Come and Find Me A Novel of Suspense - By Hallie Ephron Page 0,15

made a kind of sense. Gamelan was a Balinese music ensemble of percussion instruments. Drums, gongs, xylophones, bells. The music sounded odd and discordant, like the way the three of them worked together.

Daniel was the one who’d suggested they celebrate the impending transition by climbing the Eiger. But only two of them had come back alive, and instead of a dissonant trio, Gamelan Security turned into a fractious duo. Numbed by loss, Diana had been reluctantly dragged along by a determined Jake.

The Klaxon alarm startled Diana back to the present. Her palms turned sweaty and the back of her neck felt like someone laid an ice pack across it. She wasn’t expecting a delivery, and besides it was too late for that.

She silenced the alarm. Couldn’t be Ashley—she was supposed to be meeting Aaron downtown. Had to be a false alarm, the calm voice in her head reasoned, but she could barely hear it over the alarm that kept right on screaming inside her head.

She checked the surveillance feeds. It was already dark out, and the lights around the house had automatically turned on. None of the cameras showed anything amiss. She toggled the sun icon to a moon, and the images changed to velvety black.

There! In the feed from the camera alongside the house, she saw a bright green mottled shape moving across the screen. It disappeared from view and was picked up in the security camera angled behind the house. It could have been a person on all fours. Low to the ground. But it would have to be a small adult or a child.

Diana watched as the shape meandered back to the side of the house. It was more likely a raccoon or a large dog with a longish tail. She wanted it to go away, and then finally it did, passing back through the electronic security perimeter and off the screens.

Diana pushed away from the monitors, feeling as if she’d been picked up and shaken. Even though she knew it was insane, she toured the house, checking that every window and door was latched.

She ended up in the kitchen. Rational analysis kept her bogeymen at bay, but just the unexpected jolt could stir up that still-potent residue of grief and trauma. She’d been on such an even keel that she’d gone a week without a single remote session with Dr. Lightfoot. She knew what her shrink’s advice would be: Try to stay in the present. And along with that: Remember, you can’t control what you can’t control.

Diana checked that the back door was secure. Recognized the acrid smell of burned coffee. She’d left an empty pot on the warmer. Again. She shut off the machine and turned on the exhaust fan.

She opened the refrigerator. She hadn’t eaten since breakfast. Her therapist had repeatedly warned her not to miss meals. Low blood sugar left her shaky and even more emotionally vulnerable.

She opened the package of American cheese Ashley had brought her and ate three slices. She was working on a Granny Smith apple when the phone rang. She lifted it off the wall. Ashley’s cell-phone number glowed on the readout.

She checked the time. A few minutes to six.

“Hey, hon, you at Copley yet?” she asked.

“Getting there. What are you up to?” Ashley said. Diana could hear the sounds of a city in the background. Traffic. A horn honking. Voices.

“I took a nice long walk on the beach.”

“Really?” Ashley said. Then laughed. “Sure you did. But you had . . . me going . . . for a minute there.” She huffed. It sounded as if she was walking.

“Sooooo?” Diana asked.

“So I dumped him . . . Aaron and me . . . we’re history.” There was the sound of a siren and laughter, not Ashley’s. “I did it.”

“Really? That’s so great. How do you feel?”

“Sore. Wet,” Ashley said.

“What?”

“I told him that I just wasn’t that into him. The relationship wasn’t going anywhere and I’d had it with his weirdnesses. So he just sits there, drawing circles on the bar with his swizzle stick. He goes, ‘You sure?’

“I’m like, yeah. Completely. You okay with that?

“And before I know it, he grabs the leg of my bar stool and yanks. And just like that, I’m sitting on the floor, my drink is all over me, and Mr. Wonderful is staring down at me. The place goes dead silent. Longest ten seconds of my life. Finally, a waiter comes running over. Aaron is still there, shell-shocked, like he can’t believe