo Geary at Our Lady of the Desert, and affixed sufficient postage He would
He went into the family room and switched on the TV He tried several movies on cable, but none held his interest He watched the news for a while, but his mind wandered After he heated a ood book-which bored hiazines, but none of the articles was intriguing
Near twilight he went outside with another beer and sat on the patio The palrance rose fro the property wall Red, purple, and pink i light; and as the sun finished setting, they faded as if they were hundreds of sreat tossed cape of alh the scene was peaceful, he was restless Day by day, week by week, since he had saved the lives of Sahter Ely difficult to involve himself in the ordinary routines and pleasures of life He was unable to relax
kept thinking of all the good he could do, all the lives he could save, the destinies he could alter, if only the call would coain: "Life line"
Other endeavors see been the instruher power, he now found it difficult to settle for being anything less
After spending the day collecting what information she could find on James Madison Ironheart, with only a two-hour nap to coht of sleep she had lost, Holly launched her long-anticipated vacation with a flight to Orange County On arrival, she drove her rental car south frouna Hills Motor Inn, where she had reserved a una Hills was inland, and not a resort area But in Laguna Niguel, Laguna Niguel, and other coastal towns during the summer, rooms had been booked far in advance She didn’t intend to swim or sunbathe anyway
Ordinarily, she was as enthusiastic a pursuer of skin cancer as anyone, but this had beco vacation
By the time she arrived at the motel, she felt as if her eyes were full of sand When she carried her suitcase into her roo her doith five times the usual force
The roo to recreate the environment of Alaska, in case it was ever occupied by an Eski machines in the breezeway, she purchased a packet of peanut-butter-and-cheese crackers and a can of diet Dr Pepper, and satisfied her hunger while sitting in bed She was so tired that she felt nu her sense of taste
Sheit doith mule sweat
As if the contact of head and pillow tripped a switch, she fell instantly asleep
During the night, she began to dream It was an odd dreaes, just sounds and smells and tactile sensations, perhaps the way people dreamed when they had been blind since birth She was in a dank cool place that suely of lime At first she was not afraid, just confused, carefully feeling her way along the walls of the chaht mortar joints After a little exploration she realized there was actually just one wall, a single continuous sweep of stone, because the room was circular The only sounds were those sheon a slate roof overhead
In the dream, she moved away from the wall, across a solid wood floor, hands held out in front of her Although she encountered nothing, her curiosity suddenly began to turn to fear She stopped , stood perfectly still, certain that she had heard so sinister
A subtle sound Masked by the soft but insistent rattle of the rain It caht of a rat, fat and sleek, but the sound was too protracted and of too odd a character to have been made by a rat
More a creak than a squeak, but not the creak of a floorboard underfoot, either
It fadedcaainrhyth to the protest of an unoiled mechanism of so in that tenebrous rooht be, felt her heartbeat accelerate The creaking grew only slightly louder, but speeded up a lot; instead of one creak every five or six seconds, the sound came every three or four seconds, then every two or three, then once a second
Suddenly a strange rhythmic whoosh, whoosh, whoosh struck up, as if in syncopation with the creaking It was the sound of a wide flat object cutting the air