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Mr. Reistad had raised his eyebrows at the sight of her daypack at her feet. “Bored, are you?”
Beth remembered wrinkling her nose. “Not bored enough to do homework. Most of it’s math, and I hate math.”
It ran like a movie in her head.
His smile was so open, not like most adults’. “Well, I can entertain you for a minute.”
“How?”
“Wait and see.”
He’d reached behind the reception counter and come back with a clipboard and plain white printer paper. Oh, and a pencil. “You have an interesting face,” he said. “I can always tell what your sister is thinking, but not you.”
He sat, studied her with his head tilted and began to draw.
The movie cut off, with the suddenness of a skipping CD, and jumped jaggedly to another scene.
“Oh, my God,” Beth whispered. While he drew, she’d gone back to being bored. That’s why she’d dismissed the scene from her memory. She thought he was doing some silly cartoon-like thing, as if she was a dumb little kid. She hadn’t paid any attention to what he was drawing, until…
She spun toward the counter, looking for her phone. Her hand shook as she picked it up. It took a minute to scroll to Tony’s last call, a week ago. There. Hearing the first ring, the second, she whispered, “Please, please answer. Please.”
“Beth?”
“I remembered. It was Reistad. He started to draw me because I was bored waiting for Mom, only she came back and was in a hurry, and he shrugged and said he’d do it another time. He balled the sheet of paper up and tossed it into the wastebasket. I went to get it, but Mom got mad and hustled me out.”
“Did you get a look at it?”
The knock on her back door made her jerk. “Oh! Emily’s here. Yes, at the end. I didn’t pay attention until then, but…it was really good. And I’m sure it was the same—” She reached to unlock.
“Don’t open the door until you’re sure it’s Emily,” he said urgently. “I’ll be there in about two minutes. Be cautious.”
“Yes, okay.” Beth dropped her phone on the table and sidled to the side, where she could look out the window. Emily’s puff of short blond hair couldn’t be mistaken.
Another hard rap. “Beth?”
She hurried to open the door.
“What took you so long?” Emily stepped inside.
Focused on Emily, it took Beth a second too long to see the blur of movement behind her.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
THE BLACK-MASKED FIGURE from her nightmares was suddenly there, rushing toward the doorway behind Emily.
A cry caught in Beth’s throat. Desperate to slam the door in his face, she lunged forward. Too late. His shoulder slammed into it, and he bowled into Emily. She went sprawling, and he leaped right over her, going for Beth.
It all happened so fast. She dodged to the side and swept the counter with a desperate gaze. No butcher block with knives. The sole thing within reach was a ceramic bowl filled with apples and bananas.
Behind him, Emily began to push herself up. No, no! Stay down! Beth didn’t know if she got the words out. He was already spinning toward Emily. Now Beth heard herself screaming like a banshee as she clutched the bowl in her good hand and swung it at him, hard. Fruit flew, and the bowl bounced off his back as his booted foot lashed out and smashed into Emily’s head. She dropped with a thud and lay still.
Rage seemed to sweep away Beth’s terror. She wanted to kill this man.
With a ceramic bowl?
I’ll be there in two minutes, Tony had promised. If she could hold out that long…
Watching the intruder, she backed away. Eyes glittered from the cut-outs in the mask. Until now, she hadn’t seen what he held in his gloved hand, and she wished she still hadn’t. Instead of a baseball bat, he’d brought a knife with a wicked blade and a black rubber hilt.
It was hard, so hard, to tear her eyes from that blade, but she had to be able to read his intentions.
Not looking away from her either, he used one foot to shove Emily’s limp body to the side so he could shoulder the door shut. Beth retreated as fast as she could going backward, while he took the time to flick the dead bolt closed. Out of the kitchen. Run. If she could make it to the front door… But he’d catch her, she knew he would, and if she turned her back—She shuddered involuntarily. No.
