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traffic laws getting here, I’d be obliged.”
    “Ten minutes.” He hung up. “Thea.” He caught her before she could complete the first call. “Let’s move.”

Chapter 3
    She had herself under control by the time they got to her. Above all, she felt foolish to have run to the police—to him—because of a phone call.
    Only phone calls, Cilla assured herself as she paced to the window and back. After a week of them she should have a better handle on it. If she could tone down her reaction, convince the caller that what he said and how he said it left her unaffected, they would stop.
    Her father had taught her that that was the way to handle bullies. Then again, her mother’s solution had been a right jab straight to the jaw. While Cilla saw value in both viewpoints, she thought the passive approach was more workable under the circumstances.
    She’d done a lousy job of it with the last call, she admitted. Sometime during his tirade she’d come uncomfortably close to hysteria, shouting back, pleading, meeting threats with threats. She could only be grateful that Deborah hadn’t been home to hear it.
    Struggling for calm, she perched on the arm of a chair, her body ruler-straight, her mind scrambling. After the call she had turned off the radio, locked the doors, pulled the drapes. Now, in the glow of the lamplight, she sat listening for a sound, any sound, while she scanned the room. The walls she and Deborah had painted, the furniture they had picked out, argued about. Familiar things, Cilla thought. Calming things.
    After only six months there was already a scattering of knickknacks, something they hadn’t allowed themselves before. But this time the house wasn’t rented, the furniture wasn’t leased. It was theirs.
    Perhaps that was why, though they’d never discussed it, they had begun to fill it with little things, useless things. The china cat who curled in a permanent nap on the cluttered bookshelf. The foolishly expensive glossy white bowl with hibiscus blossoms painted on the rim. The dapper frog in black tie and tails.
    They were making a home, Cilla realized. For the first time since they had found themselves alone, they were making a home. She wouldn’t let some vicious, faceless voice over the phone spoil that.
    What was she going to do? Because she was alone, she allowed herself a moment of despair and dropped her head into her hands. Should she fight back? But how could she fight someone she couldn’t see and didn’t understand? Should she pretend indifference? But how long could she keep up that kind of pretense, especially if he continued to invade her private hours, as well as her public ones?
    And what would happen when he finally wearied of talk and came to her in person?
    The brisk knock on the door had her jolting, had her pressing a hand between her breasts to hold in her suddenly frantic heart.
    I’m your executioner. I’m going to make you suffer. I’m going to make you pay.
    “Cilla. It’s Boyd. Open the door.”
    She needed a moment more, needed to cover her face with her hands and breathe deep. Steadier now, she crossed to the door and opened it.
    “Hi. You made good time.” She nodded to Althea. “Detective Grayson.” Cilla gestured them inside,then leaned her back against the closed door. “I feel stupid for calling you all the way out here.”
    “Just part of the job,” Althea told her. The woman was held together by very thin wires, she decided. A few of them had already snapped. “Would you mind if we all sat down?”
    “No. I’m sorry.” Cilla dragged a hand through her hair. She wasn’t putting on a very good show, she thought. And she prided herself on putting on a good show. “I could, ah, make some coffee.”
    “Don’t worry about it.” He sat on an oatmeal-colored couch and leaned back against sapphire blue pillows. “Tell us what happened.”
    “I wrote it down.” The underlying nerves showed in her movements as she walked to the phone to pick up