to stumble into the sawhorse barricade surrounding the next one. She flung herself to one side and narrowly avoided dropping through the woman-sized gap, though the sound of something clattering past the sawhorses and landing on the floor below told her how close she’d come to disaster.
Scrambling to her feet again, she ignored her bruised elbows and knees and barreled up the second flight of stairs. Now, her breath was coming in strangled gasps, while sweat born of fear trickled from her armpits and down her forehead. Swiping her tangled hair from her face, she ignored the missing handrails and spindles that under other circumstances would have slowed her progress as she struggled with acrophobia. The familiar fear of falling had nothing on her newfound fear of being caught by a murderer!
Once on the third floor, she bypassed the first room and ducked into the second, praying that she had guessed correctly. Rushing to the window, she saw directly below what she was looking for: the construction Dumpster. Jumping into it would be risky, potentially even deadly—sharp wood and rough plasterboard outweighed soft insulation—but it was a chance she had to take. Catching hold of the window frame, she struggled for a few precious seconds with the sash.
Painted shut, she realized in true panic when the window, despite her best efforts, refused to budge. She swung around, wildly looking for something to break the glass. She was running out of options, and, like poor Hamlet, chances were she wouldn’t be able to manage a second attack on Barry.
Barry!
He stood in the doorway now, blocking her only way out again and looking strangely unhurried as he watched her frantic struggle. The upper portion of one denim shirt sleeve was bloody, and his mouth turned down in a pained grimace, but otherwise he appeared unhampered by her previous attack. It was like smacking a grizzly on the nose, she realized with a return of her earlier hopelessness. She might have pissed him off, or even hurt him a little, but no way was that going to stop him.
Her heart beating so loudly she knew he must hear it, Darla looked again for something to break the windowpane, or failing that, something with which she could defend herself. But the room was empty of all but a few metal paint buckets and rolls of paper tape and duct tape.
Think of Curt . . . of Tera . . . of Hamlet.
But that first wave of adrenaline that had crashed through her veins had retreated just as quickly, leaving her sapped of energy. Try as she might, Darla could not summon back what had felt for those few moments like supernatural fury.
Barry must have seen the sudden despair in her expression, for he gave her a cold smile. “Looks like you made a little tactical error. What’s the expression, Darla . . . trapped like a rat? Or maybe a cat?”
She took an uncertain step back. Think! There had to be another clever trick she could try, even something as simple as . . .
The phone! Frantically, she reached into her coat pocket, searching for her cell. It would take an instant to dial 9-1-1, and surely she could shout her location into it before Barry tried to wrestle it away. But where was it?
“Looking for this?” he asked and held out the missing cell.
Belatedly, she recalled the clatter when she’d stumbled and nearly gone through the hole in the second floor. The sound she’d heard must have been her phone slipping out of her pocket and tumbling through the gap. Now, as she watched in dismay, he let the phone drop to the floor and deliberately crushed it beneath his heel.
“Don’t want to make that same mistake twice,” he said with a cold smile. He bent to scoop the shattered phone into one of the empty metal paint cans and then replaced the lid, pounding it tightly shut again with his fist.
“So, as you were saying, you were here, and then you left. And when someone asks what happened after that?” He trailed off on a mock-questioning note and shrugged. “Sorry, Darla, but it’s not like I’m your boyfriend. No one expects me to keep track of your whereabouts.
“And here’s something you probably don’t know,” he went on as she struggled not to break down into desperate sobs. “I overheard Tera telling Curt that her mother had bought a gun. Your detective friend must have figured that out for him to arrest her.