A Clean Kill

Twenty-seven

L

ynn wished Remy would show up at Starbucks.

She didn't want to go back to the Perkins house and have to deal with Alison. But her wish didn't come true. She had another latte and finished reading Us. Then she returned to the house as usual. When she ducked under the stairs, she saw that the kitchen door wasn't shut all the way. She knew she hadn't left it open.

Her first thought was to call Alison on her cell to make sure everything was all right upstairs. Her second thought was to run away, but she had nowhere to go. Her third thought was to go in and fix whatever was wrong. Fixing things had been her role all her life. She was a helper, programmed to clean up the messes the impaired people in her life always seemed to make. Pushing away a strong feeling of martyrdom at one more unfair burden, she went into the unguarded house.

The very instant she was inside, she knew she'd made a big mistake. The dogs were barking, locked up somewhere. Alison never locked the dogs up. Every instinct told Lynn to get out of the house and call for help. But whom could she call? Maddy was gone. Remy was no longer two blocks away.

She didn't think of Andrew. He never helped. She could think only of Jo Ellen, and Jo Ellen would not be her friend in a situation like this. There was no one to call, and the dogs were in a frenzy trying to get out.

With her heart pounding almost painfully, Lynn went into the front hall and called upstairs. "Alison?" For once she would have given anything to hear the familiar angry voice shouting at her to shut up.

"Alison, are you okay?" No answer.

"Shit," she muttered. The house just didn't feel right. She hoped Leah hadn't done anything loony. "Shit," she said again. She blew air out of her mouth and started climbing the stairs, making as much noise as possible. "Alison, it's me."

No answer. Lynn walked slowly down the hall to the master bedroom. The door was open, so why were the dogs locked up? She didn't like it, and then she stopped short when she saw Alison's distorted face. "Oh, no."

She didn't have to go in to know that her boss was dead. She started screaming and couldn't stop as she ran down two flights of stairs, out the kitchen door, and into the street. Her hands were shaking so badly that it was several minutes before she could hit the numbers 911 on her cell phone. By then a crowd had gathered.