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of
Reggie's place."
    Holly lifted her brows. "Me, too."
    "Mom says he used to have one of these
parties every single year, before he moved away. She says they were
the best parties anywhere, when she was a kid."
    "My aunt Jen told me the same thing. That
spooky old house of his has to be the best place around for a
Halloween party."
    "Yeah." Bethany nodded hard. "Maybe I will
go. If you really think I'm not too old."
    "You're definitely not too old."
    Bethany smiled up at her. "Will you help me
figure out a costume?"
    "We will put together the best costume Dilmun
has ever seen." She clasped Bethany's hand, led her to the door,
and they walked out together.
    Halfway to the table, Bethany looked up with
her bright blue eyes and said, "Having you next door is like having
my very own older sister. I always wanted one, you know."
    Holly's smile froze in place as Bethany
turned and ran to join her mom at their corner booth.

 
FOUR
     
    HIM. IT'S HIM! What the hell is he doing
here? I know his face. He's the cop who found the bodies. His face
was splashed all over the papers. And now he's here. Jesus, sweet
Jesus, does he know? Is he onto me?
    Oh, God, he's talking to her of all
people!
    Okay, wait. I need to get a grip, here. He
may not know anything at all about me. About her, maybe, but that's
okay. That's okay, that won't tell him a fucking thing. It would
explain his coming out here. Talking to her. But that's all. Maybe
that's all.
    Son of a bitch found my place. Found my
sugarpie and her goddamn brother before I could put them to rest.
Of course, the boy wouldn't have gone beside her. He didn't belong.
He got in the way.
    Holly is a basket case. She's crazy. He'll
find that out soon enough. She won't be any help to him at all.
She's fucking crazy. Everyone knows it.
    But why is he here? Why is he lying about
what he's doing here?
    To protect the crazy bitch, maybe. Yeah.
Yeah, that could be it. He has to know I won't let her talk to
him. He figures if I know what he's really after, I'll have
to shut her up, just in case. But she may not know, either. If she
did, she 'd have run her mouth about it long before now, wouldn't
she? Fucking ungrateful little brats usually did if you let
them.
    Still, that nosy cop might not know a damn
thing. Not yet. Not yet.
    But what if he does?
    Hell, I've got to be sure.
    ***
    HOLLY DIDN'T GO straight home from work. She
started to. She walked along her usual route, back through the
strip, where the shops were mostly closed now, all the way down to
the leading edge of Lake-view Road. Her home, her safe, comfortable
haven, was five houses ahead on the right.
    So why did her eyes keep wandering along
Shoreline Drive's beach-hugging loop? Why was her body turning to
take that stretch of road, even though it meant turning right into
the brisk, chilly wind? And why on earth were her feet carrying her
amid the rustling leaves, along the gravel road that was all but
deserted at this time of the year?
    She didn't know. She did know that it was a
mistake. Disaster always followed when you took the long way home,
she'd learned. You just didn't veer from your routine. You stuck to
a plan, and in that way you could be in control.
    She wasn't in control right now. And that
scared her.
    The lake was dotted with dancing whitecaps,
and the wind nipped at her nose and cheeks, grazing them. The
closer she walked, sneakers crunching over gravel, the more intense
that wind became. Trees lined the left side of the road, their
limbs shedding any remaining leaves rapidly, their colors fading
like the color of an old man's eyes. Tall reeds, cattails, and muck
stretched for several yards along the roadside. As she passed those
waving, whispering rushes, the sky seemed to darken by degrees. It
was as if every breath of wind blew a little more of the daylight
away. It was completely unlike her not to go straight home. And she
hadn't gone through all those years of therapy not to know why that
was, but she refused to