First Thrills - Lee Child [30]
Maty glanced at the clock and continued to lay still. Ten minutes. Fifteen minutes. It felt like a week. Twenty minutes. No footsteps. The thumping of her heart quieted. The banging in her head grew. Too much wine. Too much stress. And she’d forgotten to take her medication last night. Was that all it was?
She watched the darkness turn to dawn. The night shadows started to fade and disappear from the bedroom walls. When Maty finally convinced herself that her imagination had gotten the best of her, she eased out of bed. Still, she monitored her movement, stopping and waiting, listening. After a few minutes of tiptoeing she felt ridiculous.
She stopped at the bathroom then marched into the kitchenette. She’d brought the staples for breakfast, had loaded the small refrigerator. Even without electricity everything was still cold. Her backpack sat on the counter where she’d left it. She poured herself a glass of orange juice and turned to go out onto the porch. That’s when she saw the shadow of a man was standing by the door.
Maty gasped and dropped the orange juice, glass shattering.
“You forgot to take your pills last night,” William said, walking into the middle of the room where she could see his face.
“You scared the hell out of me. What are you doing here?”
“I reminded you.”
It was like he hadn’t heard her. He looked tired. His clothes were wrinkled and damp. His shoes muddy.
“How long have you been here? How did you get in?”
“You drank a whole bottle of wine.” he held up the empty bottle she had left on the porch. “But you forgot to take your pills.”
“William, what are you doing here?”
“I’m not really here,” he said this with a grin. “I’m checked in at a conference in Kansas City. I did that yesterday morning. Everyone thinks I’m in my hotel room, behind the do-not-disturb sign, preparing my presentation. My car’s in the hotel’s parking lot. I rented one to come back.”
“But I don’t understand. Why are you here?”
“Because I had a feeling you wouldn’t take your fucking pills.”
“William?”
“I changed them out, you see. A nice little concoction that wouldn’t go so well with alcohol. Actually it probably wouldn’t go so well with anything, but the alcohol would just be another indication of you going over the edge.”
He tossed the bottle aside and that’s when Maty noticed he was wearing gloves. And in his other hand he carried a knife, a wide-bladed hunting knife that he held down at his side as if he didn’t even realize he had it there.
Panic forced Maty to step backward, slowly away from him until the small of her back pressed into the countertop. Trapped. There was nowhere for her to go.
“I don’t understand,” she found herself saying out loud. It only seemed to make William grin more.
“Of course you don’t. You’ve been so self-involved in your own stressed-out madness that you haven’t noticed anything or anyone around you. Where’s your pill bottle?”
“But if you haven’t been happy—.”
“Where the hell are your pills, Madeline?”
In two steps he grabbed her by the hair and shoved the knife to her throat. His breath hot in her face, his eyes wide. He smelled of sweat and mud. He looked like a madman.
“It was you. Last night in the woods,” she whispered and felt the metal press against each word. “Why?”
This time he laughed.
“I had to make sure you took them, that it looked like you’d gone over the edge. Everyone was supposed to be gone, but that boy ranger was still here. He saw me.”
“Oh my God. William. What did you do?”
“The son-of-a-bitch would have ruined it all. Then after the storm when I came inside and found you still breathing . . .” He dragged out the last word like it disgusted him.
“You’re the one who took the key from the park office door.”
“I knew you’d stop at work. It gave me plenty of time to get here.”
“You called me from here. The train whistle . . .”
“Make it easier on both of us, Maty. Where are your pills?”
He yanked her head against the