Her muscles tensed as she cycled through the possibilities, each more grisly than the last.
Another footstep.
Like a hunted rabbit. she kept absolutely still, hoping he would leave. She held her breath and strained her ears for another sound. Had he meant to finish her off with the hypodermic, and was only now coming to see if she was dead? Stern might be desperate, but he wasn’t stupid. And letting her go was the one thing he couldn’t do. She’d head straight for the police. Even if they couldn’t get Stern for killing his wife, they could certainly charge him with kidnapping and grievous bodily harm.
A door scraped open. A shadow appeared in the gloom.
When a dim bulb snapped on, she was momentarily blinded. She squinted and prepared to defend herself.
As the shadow detached itself from the doorway, her throat closed up. But with nothing to lose, she canted her body backwards and got ready to kick.
But it couldn’t be Stern. She blinked. The body was too bulky, the shaggy head familiar. Tim. His eyes were wide in the dim light, with a look of terror stamped on his face.
She tried to speak, but the gag in her mouth prevented her from making any intelligible sounds. She waited for him to make a move, but he remained stock-still, a tree rooted to the floor. As she shuffled her feet and tried to stand, he looked back over his shoulder in alarm. The seconds ticked by.
He moved closer and crouched down. ‘What are you doing here?’ The barest whisper, like exhaled breath.
She twisted round to show him her hands were tied, and waited for him to undo the knots.
An agonising minute passed before he edged towards her with a sideways motion, dragging his heels, crablike, across the rough floor. His hand trembled as he reached out to touch her hair, freed from its customary knot, before pulling away fast, as if stung. With clumsy fingers, he struggled to get at the gag’s knot on the back of her neck. Blood pounded in her ears. Tim’s breath grazed her cheek as he wrestled with the knotted cloth.
Unbearably slow, he loosened the gag at last. She coughed and sucked in a lungful of air. In another part of the cellar, a water heater clicked on, and her momentary elation plummeted. Nothing had changed. She was still trapped.
‘Thank you.’ She coughed again and sought his eyes, but he turned his head away. ‘And my hands?’
Fear darted across his face. He looked at her, then looked away. Something was different, but what? Then, with a shock, it came to her. The dullness was gone, and his usually passive expression was no longer flat. He must be off his meds again. Was that a good thing, or bad? Whatever it meant, he was clearly terrified, transformed from a large man doped up on meds, into a small boy afraid of his father. Untying her might be asking too much. With her hands free, he couldn’t be sure what she might do. But at least she could scream, and with the use of her legs, she could run.
‘Timothy, do you know what time it is?’ Frightened as she was, she remembered to use the name he preferred.
He held his wrist close to his face to look at his watch, the same chunky black model he’d had at Greenlake.
‘It’s exactly…’ He held up a finger and counted under his breath. ‘2.36.’
‘In the afternoon?’
‘No.’ A puzzled frown. ‘It’s dark out.’
The middle of the night then. Stern would be asleep. ‘What day is it?’
He consulted the watch again. ‘SAT. Saturday.’
So she’d been out for more than six hours. Her throat was parched, and her head ached. ‘How did you know I was down here?’
‘I saw your car from the window. I heard you talking to my father.’
‘Why didn’t you come downstairs?’
‘The bedroom door was locked.’ He tilted his head as if listening for movement. ‘The rule is,’ Tim said, ‘I go to my room if anyone comes to the house. My father locks the door, so no one will take me away.’ He rubbed his eyes with his fists. ‘I saw him drive your car away. Before he fell asleep, he brought me something to eat and forgot to lock the door. So, I came down here to look for you.’ He looked frightened. ‘This is where he sends me when I’m bad. So I try to be good,’ he said, peering at the damp walls and the ceiling draped with cobwebs. ‘I don’t like it here.’
In a few hours it would be daylight. What if Stern woke and discovered Tim’s room was empty? Her mind raced through the possible options. She needed to get out of the house without alerting him. But with no transportation, she wouldn’t get far. If she knew where Stern kept his keys, she could drive his car into town and alert the police. But she’d have to do all that without waking him.
‘Timothy, listen to me.’ She scooted along the floor to close the distance between them. ‘I need your help.’ She tried and failed to catch his eye. ‘But we have to be very quiet.’ She dropped her voice to a whisper. ‘Could you untie my hands now?’
He chewed the skin on his thumb. ‘You won’t
