out of order.'
'No way,' I said.
'Then it's off the hook. You've overdeposited,' she said. 'I told you fifty cents. If you'll give me your full name and number, I'll see that it's credited to your account.'
I left the receiver dangling and sprinted to Alice.
There wasn't much traffic at that hour, but there was too much. More than thirty minutes had passed before I turned off Topanga Canyon onto Old Topanga, swearing at Alice for not being a Porsche. Her springs creaked on the curves, and I nearly burned out the clutch going uphill on Topanga Skyline. I jumped out at the bottom of the driveway, left the door open, and went up as quietly as I could.
All the lights were on.
I circled the house before I went in, but the windows were too high for me to see anything. They'd always been too high. Why should tonight be different? I grabbed a shovel and headed up the little corridor that led to the front door.
It had been kicked in. It sagged from its hinges dispiritedly like a shot sentry. It had been broken in two places, both above and below the latch.
My foot hit something as I went in. It was an empty bottle of red wine. I watched it roll reproachfully away from me before I lifted my eyes.
Devastation.
The coffee table was overturned. The throw rug was crumpled against the far wall. The couch was halfway into the middle of the room, as if someone had tried to take cover behind it. The door to the sun deck hung open. It creaked as a breeze stirred it.
Hefting the shovel in both hands, blade forward, I went into the bedroom. Nobody. Nobody in the bathroom, just a tap dripping water. I shut it off and went out onto the sun deck.
The lights of Topanga stretched below me, each light representing a little room where people sat together, safe from the night. To my right and far away, a coyote howled at the moon. I knew there was no one in the room beneath my feet, but I went outside and down the hill to check anyway. I was right.
Back in the living room, I sat down on the floor and tossed the shovel halfway across the room. It landed with a thump and a clatter. A flash of bright blue near the overturned table caught my attention, and I crawled over on my hands and knees to look.
It was Hansel. His head had been torn off. There was more blood on the floor than Hansel's body could possibly have held. I put an exploratory finger into the nearest pool. It was thick and tacky.
Something chirped, and I looked up. Gretel sat on top of a curtain rod, looking down at me. She cocked her head for a better look and then chirped again.
'Good for you,' I said thickly. I looked over at the birds' cage. It was battered and broken. The door was gone. Suddenly the hair on my arms stood straight up, my heart slammed against my throat, and I was bathed in sweat- and I realized that I was angrier than I'd ever been in my life.
The anger focused me. I got up and picked up the phone, putting the receiver back on the hook. The red light on the answering machine blinked at me steadily, and I hit the button for playback.
First I got Eleanor. For the first time since I'd known her, I fast-forwarded the machine past her message. Then I was listening to Nana and me. 'Tunut,' Nana said. I hit fast forward again and then pushed the play button.
'Nana,' a male voice whispered coarsely. 'Nana, pick up the phone. I know you're there, Nana.' Then nothing, just the hum of the line. Whoever it was had disconnected with a sharp click.
I waited. 'Wednesday, eight-oh-three p.m.,' the machine said tonelessly. The tape continued to roll.
Then the whisper was back. 'Nana,' it said, 'pick up the phone. Something has happened to Simeon. Pick up the phone.'
'Hello?' Nana's voice said. 'Hello? Who is this? What's happened? Is he all right?'
No answer. Just the wind howling through the phone lines again. 'Is he all right?' Nana said insistently. There was a click.
'Wednesday, eight-oh-five p.m.,' the machine said.
Then there was nothing. Nothing at all.
I sat there, feeling my blood pressure subside and listening to the silence. Crickets made cricket noises. The house creaked. There was one other sound, one I couldn't identify at first. A kind of whirring. The refrigerator? No, not the refrigerator.
It came from the computer.
I went over to it, stood over it. The screen was dark, but the machine was on. I touched a key. Screensave, Nana had called it. The message leapt into life before me on the screen.
IT'S ABOUT EIGHT, it said. SIMEON, SOMEONE CALLED HERE. SAID SOMETHING WAS WRONG WITH YOU. WHEN I ANSWERED HE HUNG UP. SIMEON, SOMEONE JUST CALLED AGAIN. IT'S A LITTLE AFTER EIGHT NOW. SIMEON, I'M SCARED.
There was a blank space on the screen, then some more words.
SOMEBODY'S HERE. I HEAR THEM OUTSIDE. I HEAR
That was the end of it.
I paced the length of the living room. The pool of blood caught my eye. Then I had an idea and went back to the computer. I pushed the key that said Page Down.
A single word appeared neatly centered in the middle of the screen. It was all in capital letters. It said:
TOBY
21
First I called the police and reported Toby's Maserati stolen. The license plate was easy, since the last time I'd seen it I'd been flat on my back and it had been two feet from my chin: TOBY 1.
I could think of only one place he might have taken her, but if I was wrong, they could still be on the road. They couldn't have been gone much more than forty minutes. Red Maseratis aren't that common, even in Los Angeles; some alert cop might get lucky and spot the car. And I might win the state lottery next month, too.
Then I ran back down the driveway, leaving the broken door sagging open behind me, to check out the only remotely likely guess I had.
I coaxed extra speed out of Alice down the winding roads of the canyon, keeping my mind blank and my breathing even. Halfway to the coast I got stuck behind a necking couple with more eyes for the moon and each other than for the road. I hit the horn twice and got an aggressive slowdown from the lovesick creep at the wheel, a display of automotive macho for the little lady. I waited for a right-hand curve, gunned Alice, and slammed into the driver's side of the creep's rear bumper. He fishtailed off to the right, and I passed him on a blind curve and left him stalled out most of the way onto the shoulder.
By the time I ran the red light on the PCH and headed north at seventy miles per hour, fourteen minutes had elapsed since I left the house.
Try as I might, I couldn't keep my mind from working. I was doing the only thing I could think to do, but there was a tickle in the back of my head that I couldn't ignore.
I knew Toby hadn't killed Saffron.
I had bet Nana's safety on the assumption that he hadn't killed, or at least intended to kill, Amber, that he wasn't a cold-blooded murderer. And, except for Nana, Toby was the only person involved who knew where I lived. Even Dixie only had my phone number.
And then, as Malibu Canyon receded behind me, that particular security blanket ripped right down the middle.
Saffron had known. She'd been there.
Whoever killed Saffron had played with her for a long time.
