4th of July

Chapter 28

GET IN AND OUT in under five minutes. Absolutely no more than five.

The Watcher noted the exact time as he stepped out of his gray panel van onto Ocean Colony Road. He was dressed as a meter man this morning: dun-colored coveralls with a red-and-white patch over the right breast pocket. He pulled down the bill of his cap. Patted his pockets, feeling his folding knife in one, his camera in the other. Picked up his clipboard and a tube of caulk, tucked them under his arm.

His breathing quickened as he took the narrow footpath alongside the O’Malleys’ house. Then he stooped at one of the basement window wells, stretched latex gloves over his hands, and used a glass cutter and a suction cup to remove a twenty-four-by-twenty-inch pane of glass.

He froze, waiting out the yipping of a neighbor’s dog, then slipped feet first down into the basement.

He was in. Not a problem.

The basement stairs led up to an unlocked door to a kitchen filled with deluxe appliances and a ridiculous excess of gadgets. The Watcher noted the alarm code posted by the phone. Committed it to memory.

Thanks, Doc. You dummy.

He took out his small, excellent camera, preset to shoot in bursts of three consecutive shots, and pointed it around all sides of the room. Zzzt-zzzt-zzzt. Zzzt-zzzt-zzzt.

The Watcher bounded up the stairs and found a bedroom door wide open. He stood for a moment in the doorway, taking in all the girly things: the four-poster bed, ruffles in lavender blue and creamy pink. Posters of Creed and endangered wildlife.

Caitlin, Caitlin . . . what a sweet girl you are.

He pointed the camera at her vanity table, zzzt-zzzt-zzzt, capturing images of lipsticks and perfume bottles, the open box of tampons. He sniffed the girly scents, ran his thumb across her hairbrush, pocketed a long strand of red gold hair from the bristles.

Leaving the girl’s room, the Watcher entered the adjacent master bedroom. It was draped in rich colors, redolent with the smell of potpourri.

There was a supersize plasma screen TV at the foot of the bed. The Watcher pulled open the night table, rifled through it, and found a half dozen packets of photographs wrapped in rubber bands.

He undid one of the packets and fanned the photos out like a deck of cards. Then he returned the packet and closed the drawer. He took a slow pan around the room with his camera whirring.

That’s when he noticed the little glass eye, smaller than a shirt button, glittering from the closet door.

He felt a thrill of fear. Was he being taped?

He pulled open the closet door and found the video recorder on a shelf at the back wall. The on-off button was in the off position.

The machine wasn’t recording.

The Watcher’s fear lifted. He was elated now. He panned his camera, capturing each room on the second floor, every niche and surface, before heading down to his basement exit. He’d been inside for four minutes and a few seconds.

Now, outside the house, he ran a line of caulking along the window glass and pressed it back into place. The caulk would hold until he was ready to enter the house again—and torture and kill them.