The Babysitter Murders - By Janet Ruth Young Page 0,43
comes through the plate glass, getting caught in the curtain. The car’s horn blares like someone’s leaning on it, as intrusive and unstoppable a noise as the twenty-two rings, as driver takes off in a spray of gravel.
The object lies on the carpet surrounded by shards of glass as large as Dani’s hand. It’s a stone the size of a baseball, wrapped in a piece of paper secured by rubber bands. Dani snaps off the bands, unfolds the paper, and reads
die, kiddie killer.
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Dani dials Shelley’s number.
“It was you!” Shelley says. “You’re the babysitter. I can’t believe it, Dani.”
“Are you home? Can I come over now?” Dani asks. “Can I stay at your house for a few days?”
“Are you kidding? My mom would never have you in the house. How could you treat Alex that way?”
“I never did anything. I only thought about doing it. That’s what I needed to tell you that day. That was my secret. I had a secret, just like you have a secret.”
“My secret is nothing like your secret, Dani.”
Dani hears the dial tone.
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Dani stuffs things into her pack. Her hands shake so much that they slow her down. She calls her mother and the voice mail message comes on, soothing, cajoling, and full of confidence. “You’ve reached Beth Solomon of Solomon and Cahill Properties . . .”
“Mom, I have to go!” she yells. “They’re after me.”
She runs the same way she sent Gordon, out the back door, past the fountain, and into the woods.
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Sunday, May 16
MONSTER
says the headline in the National Envestigator News Online.
Below that word is a photo of Dani from the Hawthorne Beacon-Times sports page, cropped to show only her head and shoulders.
She has hit the ball out of bounds and has a disgusted expression.
Blown up to six inches, the picture looks angry and deranged.
Like the face of a monster.
P A R T 4
T H E
W O O D S
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Protect Our Kids
Chat room
Sheepdogg: Problem solved, Rowdie. Dani Death is gone. Since yesterday.
Rowdie: Where is she now?
Sheepdogg: Don’t know just yet, but we’ve got her on the run. I’ll sniff around.
Maybe once we flushed her out she got whacked by an irate parent.
Rowdie: Too bad the cops don’t have the cojones to handle that girl. Cops aren’t good for much other than speeding tickets.
Sheepdogg: Not their fault. They wanted to lock her up but their hands were tied. Anyway, I heard that when BetSo got home from selling McMan-sions her lil darlin was gone.
Rowdie: That’s right. She escaped Hawthorne and is off to some other town to chop babies into Tater Tots!
Sheepdogg: What do we do now, assuming she remains at large?
Rowdie: POK will list her in its offender registry and T H E B A B Y S I T T E R M U R D E R S
post her picture in all the surrounding towns. We’ll get the word out to POK Massachusetts and POK
New Hampshire. And we’ll keep working our media contacts. Somebody will find her.
Sheepdogg: Bell rang. Gotta go. Check in later.
Rowdie: Good dog!
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Dear Alex,
It’s hard for me to write this. You must be confused, since one minute I was there and the next I was gone. I don’t know what you’ve been told about me or by whom, but I want you to know that I never really wanted to hurt you.
Just the opposite—I wanted to keep you safe.
I shouldn’t tell you any of this since I think little kids should be protected from bad things. Remember how I wanted the TV off when something scary came on? I wanted to protect you. Anyway, by now you probably know that there’s something wrong with me and that’s why I had to leave.
I got the idea of writing this because I saw some berries growing and wondered how Louie was doing. You take such good care of him. Someday you’ll take care of someone the same way I wanted to take care of you.
Now I wonder why I’m even writing this. You can’t read some of these words. And who would read them to you?
T H E B A B Y S I T T E R M U R D E R S
Not your mom, I’m sure. Anyway, I’ll just say I’m thinking of you. No one will ever see this, but here is my thought of you, written down on paper and buried under a maple tree.
Love always,
Dani
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“Is that Big Red?” the elderly woman asks. Her husband
is reading the paper. The front-page photo looks like the tall