"You okay, Bryn?"
"Yeah, I'm fine.Just tired."
"Umm...even I have to admit that Condor was a devil today. Oh, well, I'll let you get going."
"Barbara, wait! I know this sounds a little ridiculous, but could you get those pictures back?''
"Of Lee?"Barbara queried, puzzled.
"Yes."
"How could I do that? I told you I already turned them over to him. I haven't got a single proof or a negative. Why?"
"Oh, nothing.Never mind. I had just...ah...wanted to take another look at them."
"Well, I'm sorry."
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"Don't worry about it."
"Okay, see you tomorrow."
Bryn hung up, glad for once that work and the kids kept her so busy. She told the boys to do their homework while she heated up somechili and mentally thanked Clarence Birdseye for packaging a spinach concoction that all three would eat. She tried not to think about anything but pots and pans and the convenience of boil-in bags.
After dinner she switched on the Disney Channel, supplied the kids with crayons and coloring books and warned them to watch out for Adam. "I'll be in the darkroom, and don't barge in without knocking unless there's an emergency, okay? I have to develop a print."
They all nodded solemnly,then started bickering about the crayons before she unlocked the back door leading to the darkroom. She kept it locked because of the kids. To get in from the back she had to slink around the filing cabinet which almost completely blocked the door.
It took her a moment to squeeze her way in; it would probably have been easier to just go around and unlock the front door but she was accustomed to working in semidarkness, and she wasn't at all worried as she fumbled around to find the string to the overhead light.
No, she wasn't worried. She didn't have the slightest premonition or foreboding.
Which made it all the worse when she found the switch and filled the room with pale, artificial light.
For a moment she was stunned.Too stunned to assimilate all that she saw. And then the cold set in.A wave of icy fear that seemed to begin in the pit of her stomach and spread to paralyze her limbs.
A scream rose in her throat, yet as if in a dream, she found she couldn't release it. The constriction was horrible; she couldn't scream, couldn'tbreath ....
She could only stare at the total destruction within the small room.
Pictures... old pictures, meaningless pictures, new pictures... all joined together in a savage, silent pattern of horror. They were hung from the drying line and spread across the floor.Littered over her desk. All slashed to macabre ribbons.
And her desk! Each drawer had been ripped out, its contents scattered to the far corners. Gallon jugs of developer and chemicals had been emptied and dumped; the destruction was complete.
In a daze, Bryn started to move toward her desk, compelled by a piece of a photo.
She realized that the other pieces of the photo were beside it, purposely set apart in a slashed jigsaw.
She knew the picture, though she hadn't taken it herself. It was blurred and out of focus, but she had loved it. Barbara had taken it of her with the boys when they had shared a Sunday picnic right after Christmas....
But now the photo was clearly a threat. Adam had been cut out and laid separately aside, as had Brian and Keith.
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She was left as the center piece, smiling brilliantly. It had been a nice, laughter filled day. But now her smile mocked her. It seemed grotesque. Her cheap little nail-file letter opener had been slammed into it, angled from her mouth to her throat.
"Oh, God!"
Sound at last tore from her, but it wasn't a scream. It was a whisper. She grabbed the desk because she was going to fall. She couldn't hold on to the light; darkness was swamping her....
No joke, no joke, it wasn't a joke.
Something rose to salvage her consciousness right before the darkness could cover her. It was anger.
She had been scared half to death; her things had been ravaged. She had been violated on a very personal level....
"Son of..." she began softly, grating her teeth. She wasn't going to scream. She wasn't going to send the boys into a panic. She was going to think, calmly. And then decide what to do.
Just as she came to that determined decision, the phone began to ring. And ring...
Chapter 6
Bryn stumbled through the refuse as she hurried to wedge her way past the file cabinet and back into the house.
"Brian! Keith!" she yelled, grunting as she hurried. "Don't youdare! Do you hear me? Don't you dare answer thatphone! "
Raw emotion must have given an edge of authority to her voice; when she charged back into the house both boys were standing near the phone, but they were staring at her rather than touching it.
She swept past them and grabbed the receiver, practically shouting into it. "Hello?"