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Her heart went into overdrive.
Who was it?
Why were they inside?
For no good reason.
Did they have a weapon?
Her phone! She needed her phone . . . anxiously, silently praying, Nikki patted the pockets of her robe as if by some chance it could be there while through the mist of the bathroom her gaze scraped the counter, but of course, it wasn’t there. Nope. She’d left it on the charger downstairs.
Crap!
A kaleidoscope of jagged images spun through her mind, of all the times she had been at a killer’s mercy, the sheer terror of fighting for her life. Her fingers clenched in the terry cloth. For a second she remained frozen and dripping onto the bathroom tiles.
Then the adrenaline kicked in.
Pull it together, Gillette!
Cinching her robe tight, she crept to the door, reached for the doorknob and twisted, realizing she hadn’t locked it. She stepped into her bedroom, crossed the hardwood on bare, damp feet.
The footsteps were fleeing, sounding farther away as whoever it was raced down the steps in frantic, rapid succession. The dog hadn’t given up. Mikado was barking out of control, his toenails, too, clicking frantically against the steps.
“Who’s there?” Nikki demanded, slipping through the bedroom to crack the door to check the near-dark hallway.
Nothing.
Her eyes adjusted to the darkness, her ears strained as she heard the scuffling downstairs.
She steeled herself. Tried to think.
Her phone was downstairs.
But Reed’s gun was locked in a safe in the bedroom closet.
Only steps away!
It would just take a few seconds to retrieve it as whoever was in the house could be armed. Heart thudding, she turned toward the closet.
“Yeowww!” A pained scream echoed through the house, and then the intruder snarled in a harsh whisper. “You bit me? You fuckin’ bit me?”
More growling and barking.
“Back the fuck off! Shit! Let go of me! I’ll kill you, you goddamned mutt!” a gravelly whispered voice warned.
“No!” Nikki screamed, dashing into the hall.
Too late!
Thud!
Mikado let out an anguished howl.
“Mikado!” she cried, her heart wrenching. No, no, no!
She heard the back door open.
Nikki flew down the stairs as the door slammed.
