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No. The killer was not going to get to her, the way he had to Marci and Luna. She couldn’t imagine how Luna could have let him into her apartment the way the police thought. Maybe he had already been inside, waiting for her. Sam said they hadn’t found any sign of forced entry, but maybe he could pick locks or something. Maybe he had somehow gotten his hands on a key. She didn’t know how he could have, but he had to have gotten in somehow.
If Galan was at work when she got home this afternoon, she thought, she wasn’t going inside the house alone. She would get a neighbor to walk through the house with her. And she had Trilby for added security; nothing got past the little dog. Cockers were very protective of their families. Sometimes her barking was a nuisance, but now T.J. was thankful she was so alert.
Leah Street looked up in surprise when T.J. entered the office. “I didn’t expect you today,” she said.
T.J. hid her own surprise. Leah’s clothing was never flattering, but she was at least neat. Today she looked as if she had grabbed something off the floor. She wore a skirt and blouse, but the skirt sagged on one side and the hem of her slip showed. T.J. hadn’t realized anyone still wore slips when they didn’t have to, especially in the late-summer heat. Leah’s blouse was wrinkled, and there was a stain on the front. Even her hair, which was usually so immaculate, looked as if she hadn’t combed it before coming to work.
Realizing Leah was watching her expectantly, T.J. pulled her mind back to what had been said.
“I thought working would help. You know, the routine of it.”
“Routine.” Leah nodded, as if the word was somehow profound.
Weird. But then, Leah had always been a couple of french fries short of a Happy Meal. Nothing drastic, just a little … off.
From what T.J. could tell, Leah was really off today, occupying her own little world. She hummed, she filed her nails, she answered a few calls. She sounded rational, at least, if not very effective. “I don’t know, I’ll get back to you,” seemed to be her phrase of the day.
A little after nine she disappeared, and came back ten minutes later with dirt stains on her blouse. Coming over to T.J., she leaned down and whispered, “I’m having a problem getting to some files. Will you help me move some boxes?”
What files? What boxes? Almost all their files were on computer. T.J. started to ask what she was talking about, but Leah gave a quick, embarrassed look around the office as if she was in some difficulty that had nothing to do with files, and didn’t want the others to know.
Why me? T.J. thought, but sighed and said, “Sure.”
She followed Leah to the elevator. “Where are these files?” she asked.
“Downstairs. In the Storage room.”
“I didn’t know anything was actually stored in ‘Storage,’” T.J. joked, but Leah didn’t seem to get it.
“Of course there is,” she said, sounding bewildered.
The elevator was empty, and they didn’t meet anyone in the first floor hallway, which wasn’t surprising considering the time of morning. Everyone was in his or her office, the computer nerds were probably having a spitball war, and it wasn’t time yet for the morning coffee break, when people started moving around more.
They went down the narrow, puke green hallway, and Leah opened the door marked “Storage,” stepping aside for T.J. to enter ahead of her. T.J. wrinkled her nose at the smell, dank and sour, as if no one had been in there for quite a while. It was also dark.
“Where’s the light switch?” she asked, not stepping inside.
Something hard hit her in the back, shoving her forward into the dark, smelly room. T.J. sprawled on the rough concrete floor, scraping skin off her hands and knees. Sudden horrified realization exploded in her mind, and she managed to roll to the side and scramble to her feet as a long metal pipe came whistling down.
She screamed, or she thought she did. She wasn’t certain, because her heartbeat was thunderous in her ears and she couldn’t hear anything else. She tried to grab the pipe, and wrestled briefly for possession of it. But Leah was strong, very strong, and with a hard shove knocked T.J. off her feet again.
T.J. heard that whistling noise again; then lights exploded in her head and she didn’t hear anything else.
twenty-eight
A door opened out in the hallway. Corin froze, listening to the heavy footsteps as they crossed the hall; then there was the sound of another door opening and closing. It was someone in maintenance, he realized. If the man had looked in this direction and seen the open door of the storage room, he would certainly have come to investigate.
Corin was agonized. Why hadn’t he thought of the possibility that one of the maintenance workers could be nearby? He should have; he hadn’t been careful enough, and Mother would be angry.
He looked at the woman lying on the dirty concrete floor, barely visible in the light coming through the open door of the storage room. Was she breathing? He couldn’t tell, and he was afraid to make any noise now.
He hadn’t done this right at all. He hadn’t planned well, and that frightened him, because when he didn’t do something perfectly, Mother was enraged. He had to please her, had to think of something he could do, some way he could make up for his mistakes.
The other one. The one with the smart mouth. He had made a mistake with her, too, but it wasn’t his fault she hadn’t been at home, was it? Would Mother understand?
No. Mother never accepted excuses.
He would have to go back and get it right.
