Linwood Barclay - The Twenty-Three

I lay there for several minutes, catching my own breath, waiting to see if he’d take another.

He was dead.

I shifted over as close as my tethered arm would let me, patted him down, trying to find my phone. As best I could tell, it wasn’t on him. So I crawled back to my original position, laid out on the floor on my back, one arm stretched out above my head, still attached to the sink.

Someone would come, eventually. Or maybe, once I had some strength back, I’d yank that sink right off the goddamn wall.

I closed my eyes, listening to my own breaths and the pulsing of my heart in my temples.

Thought about Maureen. Thought about Trevor.

Thought about cake.

I want to thank Carol Fitzgerald, Amy Black, John Aitchison, Kristen Cochrane, Michele Alpern, Louisa Macpherson, Helen Heller, Kara Welsh, Danielle Perez, Paige Barclay, Bill Massey, Ashley Dunn, Juliet Ewers, Spencer Barclay, Brad Martin, Eva Kolcze, Loren Jaggers, Sam Eades, and Heather Connor.

And, as always, booksellers.

Linwood Barclay started his journalism career in 1977 at the Peterborough Examiner, moved on to a small Oakville paper in 1979, and then to the Toronto Star in 1981 where he was, successively, assistant city editor, news editor, chief copy editor and Life section editor. He is now a staff columnist for that section, writing three times a week. His previous books are FATHER KNOWS ZILCH, THIS HOUSE IS NUTS!, and MIKE HARRIS MADE ME EAT MY DOG. He lives in Burlington, Ontario, with his wife, Neetha.