'Fuck!' She raised herself up on an elbow. 'Cut that out.'
The maid paid no attention to her. She went on vacuuming vigorously, moving back and forth across the carpet and around the bed as if Alison weren't there.
Alison pulled herself into a sitting position. 'Get the fuck out of here,' she screamed.
The maid reached onto the bed for a pillow and smacked it so hard a few delicate feathers escaped from the pillowcase and flew into the air. She took another and smacked that one, too. The vacuum cleaner ran on as she busied herself at the bed, plumping pillows as if no one were yelling at her to stop it.
A pillow hit Alison in the face as the maid tossed it down on the bed. Alison pushed it away, and the maid grabbed it from her. She couldn't see much without her contacts, certainly not a clear view of the features of her tormentor. But she did catch a glimpse of sparkling diamonds on the wrist of the woman's hand as she pelted her almost playfully with the pillows.
Alison couldn't figure out what .was happening. She made an effort to get up and force the devil out of her house but not very effectively. The vacuum was roaring, and the pillows became a shell game with her face lost in the middle. She had that wild, panicked feeling that none of this 'was real and she was hallucinating, making nightmares out of common events, as had happened several times before. Each foot felt like it weighed a thousand pounds and her hands were helpless to fight off her own covers. Then diamonds sparkled in front of her eyes one last time and she had an odd thought,
Twenty-seven
L
ynn wished Remy would show up at Starbucks.
She didn't want to go back to the Perkins house and have to deal with Alison. But her wish didn't come true. She had another latte and finished reading
Her first thought was to call Alison on her cell to make sure everything was all right upstairs. Her second thought was to run away, but she had nowhere to go. Her third thought was to go in and fix whatever was wrong. Fixing things had been her role all her life. She was a helper, programmed to clean up the messes the impaired people in her life always seemed to make. Pushing away a strong feeling of martyrdom at one more unfair burden, she went into the unguarded house.
The very instant she was inside, she knew she'd made a big mistake. The dogs were barking, locked up somewhere. Alison never locked the dogs up. Every instinct told Lynn to get out of the house and call for help. But whom could she call? Maddy was gone. Remy was no longer two blocks away.
She didn't think of Andrew. He never helped. She could think only of Jo Ellen, and Jo Ellen would not be her friend in a situation like this. There was no one to call, and the dogs were in a frenzy trying to get out.
With her heart pounding almost painfully, Lynn went into the front hall and called upstairs. 'Alison?' For once she would have given anything to hear the familiar angry voice shouting at her to shut up.
'Alison, are you okay?' No answer.
'Shit,' she muttered. The house just didn't feel right. She hoped Leah hadn't done anything loony. 'Shit,' she said again. She blew air out of her mouth and started climbing the stairs, making as much noise as possible. 'Alison, it's me.'
No answer. Lynn walked slowly down the hall to the master bedroom. The door was open, so why were the dogs locked up? She didn't like it, and then she stopped short when she saw Alison's distorted face. 'Oh, no.'
She didn't have to go in to know that her boss was dead. She started screaming and couldn't stop as she ran down two flights of stairs, out the kitchen door, and into the street. Her hands were shaking so badly that it was several minutes before she could hit the numbers 911 on her cell phone. By then a crowd had gathered.
Twenty-eight
One small thing April missed in Westchester was the wide-open sky and the view looking west to the Manhattan skyline from Mike's twenty-second-floor apartment in Forest Hills, Queens, where they used to live. On the rare occasions when they were around to see it, she and Mike used to watch the sun go down over the city. Both felt a deep connection to it.
The loss of city view in Hastings-on-Hudson, however, was more than compensated for by the mighty oak tree that stood guard outside their bedroom window. The tree brought them closer to nature than they'd ever been. Before she'd had the tree to watch, April had followed the weather only because of the impact it had on the city's infrastructure—the subways and trains, the streets and highways. And on crime. Rain, fog, snow, and hail were bad for traffic, but had the silver lining of keeping criminals indoors.
The tree, however, gave April a reason to pay attention to the seasons. It was an ever-changing art show. In winter, snow piled up on its bare branches, beautiful and white. The snow melted and froze again, forming long spiky icicles. In
spring the tree took the abuse of the rain that lashed it and the wind that whisked the new leaves' into dance. Every day the tree was a little different. Something was always going on, and it had a way of telling her when to get up.
The day after Maddy Wilson's murder April was deep in a dream when the birds started stirring in the tree. It was an old nightmare she didn't have much anymore. Her teeth were being extracted from her mouth by a great wad of caramel. It was a scary dream because her father had a story of torture long ago in China to account for the two solid gold teeth placed in the front of his mouth where no one could fail to see them. As the sun announced morning, she rolled into a fetal position to protect herself against his ancient injury.
Mike was already awake, nestling closer. 'Everything is okay. You're okay.' It was his job as a husband to say these things and her job as a wife to believe him. Today she had trouble.
From deep inside the dream, she heard the scraping of one branch against another. She heard the birds chatter, felt Mike's reassuring touch, and willed herself awake. She wanted to go on her honeymoon, and instantly she smelled something funny. 'What's going on?'
He made a small laugh and whispered, 'Your mother's cooking. Don't worry about it.'
Then his hands began to travel the curves of her body with the light touch that always aroused her. Mike had his own plan. His fingers skimmed her bottom and the hollow between her buttocks, then reversed direction. He nuzzled her neck, kissing her softly as he always did in the morning—their' one quiet time together. After a few moments, he began to explore more intimate places. April sighed. Today, she was torn between pleasure and duty. Should she get up and find out what her mother was up to? Should she call Sergeant Gelo and find out what last night's little foray into the Spirit world had accomplished? Should she forget them for just a little while? Outside, birds carried on in their different voices. A finch warbled; doves and morning called. She pulled away, listening.
'What?' Mike murmured. He was ready for love, nudging her with a fine erection.
She debated for all of two seconds and decided not to waste a good thing. 'Nothing,' she murmured.
Some time later, feeling sated and drowsy again, April suddenly realized much was wrong in her house. For one thing, the 'TV was blaring. World news in Chinese was trying to blast through the closed door of the bedroom. Furthermore, the house no longer smelled like vanilla candles and potpourri. The odor that emanated from downstairs was highly reminiscent of the Chinatown tenement apartment of her childhood. Mike was definitely right. Her mother had commandeered the kitchen.
April quickly ducked into the shower. When she came out, the first thing she saw was the black luggage and brightly colored summer clothes she'd bought for her cruise. It was Tuesday. Only three days of work left. The clothes were piled on a chair and hanging from a hook on the closet door. She put them out of her mind, dressed, and hurried downstairs with her hair still wet. There was no sign of her father, but Skinny was busy at the stove.
'Hi, Ma. How are you?' April wanted her mother gone, but she had to step carefully because she didn't want any dire repercussions from hurt feelings complicating her life right now.
'Didn't sleep at all,' Skinny replied. She turned around to peer at April through dime-store reading glasses she
