puzzles on a bookshelf, a basket of toys in the corner, comfortable leather couches that were gloriously spill-proof. She studied the knickknacks scattered about: an old-fashioned clock that had to be wound daily, an ancient set of encyclopedias on a shelf near the recliner, a crystal vase on the table near the windowsill. On the walls hung framed black-and-white architectural photographs of decaying tobacco barns. They were quintessentially Southern, and she remembered seeing many of these rustic scenes on her journey through North Carolina.
There were also signs of the chaotic life Alex led: a red stain on the runner in front of the couch, gouges in the wood floor, dust on the baseboards. But as she surveyed the house, she couldn’t help smiling, because those things, too, seemed to reflect who Alex was. He was a widowed father, doing his best to raise two kids and keep a tidy, if imperfect, house. The house was a snapshot of his life, and she liked its easy, comfortable feel.
She turned out the lights and collapsed on the couch. She picked up the remote and surfed TV channels, trying to find something interesting but not too demanding. It was coming up on ten o’clock, she noted. An hour to go. She lay back on the couch and started watching a show on the Discovery Channel, something about volcanoes. She noticed a glare on the screen and stretched to turn off the lamp on the end table, darkening the room. She leaned back again. Better.
She watched for a few minutes, barely aware that every time she blinked, her eyes stayed closed a fraction longer. Her breath slowed and she began to melt into the cushions. Images began to float through her mind, disjointed at first, thoughts of the carnival rides, the view from the Ferris wheel. People standing in random clusters, young and old, teens and couples. Families. And somewhere in the distance, a man in a baseball hat and sunglasses, weaving among the crowd, moving with purpose before she lost sight of him again. Something she’d recognized: the walk, the jut of his jaw, the way he swung his arms.
She was drifting now, relaxing and remembering, the images beginning to blur, the sound of the television fading. The room growing darker, quieter. She drifted further, her mind flashing back again and again to the view from the Ferris wheel. And, of course, to the man she’d seen, a man who’d been moving like a hunter through the brush, in search of game.
40
Kevin stared up at the windows, nursing his half-empty bottle of vodka, his third of the night. No one gave him a second glance. He was standing on the dock at the rear of the house; he’d changed into a black long-sleeved shirt and dark jeans. Only his face was visible, but he stood in the shade of a cypress tree, hidden behind the trunk. Watching the windows. Watching the lights, watching for Erin.
Nothing happened for a long while. He drank, working on finishing the bottle. People came through the store every few minutes, often using their credit cards to buy gas at the pump. Busy, busy, even out here, in the middle of nowhere. He moved around to the side of the store, gazing up at the windows. He recognized the flickering blue glow of a television. The four of them, watching TV, acting like a happy family. Or maybe the kids were already in bed, tired from the carnival, tired from the bike ride. Maybe it was just Erin and the gray-haired man snuggling on the couch, kissing and touching each other while Meg Ryan or Julia Roberts fell in love on the screen.
Everything hurt and he was tired and his stomach kept churning. He could have walked up the stairs and kicked the door in, could have killed them half a dozen times already, and he wanted to get it over with, but there were people in the store. Cars in the lot. He’d pushed his own car forward with the engine off to a spot beneath a tree at the rear of the store, out of sight from passing cars. He wanted to aim the Glock and pull the trigger, wanted to watch them die, but he also wanted to lie down and go to sleep because he’d never been more tired in his life and when he woke up he wanted to find Erin beside him and think to himself that she had never left him.
Later, he