Smoke and Mirrors

114

Styer put a knee in Cynthia’s back and taped her mouth shut. Then he removed the explosives belt she had been wearing and laid it aside. “Remember the bomb downstairs, Cynthia,” he whispered tenderly as he secured her hands and lashed her ankles with tape.

He surveyed the blood rapidly pooling under Alexa’s head and listened for any sounds of people coming to investigate the noise made by bodies hitting the floor. After a few seconds, with only the sound of the grandfather clock ticking, he heard something in the back of the house-a motor perhaps. Moving slowly down the hall he went into the kitchen, which was filled with the smell of coffee. On the table he spotted a copy of a tabloid lying open, a cup of coffee beside it. It was still hot and freshly poured.

He moved to the closed door of the utility room and realized the sound was a clothes dryer running. Someone was doing the laundry. He heard the lid of a washing machine close, the unmistakable sound of the dial being twisted and pulled, and the water running into the tub.

Crossing the hall, Styer moved back into the kitchen and sat down at the table to wait, placing the gun in his lap.

The door opened and the maid came out and turned into the kitchen, her arms holding a basket filled with folded towels. When she saw Styer, she smiled, glad to see him. Most of the locals knew the physician. “You pour you some coffee, Doc, and let me go fold these towels up. Been a busy and tragic time around here lately. I’m way behind. I didn’t know you was coming out. Take your hat and that wet coat off and stay awhile.”

“I’ll be here just a little while,” he said.

The maid’s expression changed slowly, and she tilted her head. He knew he had been pressed to make a quick study of this subject. His disguise depended on people not knowing the man more than superficially or getting a good look, and it hadn’t fooled that chief deputy either. The woman’s eyes narrowed slightly and Styer saw that despite the wide-brimmed hat pulled low, the accent and pitch of the voice, and the resemblance, she knew.

When the gun came up, she just stood wide-eyed-the proverbial deer frozen in the headlights.

“If you want to live,” he said in his own voice, “tell me where the boy is.”

“Gone,” she said, turning her eyes to the counter, where the block held a selection of knives. He knew she was trying to decide if she could get to them before he could shoot her.

“I don’t want to hurt him,” he said. “Word of honor.”

The big woman hurled the basket at him. For her size, she was amazingly agile, but of course she couldn’t out run a bullet.