It was like running into a brick wall.
Staggering backward, she flashed back to one of the main rules ofKrav Maga.
Use any object you can get your hands on.
She knew that the leather satchel was hanging by a strap from theman’s soldier. With a swift, deft move, she snatched it away from off his arm.When he lunged to take it back, she ducked down low and slung the strap betweenhis feet, then scrambled crablike around him. When he tried to take anothercouple of steps, his feet became entangled with the strap and he stumbledbadly.
Ann Marie gave him a sharp kick to the chest, and this time hetoppled backward. She briefly considered leaping on him and trying to pummelhim. But now that she had an idea of his size and strength, she didn’t dare.
Instead, she turned and ran again. But she realized she wasmoving away from the exit she had spotted, rather than toward it.
And now the familiar ugly voice rang through the hallway behindher.
“Really, now. All this violence isn’t necessary. Pan is quite putoff by it.”
Pan again, she thought, as she fled around yet anothercorner.
I’ve got to hide.
She glanced to her left and saw that she was standing next to aclassroom door. She grabbed the doorknob and turned it and yanked it. She washardly surprised that the door was locked. She hurried to the next classroomdoor and found it was locked as well. Then she rushed to a third door, expectingthe same results.
But this time the door came open.
She could hardly believe her luck.
At that very moment, she heard his voice behind her.
“I see you!”
She charged through the door and shut it behind her. Leaningagainst the inside of the door, she fumbled for a lock, but she didn’t findanything she could turn with her fingers. Her mind raced, trying to sort somekind of logic to offset her fear. She was pretty sure now that the man had comehere alone. So who the hell was Pan? His imaginary friend?
Something from her psychology classes dawned on her …
Yes. That’s exactly what Pan is.
She was dealing with a psychotic who experienced hallucinations.And like many psychotics, this one had serious delusions of self-importance—andpossibly supernatural power. He was even more dangerous than she had imagined.
I’ve got to keep him from coming in here, she thought.
She grabbed a chair and shoved the back of it under the doorknob,but before she could get it braced in place, the door flew open and the chairwent flying. Her pursuer came hurtling into the room with her.
Ann Marie turned to flee, but she was stunned to find herselfface to face with a grinning face … a human skull.
It took her a fraction of a second to realize where she was.
A science classroom.
The skull was part of a complete human skeleton that was hangingfrom a stand.
She grabbed the skeleton and slung it toward the man as shedashed around to the other side of a big lab table. Glancing back, she caught aglimpse of him colliding with the strange figure, looking almost comical as hewrestled with the rattling bundle of bones.
But she knew the skeleton wasn’t going to slow him down. Shegrabbed beakers and test tubes and hurled them at him wildly. He raised hishands to protect his eyes, and she made a rush toward the door, pushing a largedesk between her and her pursuer as she fled the way she’d come.
In an instant, Ann Marie was careening through the maze ofhallways again. She’d long since lost any sense of direction and had no ideawhere she was. As she turned down one hallway, she saw an open doorway at itsend. When she ran through it, she found herself on the stage of a schoolauditorium.
She felt relieved at the sight of the rows and rows of seatsextending beyond the stage. Perhaps she could disappear among them and stayhidden until he gave up searching for her.
Like that’s going to happen, she thought with a groan.
Then she heard his voice from behind her again.
“A stage-struck little girl, are we?”
She spun around and saw him standing in the doorway through whichshe’d just come. She knew it was no good trying to hide among the auditoriumseats now that he could see her. She whirled and saw another door, yanked itopen, and dashed into total darkness.
Ann Marie found herself suddenly tangled and tumbling in somesort of soft, chaotic mass of material. Before she could work herself free, alight snapped on, momentarily blinding her.
Then she saw that she was in the school’s theater storage room,full of costumes and props and even masks. She’d tumbled into a rack ofcostumes and was now struggling on the floor trying to pull herself loose fromthem.
The man was standing in the doorway now. He’d flicked on thelight switch, and he’d lifted his mask to reveal an insanely grinning, wild-eyedface that seemed scarcely more real than the mask itself.
He let out a laugh and said, “Pan has chosen the perfect spot.”
Ann Marie was too tangled to pull herself loose. And in a flash,the man was upon her, and he had looped a cord around her neck and she couldn’tbreathe.
As he ruthlessly tightened the cord, he spoke in a gleefulwhisper.
“Pan’s will be done.”
Ann Marie felt the whole world disappearing around her.
CHAPTER THIRTY SIX
It only took Riley Paige a moment to realize that her juniorpartner was in terrible danger—if she wasn’t dead already. With a yell of fury,she rushed up behind the crouching man and threw her arm around his neck,yanking him fiercely backward away from his intended victim.
As they staggered together, she realized that he was startlinglylarge and bulky and not as affected by her charge as she had expected. He wasregaining his balance and she was struggling with her own. Riley knew she had adesperate fight on her hands, and there was no time to properly assess thesituation.
A glance to the side told her that Ann Marie was still lyingmotionless in a pile of colorful costume clothing and