Page 32

The note she had seen on the pole was not a prank. It was not part of some stupid game. What it said was real: someone had been watching the people who read it and had chosen someone from among them.

They had chosen her.

Why? Why had they chosen her ? And how had they known who she was, and that she would be at the library? Had they followed her ever since she read it?

That thought broke the dam and a full-on panic came roiling through her. She bit it back, forced herself to take deep breath after deep breath. She had to think.

She wondered what they wanted. They couldn’t have been targeting her specifically because they couldn’t have known she would see the original note, which meant it was no more than bad luck that had put her in their path, but now – for whatever reason – it was her.

But why? She ran the words through her mind again.

For tomorrow we begin anew.

What was that supposed to mean?

She took a deep breath and laid out the options. Maybe it meant nothing. Maybe this was a prank. If so it was very elaborate, but it was possible that if the person behind this was trying to get a kick out of upsetting someone, then they could have taken it this far: watch to see who read the note, pick one of them, and find a way to get a second note to them.

She almost laughed at the naïvety of her optimism, of her desire to wish this away. It was possible someone would put a note like that on a lamppost, but not that they would follow it up with this.

Which left the other option: this meant something. There was a reason for it, a plan.

She didn’t know what it was, but one word stood out.

Tomorrow.

Whatever it was, this was moving quickly.

She did not think she would sleep that night, but she lay back down, and put her hand on Ryan’s hip, the warmth of his body a comfort. He shifted, turning to face her, and she put her head on his shoulder.

It was a long time coming, but eventually sleep enveloped her in a fragile peace.

Too Early on a Saturday Morning

Mary did not sleep for long.

A noise – she wasn’t sure what it was – woke her up. Was it a footstep, the creak of a stair, a stifled sneeze? She didn’t know, but something had entered her sleeping mind and set off whatever alarm bells existed in her subconscious and now she was awake.

Wide awake. Immediately and totally and on full alert, her heart racing, her breath shallow and quiet to allow her to listen all the better.

Nothing. Only the rhythm of Ryan’s breathing and the sound of an occasional car in the distance, but not a sound from the house.

She reached out and lifted her phone gently from the nightstand. It was just after four in the morning; she had slept for longer than she had thought. She unlocked it and opened the phone app. She tapped ‘911’, ready to hit dial the moment she heard a confirmatory noise. What if someone burst into the room? Even if they took her phone from her the call would register and the cops would be on their way – and in this small town they would be no more than minutes from the house. Not much happened at four a.m. on a Saturday morning.

No noise came. No one burst into the room, no stair creaked, no shadow moved in the glow cast by the landing light Otis had left on.

The house, she realized, was empty. Maybe the sound that had woken her was a passer-by or a falling branch or an animal. Or perhaps it was nothing – she was simply on edge and some imaginary sound had woken her and she had jumped onto full alert.

Well, there was no going back to sleep now. Through the gap in the curtains she could see the dawn rising, a pink blossom on the edge of the night. She got up and pulled on a T-shirt and a pair of running shorts.

Mary stuck to the roads. Even though there was little chance of anyone being on the forest trails that surrounded Barrow at this time in the morning, she preferred not to run into anyone who was, because there were precious few good reasons for them to be there.

As she ran, she went again through the sequence of events, the hush of the early morning allowing her to set her mind in order.

A note on a pole, designed to get people to read it. Someone watching, and then following up with a second note, designed to – what? Intimidate her? Why? It was so elaborate, so much effort merely to scare her. There had to be another reason. It came to her – to make her so worried something could be extorted from her?

If that was what it was then they would not stop at one victim. They would have as many as possible, which meant they would send follow-up notes to all the people who read the first one.

Like the woman who Mary had seen reading it just before her. She tried to picture her: mid-twenties, long, chestnut hair, green eyes. Not much to go on, but she would ask around. She would also ask if anyone else had seen the note on the pole, and if so, whether anything had come of it. Not much happened in Barrow without plenty of people knowing about it, so if this was happening, Mary would find out.