and everyone knew her.”
“That may have been the plan, but when you think about it, she was alone and isolated out there at the Webb house. If someone did want to get rid of her, she sure as hell made it easy for him. I would have thought that if she was frightened, she would have wanted someone around her she could trust.”
“Unless,” Irene said, “she didn’t trust anyone she knew. Maybe that’s the real reason she got in touc ith me. I was someone from her past that she felt she could trust.”
“With what?” he asked simply.
“That’s what I need to find out.”
He said nothing, just tightened his grip on her.
“I can’t help but notice that you are no longer trying to argue me out of my conspiracy theory,” sh aid after a while.
“Unfortunately, it’s starting to make sense. Probably not a real good sign.”
“You think maybe we’re both ready for a nice long vacation in a padded room?” she asked.
“On the whole, I’d rather go to Hawaii.”
“Me, too.” She paused. “But first I need to talk to Hoyt Egan,” she said very softly.
“I’ve been thinking the same thing. Got a plan, if you’re interested.”
She looked at him. “Tell me.”
“The morning after the Old Man’s birthday party you and I could drive on into San Francisco an orner Egan. If we take him by surprise, we might get some answers out of him.”
“I like your plan.” She nodded once, decisively. “I like it a lot.”
He smiled a little and turned her in the circle of his arm so that he could see her face.
In the glow o he porch light her eyes were deep wells of shadows.
“I’m sorry that Tucker Mills scared you tonight,” he said.
“He didn’t mean to do it.”
“No, but that doesn’t change what happened. Are you okay?”
“I’m still a little shaky.” She gave a weak, forced laugh. “When I realized that the light was off in the bedroom, I just sort of froze for a few seconds. Talk about a deer in the headlights. When I coul ove, all I could think about was getting out of the house.”
“A real good strategy, under the circumstances.”
“I must have looked ridiculous.”
“No, you looked scared,” he said. “But you were moving, doing the smart thing. Not everyone can function under that kind of fear. Some people stay frozen.”
“I was terrified,” she whispered.
“I know.” He massaged the nape of her neck, trying to loosen some of the taut muscles he found there.
“I know.”
She closed her eyes after a moment. “That feels very, very good.”
He felt some of the tension seep out of her.
“Something I’ve been meaning to ask you,” he said after a moment.
“Mmm?”
“What’s with the lights? Why do you leave them on all night long?”
“I suppose you could call it my security system,” she said, eyes still closed.
“This may not be the best time to go into the subject, but there are better security measures you can take if you’re worried about intruders. A good alarm system, for instance. You saw for yourself tonight that having the cabin fully lit didn’t keep Mills from letting himself inside.”
Her lashes lifted. He looked into her haunted eyes and went cold to his bones.
“The lights were off in the house that night,” she said in a disturbingly steady, dispassionate tone. “I got home late. Long past curfew. I’d violated one of Dad’s strictest rules. I allowed Pamela to drive me over to Kirbyville. I didn’t want to face my folks any sooner than necessary. When I saw that the lights were off, I thought they’d gone to bed. I went around the back to use the kitchen door.”
He remembered what Maxine had told him. Hugh Stenson shot his wife to death in [_the kitchen of their home. Then he turned the gun on himself. _]
He gripped Irene’s shoulders. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have asked. You don’t have to talk about this. Not now. Not tonight.”
She did not appear to hear him. He realized that it was too late. She was in another zone.
“I thought I could sneak into my room, that if I was careful and didn’t make any noise or turn on any lights Mom and Dad wouldn’t hear me,” she said.
He had known it would be bad, he reminded himself. He also knew that there was nothing he could do but hold her while she talked. He tightened his grasp on her shoulders.
“I unlocked the back door, but when I tried to open it, I realized that there was something heav locking it. I pushed harder, forcing it open. There was a smell, a terrible stench like nothing I’d ever known. I thought maybe a wild animal had somehow gotten inside the house and ripped into th arbage. But that didn’t make sense. Mom and Dad would have heard the commotion.”
“Irene,” he said softly. “I’m here.”
“I couldn’t see anything,” she continued in the same flat, frighteningly uninflected voice. “It wa o dark.”
“I know.”
“I found the light switch on the wall beside the door. Turned it on.” She sucked in a shuddering breath. “And then I could see.”
“Irene, hush. That’s enough.” He cradled her close, rocking her gently. “You don’t have to say an ore. For God’s sake, forgive me. I understand about the lights now.”
“It was as if I went into another dimension,” she said against the front of his shirt. “I could not dea ith being there alone with them, so I went someplace else for a while.”
“I know,” he stroked her hair. “I’ve been in that other place, myself.”
“Jason implied you were in combat.”
“Like I said, another place.”
“You’ve seen how they look, haven’t you?”
He knew what she meant. “Yes.”
“People you know. People you care about. You’ve seen what they look like . . .
afterward. You know how it is. And you wonder why them and not you.”
“The world is different after that,” he said. “Things are never, ever the same again.
People who haven’t been to that other place can never really understand how hard it is for the travelers who return, travelers like us, to pretend that nothing has changed.”
She put her arms around him, hugging him fiercely.