"Nothing, Kara. Nothing at all."
You love this room just the way it is—like a tomb. Why are you pretending to want to change it? Tell me!
"It's very simple, really. Your detective friend is suspicious of you. That's why he keeps asking questions about your past together. I'm doing this to allay those suspicions. Seeing me making changes in the house will put him more at ease, make him more willing to overlook any gaffes I make as I pretend to be you."
There is a lengthy pause. Then:
I don't trust you.
"I realize that. But it doesn't matter."
You don't tell her what you're really planning. Better to let her learn as it happens. The shock will drive it all more deeply home.
And it will happen soon. Very soon.
▼
With growing unease, Kara watched Rob set up the ladder next to the window. Maybe Gabor truly was trying to allay Rob's suspicions, but somehow that didn't ring true. She had a feeling he was up to something.
She had to admit, though, he was certainly acting like a devoted parent where Jill was concerned, whether for Rob's sake or to make up for locking her out of the cellar earlier, Kara couldn't say. But when Jill wanted to go downstairs, Gabor convinced her to stay, and even turned on the projection TV so she could watch Pee Wee's Playhouse.
"She's not going to see much on that screen once I let the light in," Rob said.
"We'll adjust," Kara's voice said. "I think opening this floor up to that southern exposure is worth the loss of a little daytime TV, don't you?"
"I guess so."
Rob locked down the spreader on the stepladder, checked its stability, then began to climb.
"Want me to steady it?"
"Nah. I'll be okay."
But to reach the center curtains, Rob had to climb to the very top and perch on the head step. The ladder wobbled under him,
"Maybe you'd better steady it after all," he said.
Her hands braced the side rails as Rob reached under the valance and unhooked the left curtain. When he let it drop, blinding sunlight poured in on an angle through the five-foot sheets of glass. He looked down at her.
"How's that?"
"Great. Now the other one."
As Rob worked on the right curtain, Kara noticed that her right hand had moved from the ladder's side rail to the front pocket of her jeans. It pulled out a key ring and began twirling the ring on its index finger.
What are you doing that for?
"I want to see if he notices."
He will notice!
"I hope so. Because I want him to know before he dies."
Sick terror engulfed Kara.
No! What are you going to do?
"Watch."
Rob dropped the second curtain. More sun poured in.
"There we go. Now, you said you wanted the drapes—"
His eyes widened as he looked down at her. Kara could see his eyes fixed on her hand and the twirling key ring.
"It's you!" he said in an awed whisper. "God damn it, it's you!"
Kara heard her voice shout "Yes!" and then her hands were pushing hard against the stepladder. Before Kara could even attempt to hold them back, the damage was done. With all Rob's weight at the top, the ladder toppled easily, vaulting him toward the huge panes of glass. With a terrified cry, he grabbed a pleat of one of the side drapes but it pulled free and he crashed into the top pane. It shattered with a bell-like clang, and then all the glass was coming apart, in shards large and small, in squares, triangles and daggers, catching and throwing flashes of sunlight as they spun and tumbled in all directions.
Kara heard Jill shriek in terror behind her. Rob's body twisted and contorted within the flying glass, one hand still clutching the side drape, the other grasping at empty air. He fell out of sight, pulling the drape after him. A silent scream ripped from Kara as she saw the fabric catch for a second on the edge of the window frame. She thought it might hold, then it too slipped from sight.
NO!!!
▼
You watch the detective fall to his death. It's a three-story drop. And if the fall in itself isn't enough, there's a patio below ringed with a wrought iron fence. The fence is directly below the window. It's not spiked, but it will break Detective Harris in two when he strikes it.
But now for the second part of the plan: the child.
You turn and see her horrified face as she runs up to where you stand. All you have to do is grab her arm and propel her the rest of the way through the shattered window, to follow her father down in death. She's at your side now. You reach for her arm—
There's movement at the window. It catches the corner of your eye. You look. It's a hand—bloody, but rising over the corner of the floor-level sill, grasping the side of the frame.
The detective didn't fall all the way!
He's alive! Kara cries. Thank God!
You rush forward and see that he somehow managed to grab hold of the cornice that runs along the back of the house at the level of each floor. And now he's climbing back in! He's got to be stopped! He's barely holding on by his fingertips.
"I'll remedy that!"
A quick slash or two at his hands with one of these glass daggers littering the floor should send him down to where he should already be.
Don't! Leave him alone!
You pick up a slim, sharp shard of glass. This should do it. As you shift it in your hand it slips. You grab for it with the other hand and feel a piercing pain in your palm—
—and suddenly the world is dark and your body is bloated and thick and small and your limbs are scrawny things that you can barely move. "NO!"
▼
Kara's knees suddenly went out from under her and she fell forward, nearly tumbling out the window herself. The pain in her palm was blinding. She turned her hand to look at the bloody glass dagger protruding from both sides. All the way through! Pain blazed anew, higher than before as she pulled it free.
And then Kara realized that she had turned her hand, she had removed the glass—not someone else.
"I'm free!" she screamed aloud. "Oh, God, I'm free!"
But how? Why? Her mind raced. Kelly had got free of him—and Kelly had a deep bite mark on her shoulder. Lazlo had got free of him—right after being knocked down by a car.
Rob had raised his head and shoulders above the sill. He glared at her with a mixture of fear and fury.
"Pain, Rob! Pain! That's the key! Pain cuts the contact, breaks his control!"
As he levered himself over the sill and onto the floor, Rob looked at her with confused eyes, full of mistrust.
"It's me, Rob! Really me! I'm free of him!"
God, it was wonderful to speak her own words, have control of her own limbs. But for how long?
She, picked up a piece of glass in her good right hand and stared at the left's bleeding palm. There might be a way to hold Gabor off. She clenched her teeth and drove the point of the glass into her injured hand. She screamed with the burst of renewed pain.
"Kara!" Rob shouted. He was inside the window now, staring at her with horrified eyes. "What the hell—?"
"It'll keep him away!" she said, gasping through her teeth. "God, it's got to!"
"Then it's true? Gabor is behind this whole thing?"
His eyes were wild, as if he still didn't believe any of this was really happening. But he'd mentioned Gabor. That meant he knew!
"Yes! Gabor—the monster!"
"Where is he?" he said.
Kara could hear Jill behind her, sobbing, scared half to death, calling her name.
"In the basement," Kara said. "Behind the paneling. Get down there, Rob. Kill him!" Those words sounded so alien, but she knew it was the only way. "Kill him before he comes back. Don't ever let him do this to me again! Please!"
She plunged the glass into her hand again.